Controller that Get/Create/Update/Destroy on files of the public folder - ruby-on-rails

Question

i'm working on a Rails app.
And i'm trying to write a controller that will have access on the files of the Public folder of rails.
And i'm kind a stuck right now.
What i'm trying to do is a get method on my FileController.
That will obtain a variable "path" who correspond to the path of the file to read who is located on the public folder of rails.
And i want to modify routes.rb for when i make a GET request of "/file/path/to/htmlpage" the request sendback to me the content of the file, like a string for an HTML file.
EDIT: The problem is that is need REST url like this.
show => GET /file/:path
create => POST /file/:path
update => PUT /file/:path
destroy => DELETE /file/:path
So i deleted my old routes and put
resources :files
And my old routes wad like that
#get "file/:path" => 'file#get', as: :get
#get "file/create/*path" => 'file#create', as: :create
#post "file/create/*path/:content" => 'file#create', as: :create_content
#get "file/update/*path/:content" => 'file#update', as: :update
#get "file/destroy/:path" => 'file#destroy', as: :destroy
My controller is maybe a little bit weird, i need some advice.
class FileController < ApplicationController
# get "file/:path"
def show
path = params[:path]
if File.exists?( Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}.html" ) )
#content = File.read( Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}.html" ) )
puts #content
else
puts "The file you want to access doesn't exist"
end
end
# get "file/create/:path"
# post "file/create/*path/:content"
def create
path = params[:path]
content = params[:content]
if File.exists?( Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}.html" ) )
puts "The file you want to create already exist"
else
File.write(Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}.html" ), "#{content}")
end
end
# get "file/update/*path/:content"
def update
path = params[:path]
content = params[:content]
if File.exists?( Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}" ) )
File.write(Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}" ), "#{content}")
else
puts "The file you want to update doesn't exist"
end
end
# get "file/destroy/:path"
def destroy
path = params[:path]
if File.exists?( Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}.html" ) )
File.delete( Rails.public_path.join( "#{path}.html" ) )
else
puts "The file you want to delete doesn't exist"
end
end
end
But now it's not working, i think i have a problem with my routes and my controller that don't communicate in the right way. But i don't see how i have do to it.
I don't have a file model because i don't see the need for what i want to do.
Thanks for your help

Answer 1

Try this:
# FileController
def action_name
#check and filter here your path param, something like:
path = params[:path].gsub /[^a-z0-9\.\/]+/, ''
if File.exists?( Rails.root.join( "public/#{path}" ) )
#content = File.read( Rails.root.join( "public/#{path}" ) )
end
end

Answer 2

There are several answers to your question that yield different results.
If you want to load the file inside ruby, you can reference the public path like: Rails.public_path. In addition, you can get the root path to your application via Rails.root. That should help you get access to the files you need inside your controller.
However I have to ask: why do you want to do this? If you simply want to serve up the file, you can let rails do that by default by simply providing the path in the link itself - it will serve up the public files. In addition, it's quite likely you don't want to push that through your ruby/rails at all, and want to setup your HTTP server to serve the static files for you which will yield a dramatic performance benefit.

Answer 3

I would use a model like this:
class PublicFile
attr_accessor :path, :content
def save(params)
File.write(params[:path], params[:content])
end
def destroy(params)
File.delete(params[:path])
end
def initialize(params)
#content = File.read(params[:path])
#path = params[:path]
end
def find(path_or_paths)
# to implement
end
def all
# to implement
end
def update_attributes(params)
# to implement
end
end
In controller and views you could generate a scaffold rails g scaffold PublicFile, you need to move the model before running the scaffold, and then use the above model that manipulates files.
In conclusion, what I mean is to change the DB that an usual Rails model has, with the access to files, this would be done in model logic.