Rails: How to reference images in CSS within Rails 4 - ruby-on-rails

There's a strange issue with Rails 4 on Heroku. When images are compiled they have hashes added to them, yet the reference to those files from within CSS don't have the proper name adjusted. Here's what I mean. I have a file called logo.png. Yet when it shows up on heroku it is viewed as:
/assets/logo-200a00a193ed5e297bb09ddd96afb953.png
However the CSS still states:
background-image:url("./logo.png");
The result: the image doesn't display. Anybody run into this? How can this be resolved?

Sprockets together with Sass has some nifty helpers you can use to get the job done. Sprockets will only process these helpers if your stylesheet file extensions are either .css.scss or .css.sass.
Image specific helper:
background-image: image-url("logo.png")
Agnostic helper:
background-image: asset-url("logo.png", image)
background-image: asset-url($asset, $asset-type)
Or if you want to embed the image data in the css file:
background-image: asset-data-url("logo.png")

Don't know why, but only thing that worked for me was using asset_path instead of image_path, even though my images are under the assets/images/ directory:
Example:
app/assets/images/mypic.png
In Ruby:
asset_path('mypic.png')
In .scss:
url(asset-path('mypic.png'))
UPDATE:
Figured it out- turns out these asset helpers come from the sass-rails gem (which I had installed in my project).

In Rails 4, you can reference an image located in assets/images/ in your .SCSS files easily like this:
.some-div {
background-image: url(image-path('pretty-background-image.jpg'));
}
When you launch the application in development mode (localhost:3000), you should see something like:
background-image: url("/assets/pretty-background-image.jpg");
In production mode, your assets will have the cache helper numbers:
background-image: url("/assets/pretty-background-image-8b313354987c309e3cd76eabdb376c1e.jpg");

The hash is because the asset pipeline and server Optimize caching
http://guides.rubyonrails.org/asset_pipeline.html
Try something like this:
background-image: url(image_path('check.png'));
Goodluck

In css
background: url("/assets/banner.jpg");
although the original path is /assets/images/banner.jpg, by convention you have to add just /assets/ in the url method

None of the answers says about the way, when I'll have .css.erb extension, how to reference images. For me worked both in production and development as well :
2.3.1 CSS and ERB
The asset pipeline automatically evaluates ERB. This means if you add an erb extension to a CSS asset (for example, application.css.erb), then helpers like asset_path are available in your CSS rules:
.class { background-image: url(<%= asset_path 'image.png' %>) }
This writes the path to the particular asset being referenced. In this example, it would make sense to have an image in one of the asset load paths, such as app/assets/images/image.png, which would be referenced here. If this image is already available in public/assets as a fingerprinted file, then that path is referenced.
If you want to use a data URI - a method of embedding the image data directly into the CSS file - you can use the asset_data_uri helper.
.logo { background: url(<%= asset_data_uri 'logo.png' %>) }
This inserts a correctly-formatted data URI into the CSS source.
Note that the closing tag cannot be of the style -%>.

Only this snippet does not work for me:
background-image: url(image_path('transparent_2x2.png'));
But rename stylename.scss to stylename.css.scss helps me.

WHAT I HAVE FOUND AFTER HOURS OF MUCKING WITH THIS:
WORKS :
background-image: url(image_path('transparent_2x2.png'));
// how to add attributes like repeat, center, fixed?
The above outputs something like: "/assets/transparent_2x2-ec47061dbe4fb88d51ae1e7f41a146db.png"
Notice the leading "/", and it's within quotes.
Also note the scss extension and image_path helper in yourstylesheet.css.scss. The image is in the app/assets/images directory.
Doesn't work:
background: url(image_path('transparent_2x2.png') repeat center center fixed;
doesn't work, invalid property:
background:url(/assets/pretty_photo/default/sprite.png) 2px 1px repeat center fixed;
My last resort was going to be to put these in my public s3 bucket and load from there, but finally got something going.

Referencing the Rails documents we see that there are a few ways to link to images from css. Just go to section 2.3.2.
First, make sure your css file has the .scss extension if it's a sass file.
Next, you can use the ruby method, which is really ugly:
#logo { background: url(<%= asset_data_uri 'logo.png' %>) }
Or you can use the specific form that is nicer:
image-url("rails.png") returns url(/assets/rails.png)
image-path("rails.png") returns "/assets/rails.png"
Lastly, you can use the general form:
asset-url("rails.png") returns url(/assets/rails.png)
asset-path("rails.png") returns "/assets/rails.png"

Interestingly, if I use 'background-image', it does not work:
background-image: url('picture.png');
But just 'background', it does:
background: url('picture.png');

In some cases the following can also be applier
logo { background: url(<%= asset_data_uri 'logo.png' %>) }
Source: http://guides.rubyonrails.org/asset_pipeline.html

You can add to your css .erb extension. Ej: style.css.erb
Then you can put:
background: url(<%= asset_path 'logo.png' %>) no-repeat;

When using gem 'sass-rails', in Rails 5, bootstrap 4, the following worked for me,
in .scss file:
background-image: url(asset_path("black_left_arrow.svg"));
in view file(e.g. .html.slim):
style=("background-image: url(#{ show_image_path("event_background.png") })");

This should get you there every single time.
background-image: url(<%= asset_data_uri 'transparent_2x2.png'%>);

By default Rails 4 will not serve your assets. To enable this functionality you need to go into config/application.rb and add this line:
config.serve_static_assets = true
https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/rails-4-asset-pipeline#serve-assets

In Rails 4, simply use .hero {
background-image: url("picture.jpg");
} in your style.css file as long as the background image is tucked in app/assets/images.

