has_one relationship not working on new/create - ruby-on-rails

I have these models:
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
has_one :user_tms, :dependent => :destroy
accepts_nested_attributes_for :user_tms
end
class UserTms < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user
end
In the UsersController I have this:
def new
#user = User.new
#user.build_user_tms
end
And the user form looks like this:
<%= form_for(#user) do |f| %>
<%= f.collection_select(:company_id, #companies, :id, :name, :include_blank => true) %>
<%= f.fields_for(:user_tms) do |tms_form| %>
<%= tms_form.collection_select(:department, #departments, :id, :description) %>
<% end %>
<% end %>
Pretty basic stuff I think, but when submitting the form I get the error:
User tms user can't be blank
And the weird thing is that when editing an exisiting user, everything works fine. Any idea what is going wrong here? Thanks!

Not sure but it is unusual to has a class end with an "s".
What is the table name? user_tms or user_tmses. I would set the plural name in your model.
I could have missed something else if so I'll delete. It is best to have a better model name for new developers though. tms doesn't mean much to most people.

Hmm, this is really weird because I thought rails is taking care of this automatically but it seems your nested model is missing the reference to the 'nester'. Try to supply it manually.
#user.user_tms.user = #user
You have to do this in the create action ie. where the record gets saved.
What version of rails are you using?

I found out what's wrong, I had a method causing some trouble with a false return value, which interfered with the normal handling of the relations with these two models.

Related

Issues on editing nested forms

I am using simple_form, a known Rails gem that makes the forms a little bit easier. I am having trouble to edit the forms. I can save the records perfectly, but when I go to the edit action, I don't see the records of the nested object from the database.
Models
# app/models/user.rb
has_one :member
has_one :academic, through: :member
accepts_nested_attributes_for :member, reject_if: :all_blank
# app/models/member.rb
belongs_to :user
has_one academic, dependent: :delete
accepts_nested_attributes_for academic, allow_destroy: true, reject_if: :all_blank
# app/models/academic.rb
belongs_to :member
Controller
# app/controllers/member_controller.rb
def edit
#member = Member.find(params[:id])
#academic = Academic.find_by_member_id(params[:id])
#member.build_academic
#member.academic.build_exchange_student # ExchangeStudent belongs_to :academic also
end
View
# app/views/_form.html.erb partial on app/views/edit.html.erb
<%= simple_form_for #member, url: database_members_path do |f| %>
<%= f.fields_for :academic do |academic_exchange_student| %>
<%= academic_exchange_student.fields_for :exchange_student do |exchange| %>
<!-- ##### Exchange student -->
<div class="row">
<%= academic_exchange_student.text_field :major%>
</div>
<% end %>
<% end %>
Yes, I am permitting the ids in the params.require(...). The record is saved perfectly, I can see it in the rails console.
When I go to this edit page, I can see the information of the member already in the text_field, but I don't see the information of the #member.academic.major there.
Also, if I go to the edit page and return in the browser, the academic record is deleted mysteriously.
Any help will be appreciated. Thank you.
I guess the problem here is that you build a new academic object in the edit view, and there can only be one academic in your User model.
I would suggest you to build the new academic only if it does not exist already:
def edit
#member = Member.find(params[:id])
#member.build_academic unless #member.academic
#member.academic.build_exchange_student unless #member.academic.exchange_student
end
PS: you also don't need the #academic variable, unless it's not used somewhere else in the edit view.

Not able to access related objects fields

So I'm new to rails and I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing wrong. Everything I've read says that I'm doing this right.
I have a relationships between two models.
class Photo < ActiveRecord::Base
has_many :votes
belongs_to :user
end
And
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessible :username, :email, :password, :password_confirmation, :remember_me
has_many :votes
has_many :photos
end
Here are my Controller methods
def index
#photos = Photo.order("created_at desc").to_a
end
def create
#photo = Photo.new(params[:photo])
#photo.user_id = current_user.id
if !#photo.save
#error = #photo.errors.full_messages.join('. ')
render view_for_new
return
end
end
I know the relationship works because in my view when I do this: <%= photo.user %> I get a user object back, and when I do <%= photo.user.inspect %> it shows all the expected fields with the correct keys and values.
However I want to access fields such as username, email, etc and display those on the page. How do I do this? I've tried doing <%= photo.user.email %> and some other fields that are available but it doesn't seem to be working
Alright figured this out, or at least partially.
Instead of <%= photo.user.email %> I did <%= photo.user.try(:email) %> and that brought the correct attribute back that I was looking for. It seems the association is done correctly. I don't know why <%= photo.user.email %> doesn't work, everywhere I look on line seems to use that sort of syntax.

