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How do I obfuscate the ids of my records in rails?
(6 answers)
Closed 7 years ago.
I have a web app made with Ruby On Rails. For now when I want to display an object I have to access the following page: http://mywebapp.com/object/1234 with 1234 the id of the object.
I would like to encode that object id and have the following result: http://mywebapp.com/object/5k (it is just an example).
How can it be done?
Many thanks,
Martin
All these converting methods are reversible, so IMHO if your object has some name or title or whatever, then the best way is adding a slug.
In such case add a new attribute :slug to your object, let automatically generate it's value from object name (or something else) on the model:
class MyObject
validates_format_of :slug, :with => /\A[a-z\-0-9]*\Z/
before_validation :generate_slug, :on => :create
def generate_slug
if self.slug.blank?
slug = self.name.mb_chars.downcase.normalize(:kd).to_s.gsub(/-/, " ").squeeze(" ")
slug = slug.gsub(/\s/, "-").gsub(/[^a-z\-0-9]/, "")
current = 1
self.slug = slug
while true
conflicts = MyObject.where("slug = ?", self.slug).count
if conflicts != 0
self.slug = "#{slug}-#{current}"
current += 1
else
break
end
end
end
end
end
then the URL can be http://mywebapp.com/object/my_object_slug, because in action you find the object via this slug:
class MyObjectController
def some_action
my_object = MyObject.find_by_slug(params[:slug])
...
end
end
Don't forget modify routes.rb:
match "object/:slug", :to => "my_objects#some_action"
You could probably do this with Base64 encoding (although if you're really trying to keep the internal id secret someone could probably guess you're using Base64 encoding and easily determine the id).
Your controller would need to look a bit like this
class ThingsController < ApplicationController
require 'base64'
def show
#thing = Thing.find Base64.urlsafe_decode64(params[:id])
end
def edit
#thing = Thing.find Base64.urlsafe_decode64(params[:id])
end
#These are just a couple of very simple example actions
end
Now actually encoding your URLs is going to be a little bit trickier - I'll look into it as it seems like an interesting problem (but I'm not making any promises).
Edit -
A bit of reading reveals that ActionView uses the to_param method in url_for to get the id of an object. We can override this in the model itself to encode the id like so
class Thing < ActiveRecord::Base
def to_param
Base64.urlsafe_encode64 self.id.to_s
end
end
Everything I've written here is conjectural. I haven't done this before or tested the code so I can't give any guarantee as to whether it will work or whether it will introduce unforeseen problems. I'd be very interested to hear how you go.
Related
I'm not 100% sure about why ActiveModel::Dirty has its name. I'm guessing it is because it is considered as dirty to use it.
But in some cases, it is not possible to avoid watching on specific fields.
Ex:
if self.name_changed?
self.slug = self.name.parameterize
end
Without ActiveModel::Dirty, the code would look like:
if old_name != self.name
self.slug = self.name.parameterize
end
which implies having stored old_name before, and it is not readable, so IMHO, it is dirtier than using ActiveModel::Dirty. It becomes even worse if old_number is a number and equals params[:user]['old_number'] as it needs to be correctly formated (parsed as int), whereas ActiveRecord does this automagically.
So I would find clean to define watchable fields at Model level:
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
include ActiveModel::Dirty
watchable_fields :name
before_save :generate_slug, if: name_changed?
def generate_slug
self.slug = self.name.parameterize
end
end
Or (even better?) at controller level, before assigning new values:
def update
#user = current_user
#user.watch_fields(:name)
#user.assign_attributes(params[:user])
#user.generate_slug if #user.name_changed?
#user.save # etc.
end
The good thing here is that it removes the memory overload produced by using ActiveModel::Dirty.
So my question is:
Can I do that using ActiveRecord pre-built tools, or should I write a custom library to this?
Thanks
If ActiveModel::Dirty solves your problem, feel free to use it. The name comes from the term "dirty objects" and is not meant to imply that it's a dirty/hackish module.
See this answer for more details on dirty objects: What is meant by the term "dirty object"?
