How to set up database.yml - ruby-on-rails

Question

I am trying to set up ruby on rails to develop locally on a 64 bit windows 7 machine using SQL server 2005. We have an existing database and it does not conform to the ruby way so I created a table to test conectivity.
Unable to find information on properly configuring the database.yml file I suspect my problem is there. I have both 32-bit and 64-bit DSNs defined. When I run the console I get "Table doesn't exist"
Here's my database.yml. I don't know
default: &default
host: 111.222.333.444
adapter: sqlserver
mode: odbc
dsn: DSN_Name
database: ERP
username: sa
password: ********
development:
<<: *default
host: 111.222.333.444
adapter: sqlserver
mode: odbc
dsn: DSN_Name
database: ERP
username: sa
password: ********
# Warning: The database defined as "test" will be erased and
# re-generated from your development database when you run "rake".
# Do not set this db to the same as development or production.
test:
<<: *default
database: db/test.sqlite3
production:
<<: *default
database: db/production.sqlite3
Does anyone know how the default works? I can't find any information on it. Specifically "<<: *default"
I updated my database.yml file. Created a table for testing; used the plural and ID for the primary key:
CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Cars](
[ID] [int] NULL,
[Name] [nchar](10) COLLATE SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS NULL
) ON [PRIMARY]
Created a model
class Car < ActiveRecord::Base
end
But I get "Table doesn't exist" after connecting to Car and entering 'Car'. Anyone have any idea what the next step would be to debug this?

Answer 1

The &default in the line default: &default, means make the key/value pairs under this YAML namespace available as the variable *default.
The <<: *default lines are taking those key/value pairs, and making them part of the other groups, so you only need to change values that are different from the default: group.
If all your databases are on the same machine, then your database.yml should look a lot like this:
default: &default
host: 111.222.333.444
adapter: sqlserver
mode: odbc
dsn: DSN_Name
username: sa
password: ********
development:
<<: *default
database: ERP_development
test:
<<: *default
database: ERP_test
production:
<<: *default
database: ERP_production
Since you are on sqlserver, you'll probably have to create all those databases yourself (instead of letting Rails do it for you).

Answer 2

from: https://github.com/rails-sqlserver/activerecord-sqlserver-adapter
Force Schema To Lowercase
Although it is not necessary, the Ruby convention is to use lowercase
method names. If your database schema is in upper or mixed case, we
can force all table and column names during the schema reflection
process to be lowercase. Add this to your config/initializers file for
the adapter.
ActiveRecord::ConnectionAdapters::SQLServerAdapter.lowercase_schema_reflection = true
Schemas & Users
Depending on your user and schema setup, it may be needed to use a
table name prefix of dbo.. So something like this in your initializer
file for ActiveRecord or the adapter.
ActiveRecord::Base.table_name_prefix = 'dbo.'