Can you pass params for associated model on create

What i want to do -
I've got 2 models Record and Author. when calling Record.create params i whant to pass params for associated Author model.
Record has column body and Author has column name
When i try to pass as follows
Record.create { body: "some text", author: { name: 'Some name'}}
i get error ActiveRecord::UnknownAttributeError: unknown attribute: author
How can i do what i need ?
UPDATE 1
association - Record has author
Nested Attributes
You'll probably be looking for accepts_nested_attributes_for, or inverse_of - both relying on an association between your two models:
#app/models/record.rb
Class Record < ActiveRecord::Base
has_one :author
accepts_nested_attributes_for :author
end
#app/models/author.rb
Class Author < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :record
end
Essentially, you'll need to build the associative data, allowing you to send the associated attributes through to your other model. I'll explain this further down the page
This is what I would do if I were you:
#app/controllers/records_controller.rb
Class RecordsController < ApplicationController
def new
#record = Record.new
#record.author.build
end
def create
#record = Record.new record_params
#record.save
end
private
def record_params
params.require(:record).permit(:record, :attributes, author_attributes: [:name])
end
end
#app/views/records/new.html.erb
<%= form_for #record do |f| %>
<%= f.text_field :record %>
<%= f.fields_for :author do |a| %>
<%= a.text_field :name %>
<% end %>
<%= f.submit %>
<% end %>
This will allow you to save the author params / attributes upon save
--
inverse
Inverse attributes are also another idea for you.
I'm not sure whether they'll work directly in this instance, but you could use the following:
#app/models/record.rb
Class Record < ActiveRecord::Base
has_one :author, inverse_of: :author
before_create :build_record
end
#app/models/author.rb
Class Author < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :record, inverse_of: :record
before_create :set_options
private
def set_options
self.draft = true unless self.record.draft.present?
end
end
This means you should be able to access the nested attribute data (I'm not sure whether you have to use accepts_nested_attributes_for still in this instance) in your other model
ActiveRecord Objects
Finally, you need to consider the role of ActiveRecord objects in this setup
Please remember you're not just passing single items of data here - you're constructing & passing objects. This means you have to consider how they work & what they mean. I'll give you a brief explanation:
Rails, because its built on Ruby, is an object-orientated framework. This means that every piece of data you create / use in this is an object. Objects are much different than variables - they are deeper & have much more data contained within them, allowing them to be used in a variety of different ways:
Rails makes use of objects in many different ways; the main one being that a lot of the helpers & other methods build themselves around the objects. That's why you get the resources directive in your routes, and can do the following: <%= link_to #user.name, #user %>
The problem many people have is they don't understand the value of object-orientation in a Rails app, and consequently try and think about their logic from the perspective of a disjointed system. Conversely, and this will help you tremendously, you need to consider that every time you create a record, you're building an object, and consequently, you need to ensure you build your app around them.
As noted, you have to ensure you have an association between the objects you wish to create. If you do that, you'll be able to build them both at the same time
Try this hopefully will solve your problem:
class Record < ActiveRecord::Base
has_one :author
accepts_nested_attributes_for :author, :reject_if => lambda { |a| a[:name].blank? }, :allow_destroy => true
end
And for more details see accepts_nested_attributes_for