Here's what I have ended up doing. I like it:
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessor :watched
def field_watch(field_name)
self.watched ||= {}
self.watched[field_name] = self.send(field_name)
return self
end
def field_changed?(field_name)
self.send(field_name) != self.watched(field_name)
end
end
And in the controller
def update
#user = current_user.field_watch(:name)
#user.assign_attributes(params[:user])
#user.generate_slug if #user.field_changed?(:name)
#user.save
end
I'll report here if I take the time to wrap this code in a gem or something.
So this is a bit of a silly one and is more lack of programming knowledge rather than anything ruby or rails specific.
If i wanted to turn an ordinary class into hash its not so bad. I already have one:
class CustomRequest
require 'json'
require 'net/http'
attr_accessor :url, :depth, :status
def initialize(url,depth)
#url = url
#depth = depth
end
def make_me_hash_and_send
#myReq = {:url => #url, :depth =>#depth}
myJsonReq = #myReq
puts myJsonReq
res = Net::HTTP.post_form(URI.parse('http://127.0.0.1:3008/user_requests/add.json'),
myJsonReq)
end
end
Simply generates the hash from the internal variables that are passed in the constructor. I want to do the same for active record but the abstractness of it isn't making it easy.
Lets say I have this class
def turn_my_insides_to_hash
#How do I take the actual record variables
# nd generate a hash from them.
#Is it something like
#myHash = {:myString = self.myString
:myInt => self.myInt }
end
I may be looking at this the wrong way. I know Outside of the class I could simply say
#x = Result.find(passed_id).to_hash
and then do what I want to it. But I would rather call something liks
#x = Result.send
(which turns the result's variables into hash and sends them)
I already have the send part, just need to know how to turn variables into hash from inside class.
You could try use JSON instead of YAML:
Result.find(passed_id).to_json
or
Result.find(passed_id).attributes.to_json
also you can use options like :except and :only for to_json method.
Result.find(passed_id).attributes.to_json(:only => ['status', 'message'])
record.serializable_hash
http://api.rubyonrails.org/v4.0.12/classes/ActiveModel/Serialization.html#method-i-serializable_hash
I write something more because SO ask me to do so.
I have a category model and I'm routing it using the default scaffolding of resources :categories. I'm wondering if there's a way to change the paths from /category/:id to /category/:name. I added:
match "/categories/:name" => "categories#show"
above the resources line in routes.rb and changed the show action in the controller to do:
#category = Category.find_by_name(params[:name])
it works, but the 'magic paths' such as link_to some_category still use the :id format.
Is there a way to do this? If this is a bad idea (due to some possible way in which rails works internally), is there another way to accomplish this? So that /categories/music, for example, and /categories/3 both work?
Rails has a nifty model instance method called to_param, and it's what the paths use. It defaults to id, but you can override it and produce something like:
class Category < ActiveRecord::Base
def to_param
name
end
end
cat = Category.find_by_name('music')
category_path(cat) # => "/categories/music"
For more info, check the Rails documentation for to_param.
EDIT:
When it comes to category names which aren't ideal for URLs, you have multiple options. One is, as you say, to gsub whitespaces with hyphens and vice versa when finding the record. However, a safer option would be to create another column on the categories table called name_param (or similar). Then, you can use it instead of the name for, well, all path and URL related business. Use the parameterize inflector to create a URL-safe string. Here's how I'd do it:
class Category < ActiveRecord::Base
after_save :create_name_param
def to_param
name_param
end
private
def create_name_param
self.name_param = name.parameterize
end
end
# Hypothetical
cat = Category.create(:name => 'My. Kewl. Category!!!')
category_path(cat) # => "/categories/my-kewl-category"
# Controller
#category = Category.find_by_name_param(param[:id]) # <Category id: 123, name: 'My. Kewl. Category!!!'>
If you don't want to to break existing code that relying on model id you could define your to_param like this:
def to_param
"#{id}-#{name}"
end
so your url will be: http://path/1-some-model and you still can load your model with Model.find(params[:id]) because:
"123-hello-world".to_i
=> 123
Although possibly more than you need, you may also want to look into 'human readable urls' support like friendly_id or one of the others (for instance, if you need unicode support, etc.) that are described here at Ruby Toolbox.