This worked for me:
background: #4C2516 url('imagename.png') repeat-y 0 0;

Related

Don't show background images on Heroku. But local is working

My tag:
= link_to '', root_path, class: 'items__footage'
My selector:
.items__footage {
display: inline-block;
content: '';
width: 300px;
min-height: 300px;
background: url('/assets/footage_still.png') no-repeat;
background-size: auto 100%;
}
The path of my image is assets/images/footage_still.png. If I indicate this path, my image does not work locally.
I have done rake assets:precompile. But it did not help.
if you can use ruby code in your css file then use items_footage's background like this.
background: url("<%= asset_path('footage_still.png') %>");
To use ruby code inside css file make that file as filename.css.erb
From the documentation
In the production environment Sprockets uses the fingerprinting scheme
outlined above. By default Rails assumes assets have been precompiled
and will be served as static assets by your web server.
During the precompilation phase an SHA256 is generated from the
contents of the compiled files, and inserted into the filenames as
they are written to disk. These fingerprinted names are used by the
Rails helpers in place of the manifest name.
So, in production all your assets will be precompiled and will be served from public/assets. Also the file will be renamed with a fingerprint. So actually In production your file name will look something like
footage_still-908e25f4bf641868d8683022a5b62f54.png
The fingerprint will changes every time the file content changes and is useful for caching the static assets, generally called cache busting.
So when you hard code the image url /assets/footage_still.png, it will break in production. To handle the situation, rails provides something called asset url helpers.
To make it work, you have to rename your .css file to .scss if not and change.
background: url('/assets/footage_still.png') no-repeat;
to
background: image_url('footage_still.png') no-repeat;
Hope this helps.
You can use image_url('footage_still.png') and let rails find the path of the image

Rails twitter-bootstrap-rails glyphicons are not working

When using the twitter-bootstrap-rails gem, the glyphicons aren't working. I noticed that the resulting css has:
background-image: "/assets/twitter/bootstrap/glyphicons-halflings.png"
This isn't a valid css property, so of course it doesn't work. I'm not doing anything special and this is being pulled in directly from the sprites.less file, which has:
background-image: #iconSpritePath;
I believe this should be translating to a background: url() in the resulting css, but this doesn't seem to be happening.
try this:
background-image: asset-url("glyphicons-halflings.png");

How to include twitter bootstrap in my Rails project manually (without using any gems)?

I'm learning Rails and want to play with Rails and Twitter Bootstrap. My Rails project layout is:
├─assets
│ ├─images
│ ├─javascripts
│ └─stylesheets
├─controllers
├─helpers
├─mailers
├─models
└─views
├─course
└─layouts
The Twitter Bootstrap layout is:
├─css
├─img
└─js
I know Bootstrap css file references its image file, such as:
[class*=" icon-"] {
display: inline-block;
width: 14px;
height: 14px;
*margin-right: .3em;
line-height: 14px;
vertical-align: text-top;
background-image: url("../img/glyphicons-halflings.png");
background-position: 14px 14px;
background-repeat: no-repeat;
margin-top: 1px;
}
So they must retain there relative position, or I have to change the CSS file. I want to know, if I don't want to use any Bootstrap related gems, what's the best way to place these Bootstrap files into my Rails project? Thanks.
First, you should probably move the Bootstrap source files to their appropriate locations in the assets folder in your Rails app - that is, CSS files in the stylesheets folder, JS in javascripts, and images in images.
As mentioned already, you'll need to change paths to images in Bootstrap's CSS. However, you'll need to make use of Rails' asset path helpers if you plan on using your app in production.
For example, background-image: url('../images/glyphicons-halflings.png'); is absolutely incorrect when using the asset pipeline. This will work fine in development, but as soon as you pre-compile assets for a production environment things won't work - Rails appends fingerprints to asset file names for caching purposes, which makes the URL above incorrect.
The correct way to code paths in your assets is outlined in the Rails Guide for the Asset Pipeline. If you're using CSS only, you should add the .erb extension to your filename (to get bootstrap.css.erb) and do something like this:
background-image: url(<%= asset_path 'glyphicons-halflings.png' %>);
If you are using SASS/SCSS, you can also use the built-in asset-path or image-path helpers. Again, this is mentioned in the guide I linked to above.
In the end, you probably should be using a gem, as this work will already be done for you. But, if you must, this should work well enough. Of course, if you ever want to update Bootstrap, you'll have to do this again.
I ran into the same trouble, and didn't want to have to install gems, etc.
There's a much easier solution.
Just override the icon selectors for background image in your custom CSS.
[class^="icon-"], [class*=" icon-"] {
background-image: url("/assets/img/glyphicons-halflings.png");
}
[class^="icon-white"], [class*=" icon-white"] {
background-image: url("/assets/img/glyphicons-halflings-white.png");
}
Put the glyphicons PNGs in app/assets/images/img/ (or wherever you want) and you're done.
You have to change every Glyphicons icon to the assets path. That's a lot of work. Also you have to use LESS, so the easiest way to use bootstrap with rails is using a gem. This is the gem that I use gem 'twitter-bootstrap-rails' this gem also includes font awesome so check this too
Redirect calls in routes.rb
get '/img/:name', to: redirect {|params, req| "/assets/#{params[:name]}.#{params[:format]}" }
This will redirect calls for /img to /assets
You can put the css and js files anywhere in your project as they don't reference each other, however, you will have to update the glypicon references in the css file.
In your case:
background-image: url("../images/glyphicons-halflings.png");
EDIT: I updated the path. I originally included "assets" which is incorrect with your given directory structure.