Nested_form has_one association

I have 2 models dog and litter_field:
class Dog < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :user
has_one :litter_field
accepts_nested_attributes_for :litter_field
attr_accessible :litter_field_attributes
end
class LitterField < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :dog
attr_accessible :breed_type
end
In my controller I have:
class DogsController < ApplicationController
def edit
#dog = Dog.find(params[:id])
#dog.build_litter_field
end
And in my view I have:
<%= simple_form_for #dog do |f| %>
<%= f.fields_for :litter_field do |l| %>
<div>
<%= l.label :breed_type %>
<%= l.input_field :breed_type %>
</div>
<%= f.button :submit, "Save" %>
<% end %>
I've looked at the documentation and from what I can tell this should work, however this page is not on the main edit page which I'm assuming is where the problem lies. Should I be adding what's in the edit action to a new action which displays the litter_field edit form?
EDIT:
What I am trying to do is split the edit form into separate pages, I've done this by adding additional actions that render extra pages so a user would go to dogs/settings/litter for example to see the litter_field nested form. I've tried adding #dog.build_litter_field to the litter action which displays the fields but when I try and save the form I am getting the error:
Failed to remove the existing associated litter_field. The record failed to save when after its foreign key was set to nil.
EDIT 2:
Fixed the above with adding:
has_one :litter_field, :dependent => :destroy
accepts_nested_attributes_for :litter_field, update_only: true
To dog.rb, the only problem I have now is it won't display the saved value on edit.
If you call #dog.build_litter_field in the edit action, it will build a new LitterField overtop of whatever had been saved previously. I would suggest trying something like this to see if it solves the problem you are currently seeing:
def edit
#dog = Dog.find(params[:id])
#dog.build_litter_field if #dog.litter_field.nil?
end
It can also help to checkout the debugger gem. You can use that to step through controller actions and see what the objects look like after each statement.

Rails 3, many-to-many form using accepts_nested_attributes_for, how do I set up correctly?