I am developing a Rails 3 app in a largely tabless capacity. I am using savon_model and ActiveModel to generate similar behaviour to ActiveRecord equivalents. Below is my code:
class TestClass
include Savon::Model
include ActiveModel::Validations
# Configuration
endpoint "http://localhost:8080/app/TestService"
namespace "http://wsns.test.com/"
actions :getObjectById, :getAllObjects
attr_accessor :id, :name
def initialize(hash)
#id = hash[:id]
#name = hash[:name]
end
client do
http.headers["Pragma"] = "no-cache"
end
def self.all
h = getAllObjects(nil).to_array
return convert_array_hash_to_obj(h, :get_all_objects_response)
end
def self.find(id)
h = getObjectById(:arg0 => id).to_hash
return convert_hash_to_obj(h, :get_object_by_id_response)
end
private
def self.convert_array_hash_to_obj(arrayhash, returnlabel)
results = Array.new
arrayhash.each do |hash|
results << convert_hash_to_obj(hash, returnlabel)
end
return results
end
def self.convert_hash_to_obj(hash, returnlabel)
return TestClass.new(hash[returnlabel][:return])
end
end
OK, so everything works as expected; values are pulled from the web service and onto the page. Unfortunately, when I look at the html produced at the client side there are some issues. The Show links are along the following lines:
/testclasses/%23%3CTestClass:0xa814cb4%3E
instead of...
/testclasses/1
So, I did a print of the object (hash?) to the console to compare the outputs.
[#<System:0xa814cb4 #id="1", #name="CIS">]
instead of what I believe it should be...
[#<System id="1", name="CIS">]
I have three questions:
1: What is the hex suffix on my class name when it is printed out
2: How can I modify my class to match the desired output when printed to the console?
3: Why are the frontend links (Show, Edit, Delete) broken and is there an easy fix?
Thanks so much for your time and apologies for rubbish code / stupid questions. This is my first Ruby or Rails app!
Gareth
The hex suffix is the object id of your instance of System
You can manipulate the output on the console by implementing an inspect instance method
The Rails url helpers use the to_param instance method to build these links. You should implement this if you are going to use your class as an ActiveRecord substitute.
Generally speaking, if you want to use all the Rails goodies with an own implementation of a model class, you should use ActiveModel:Lint::Test to verify which parts of the ActiveModel APIs are working as expected.
More information can be found here: http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveModel/Lint/Tests.html
I am using respond_with and everything is hooked up right to get data correctly. I want to customize the returned json, xml and foobar formats in a DRY way, but I cannot figure out how to do so using the limited :only and :include. These are great when the data is simple, but with complex finds, they fall short of what I want.
Lets say I have a post which has_many images
def show
#post = Post.find params[:id]
respond_with(#post)
end
I want to include the images with the response so I could do this:
def show
#post = Post.find params[:id]
respond_with(#post, :include => :images)
end
but I dont really want to send the entire image object along, just the url. In addition to this, I really want to be able to do something like this as well (pseudocode):
def show
#post = Post.find params[:id]
respond_with(#post, :include => { :foo => #posts.each.really_cool_method } )
end
def index
#post = Post.find params[:id]
respond_with(#post, :include => { :foo => #post.really_cool_method } )
end
… but all in a DRY way. In older rails projects, I have used XML builders to customize the output, but replicating it across json, xml, html whatever doesnt seem right. I have to imagine that the rails gurus put something in Rails 3 that I am not realizing for this type of behavior. Ideas?
You can override as_json in your model.
Something like:
class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
def as_json(options = {})
{
attribute: self.attribute, # and so on for all you want to include
images: self.images, # then do the same `as_json` method for Image
foo: self.really_cool_method
}
end
end
And Rails takes care of the rest when using respond_with. not entirely sure what options gets set to, but probably the options you give to respond_with (:include, :only and so on)
Probably too late, but I found a more DRY solution digging through the rails docs. This works in my brief tests, but may need some tweaking:
# This method overrides the default by forcing an :only option to be limited to entries in our
# PUBLIC_FIELDS list
def serializable_hash(options = nil)
options ||= {}
options[:only] ||= []
options[:only] += PUBLIC_FIELDS
options[:only].uniq!
super(options)
end
This basically allows you to have a list of fields that are allowed for your public API, and you cannot accidentally expose the whole object. You can still expose specific fields manually, but by default your object is secure for .to_json, .to_xml, etc.
It is not the rails 3 built-in way, but I found a great gem that is actively maintained on Rails 3: acts_as_api