CSS in Rails Asset Path not processed by ERB in development

I have a Rails app with the following in /app/assets/stylesheets/styles.css.erb:
...
#nestedbg {
background-position: left top;
background-image: url(<%= asset_path 'siteheader2.png' %>);
background-repeat: repeat-x;
background-attachment: fixed;
}
...
When I run rake assets:precompile and then run rails s -e production, everything works as expected. However, when I remove the precompiled assets and run rails s in development, the CSS file comes up as shown above instead of being properly substituted.
I tried putting config.assets.compile = true in /config/environments/development.rb and that did not help.
Any ideas?
Thanks.
I honestly cannot say why this is not interpreted correctly in your case, but I have a much better workaround to offer: skip erb interpreting altogether.
You can do this like so:
/* styles.css.scss */
background-image:url(image_path("siteheader2.png"));
If you did not have a chance to I would also suggest to have a look at SASS: it is integrated in the Rails asset pipeline and lets you do cool things like variable declarations, nesting, mixins, ...
I found that my css files wouldn't be processed by ERB unless SCSS processing was also added.
I changed my screen.css.erb to screen.css.scss.erb and now <%= asset_path 'file.png' %> is rendered correctly as /assets/file.png.
I'm on Rails 3.1.3.
I was using Rails 3.1.1 and when I switched the app to use Rails 3.1.3, the problem went away. I switched back to 3.1.1 to see if the issue came back and it did not.
I'm guessing that it was a problem with one of the gems and the update to 3.1.3 brought other gem updates with it.
Bizarrely, I found that changing asset_path to asset_data_uri and then back to asset_path worked for me. Was using Rails 3.1.3 all along.
Strange.
Sam Oliver's advice did the trick for me, simply renaming the extensions didn't update the timestamp on the files.
CSS and ERB
The asset pipeline automatically evaluates ERB. This means that if you add an erb extension to a CSS asset (for example, application.css.erb), then helpers like asset_path are available in your CSS rules:
.class { background-image: url(<%= asset_path 'image.png' %>) }
This writes the path to the particular asset being referenced. In this example, it would make sense to have an image in one of the asset load paths, such as app/assets/images/image.png, which would be referenced here. If this image is already available in public/assets as a fingerprinted file, then that path is referenced.
If you want to use a data URI — a method of embedding the image data directly into the CSS file — you can use the asset_data_uri helper.
CSS and Sass:
When using the asset pipeline, paths to assets must be re-written and sass-rails provides -url and -path helpers (hyphenated in Sass, underscored in Ruby) for the following asset classes: image, font, video, audio, JavaScript and stylesheet.
image-url("rails.png") becomes url(/assets/rails.png)
image-path("rails.png") becomes "/assets/rails.png".
The more generic form can also be used but the asset path and class must both be specified:
asset-url("rails.png", image) becomes url(/assets/rails.png)
asset-path("rails.png", image) becomes "/assets/rails.png"
Referenced By: Rails Guide Asset Pipe Line
Heading: 2.2.1 and 2.2.2 respectively.

Asset Subdirectories in Rails 3.1

I have a Rails 3.1 app with an image:
app/assets/images/icons/button.png
It seems like the image should be served at this URL:
assets/icons/button.png
but if I go to this URL I get a 404. To fix this I created an initializer and added my images/icons subdirectory to the asset path:
Rails.application.assets.append_path "app/assets/images/icons"
However, this does not seem like it can possibly be the recommended way to accomplish this. I'm aware of the require and require_tree directives for JavaScript and CSS assets, is there an equivalent for image assets? How are other people doing this?
EDIT: As of Rails 3.2.rc1 this is now fixed! asset_path now generates proper paths when deploying to sub-uri!
For images it just works. Rails packages everything in images/ tree. I personally use them like this (actual code):
CSS:
a#icon-followers{
background: url(<%= asset_data_uri "icons/followers.png" %>) center center no-repeat;
}
(asset_data_uri actually makes the images inline in the CSS file using base64, but that's irrelevant in this case)
No custom configuration required. After precompiling, images from app/assets/icons/ end up in public/assets/icons/.
You can open public/assets/manifest.yml to see how Rails translates the paths to actual files.

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