I have a many-to-many relationship between Recipes and Ingredients. I am trying to build a form that allows me to add an ingredient to a recipe.
(Variants of this question have been asked repeatedly, I have spent hours on this, but am fundamentally confused by what accepts_nested_attributes_for does.)
Before you get scared by all the code below I hope you'll see it's really a basic question. Here are the non-scary details...
Errors
When I display a form to create a recipe, I am getting the error "uninitialized constant Recipe::IngredientsRecipe", pointing to a line in my form partial
18: <%= f.fields_for :ingredients do |i| %>
If I change this line to make "ingredients" singular
<%= f.fields_for :ingredient do |i| %>
then the form displays, but when I save I get a mass assignment error Can't mass-assign protected attributes: ingredient.
Models (in 3 files, named accordingly)
class Recipe < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessible :name, :ingredient_id
has_many :ingredients, :through => :ingredients_recipes
has_many :ingredients_recipes
accepts_nested_attributes_for :ingredients
accepts_nested_attributes_for :ingredients_recipes
end
class Ingredient < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessible :name, :recipe_id
has_many :ingredients_recipes
has_many :recipes, :through => :ingredients_recipes
accepts_nested_attributes_for :recipes
accepts_nested_attributes_for :ingredients_recipes
end
class IngredientsRecipes < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :ingredient
belongs_to :recipe
attr_accessible :ingredient_id, :recipe_id
accepts_nested_attributes_for :recipes
accepts_nested_attributes_for :ingredients
end
Controllers
As RESTful resources generated by rails generate scaffold
And, because the plural of "recipe" is irregular, inflections.rb
ActiveSupport::Inflector.inflections do |inflect|
inflect.irregular 'recipe', 'recipes'
end
View (recipes/_form.html.erb)
<%= form_for(#recipe) do |f| %>
<div class="field">
<%= f.label :name, "Recipe" %><br />
<%= f.text_field :name %>
</div>
<%= f.fields_for :ingredients do |i| %>
<div class="field">
<%= i.label :name, "Ingredient" %><br />
<%= i.collection_select :ingredient_id, Ingredient.all, :id, :name %>
</div>
<% end %>
<div class="actions">
<%= f.submit %>
</div>
<% end %>
Environment
Rails 3.2.9
ruby 1.9.3
Some things tried
If I change the view f.fields_for :ingredient then the form loads (it finds Recipe::IngredientRecipe correctly, but then when I save, I get a mass-assignment error as noted above. Here's the log
Started POST "/recipes" for 127.0.0.1 at 2012-11-20 16:50:37 -0500
Processing by RecipesController#create as HTML
Parameters: {"utf8"=>"✓", "authenticity_token"=>"/fMS6ua0atk7qcXwGy7NHQtuOnJqDzoW5P3uN9oHWT4=", "recipe"=>{"name"=>"Stewed Tomatoes", "ingredient"=>{"ingredient_id"=>"1"}}, "commit"=>"Create Recipe"}
Completed 500 Internal Server Error in 2ms
ActiveModel::MassAssignmentSecurity::Error (Can't mass-assign protected attributes: ingredient):
app/controllers/recipes_controller.rb:43:in `new'
app/controllers/recipes_controller.rb:43:in `create'
and the failing lines in the controller is simply
#recipe = Recipe.new(params[:recipe])
So the params being passed, including the nested attributes, are incorrect in some way. But I have tried lots of variants that fix-one-break-another. What am I failing to understand?
Thanks to clues from all, I have found what was wrong with my approach. Here's how I solved it.
I had originally tried with a simple HABTM many-to-many relationship, where the join table was named following standard Rails convention: ingredients_recipes. Then I realized that in a way, accepts_nested_attributes_for is designed for a 1-to-many relationship. So I converted to using has_many_through, creating a model IngredientsRecipes.
That name was the core problem, because Rails needs to be able to convert from plural to singular when using build to create form elements. This caused it to look for the non-existant class Recipe::IngredientsRecipe. When I changed my form so it used fields_for :ingredient the form displayed, but still failed to save with a mass assignment error. It even failed when I added :ingredients_attributes to attr_accessible. It still failed when I added #recipe.ingredients.build to RecipesController#new.
Changing the model to a singular form was the final key to resolve the problem. IngredientsRecipe would have worked, but I chose RecipeIngredients, as it makes more sense.
So to summarize:
can't use accepts_nested_attributes_for with has_and_belongs_to_many; need has_many with through option. (Thanks #kien_thanh)
adding accepts_nested_attributes_for creates a accessor that must be added to attr_accessible in the form <plural-foreign-model>_attributes, e.g. in Recipe I added attr_accessible :name, :ingredients_attributes (Thanks #beerlington)
before displaying the form in the new method of the controller, must call build on the foreign model after creating a new instance, as in 3.times { #recipe.ingredients.build }. This results in HTML having names like recipe[ingredients_attributes][0][name] (Thanks #bravenewweb)
join model must be singular, as with all models. (All me :-).
If you inspect the form that is generated, you'll notice that the nested fields have a name like "ingredients_attributes". The reason you're getting the mass-assignment error is because you need to add these fields to the attr_accessible declaration.
Something like this should fix it (you'll need to doublecheck the field names):
class Recipe < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessible :name, :ingredients_attributes
#...
end
Update: There's a similar answer here
Leave the call as
<%= f.fields_for :ingredients do |i| %>
But before that do
<% #recipe.ingredients.build %>
Im guessing that will allow your form to be created the right way, but there are likely other errors with your models, I can look # it more in detail when I have more time if its still not working, but:
As far as what accepts_nested_attributes_for does, when you pass in a correctly formatted params hash to the Model.new or Model.create or Model.update, it allows those attributes on the related model to be saved if they are in the params hash. In addition though, you do need to make the attributes accessible if they are unaccessible in the parent model as stated by beerlington.
I think you just need set up a one-to-many association, one recipe has many ingredients and one ingredient belongs to one recipe, so your model look like:
class Recipe < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessible :name, :ingredients_attributes
has_many :ingredients
accepts_nested_attributes_for :ingredients
end
class Ingredient < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessible :name, :recipe_id
belongs_to :recipe
end
You are built right form, so I don't write it again here. Now in your new and create controller will be like this:
def new
#recipe = Recipe.new
# This is create just one select field on form
#recipe.ingredients.build
# Create two select field on form
2.times { #recipe.ingredients.build }
# If you keep code above for new method, now you create 3 select field
end
def create
#recipe = Recipe.new(params[:recipe])
if #recipe.save
...
else
...
end
end
How does params[:recipe] look like? If you just have one select field, maybe like this:
params = { recipe: { name: "Stewed Tomatoes", ingredients_attributes: [ { id: 1 } ] } }
If you have 2 ingredient select field:
params = { recipe: { name: "Stewed Tomatoes", ingredients_attributes: [ { id: 1 }, { id: 2 } ] } }

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