Advanced RESTful Rails
Ben Scofield

Constraints

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair some time declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
...

app
controllers
helpers
models
views
config
environments
initializers
db
doc
lib
tasks
log
public
images
javascripts
stylesheets
script
performance
process
test
fixtures
functional
integration
unit
...

exists app/models/
exists app/controllers/
exists app/helpers/
create app/views/users
exists test/functional/
exists test/unit/
dependency model
exists app/models/
exists test/unit/
exists test/fixtures/
create app/models/user.rb
create test/unit/user_test.rb
create test/fixtures/users.yml
create db/migrate
create db/migrate/20080531002035_create_users.rb
create app/controllers/users_controller.rb
create test/functional/users_controller_test.rb
create app/helpers/users_helper.rb
route map.resources :users

REST

Audience Participation!
who is building restful applications?

212,000 Results

How do I handle ...

Difficult
even for the pros

class UsersController < ApplicationController
# ...
def activate
self.current_user = params[:activation_code].blank? ? false : # ...
if logged_in? && !current_user.active?
current_user.activate!
flash[:notice] = \"Signup complete!\"
end
redirect_back_or_default('/')
end
def suspend
@user.suspend!
redirect_to users_path
end
def unsuspend
@user.unsuspend!
redirect_to users_path
end
def destroy
@user.delete!
redirect_to users_path
end
def purge
@user.destroy
redirect_to users_path
Restful Authentication
end
end

What is REST?

Resources
hey-helen - flickr

Addressability
memestate - flickr

Representations
stevedave - flickr

Stateless*
http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/images/usa-avhrr.gif

Audience Participation!
why care?

Process

tiptoe - flickr

Domain
ejpphoto - flickr

Modeled
kerim - flickr

?

Identify
resources

Select
methods to expose

Respect
the middleman

Simple

My Pull List

Releases

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.releases 'releases/:year/:month/:day',
:controller => 'items', :action => 'index'
end
class ItemsController < ApplicationController
# release listing page; filters on year/month/day from params
def index; end
end

Issues

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :issues
end
class IssuesController < ApplicationController
# issue detail page
def show; end
end

Series

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :titles
end
class TitlesController < ApplicationController
# title detail page
def show; end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :titles, :has_many => [:issues]
end
class IssuesController < ApplicationController
# issue listing page; could be series page
def index; end
end

Users

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :users
end
class UsersController < ApplicationController
before_filter :require_login, :only => [:edit, :update]
# edit account
def edit; end
# update account
def update; end
end

Lists

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :users
end
class UsersController < ApplicationController
# public view - pull list
def show; end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :users, :has_many => [:titles]
end
class TitlesController < ApplicationController
# public view - pull list, given a user_id
def index; end
end

Advanced

Login* mc - flickr

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resource :session
end
class SessionsController < ApplicationController
# login form
def new; end
# login action
def create; end
# logout action
def destroy; end
end

Homepage seandreilinger - flickr

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resource :homepage
map.root :homepage
end
class HomepagesController < ApplicationController
# homepage
def show; end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :contents
map.root :controller => ‘contents’, :action => ‘show’,
:page => ‘homepage’
end
class ContentsController < ApplicationController
# static content
def show
# code to find a template named according to params[:page]
end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :ads
map.root :ads
end
class AdsController < ApplicationController
# ad index - the million dollar homepage
def index; end
end

Dashboard hel2005 - flickr

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resource :dashboard
end
class DashboardsController < ApplicationController
before_filter :require_login
# dashboard
def show; end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :instruments
end
class InstrumentsController < ApplicationController
before_filter :require_login
# dashboard
def index
@instruments = current_user.instruments
end
end

Preview ashoe - flickr

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :posts, :has_one => [:preview]
end
class PreviewsController < ApplicationController
def create
@post = Post.find(params[:post_id])
@post.attributes = params[:post]
render :template => 'posts/show'
end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :posts
map.resource :preview
end
class PreviewsController < ApplicationController
def create
@post = Post.new(params[:post])
render :template => 'posts/show'
end
end

Search seandreilinger - flickr

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :posts
end
class PostsController < ApplicationController
def index
if params[:query].blank?
@posts = Post.find(:all)
else
@posts = Post.find_for_query(params[:query])
end
end
end

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resource :search
end
class SearchesController < ApplicationController
def show
@results = Searcher.find(params[:query])
end
end

Wizards dunechaser - flickr

/galleries/new

/restaurants/:id/photos/new

/restaurants/:id/photos/edit

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map| map.resources :galleries
map.resources :galleries
map.resources :restaurants, :has_many => [:photos]
map.with_options :controller => 'photos' do |p|
p.edit_restaurant_photos 'restaurants/:restaurant_id/photos/edit',
:action => 'edit'
p.update_restaurant_photos 'restaurants/:restaurant_id/photos/update',
:action => 'update',
:conditions => {:method => :put}
end
end

Collections wooandy - flickr

Web Services josefstuefer - flickr

Staff Directory
Inventory
Search Application Text
RESTful API
HR
etc.

RESTful API Staff Directory
RESTful API Inventory
Search Application Text
RESTful API HR
RESTful API etc.

this slide left intentionally blank
Administration

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.namespace :admin do |admin|
admin.resources :invitations
admin.resources :emails
admin.resources :users
admin.resources :features
end
end

Audience Participation!
what gives you fits?

Rails, Specifically

<%= link_to 'Delete', record, :method => 'delete',
:confirm => 'Are you sure?' %>
<a href=\"/records/1\" onclick=\"if (confirm('Are you sure?')) { var f =
document.createElement('form'); f.style.display = 'none';
this.parentNode.appendChild(f); f.method = 'POST'; f.action = this.href;var m =
document.createElement('input'); m.setAttribute('type', 'hidden');
m.setAttribute('name', '_method'); m.setAttribute('value', 'delete');
f.appendChild(m);f.submit(); };return false;\">Delete</a>
Accessibility

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.users 'users', :controller => ‘users’, :action => ‘index’
map.users 'users', :controller => ‘users’, :action => ‘create’
end
Hand-Written Routes

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :users
# Install the default route as the lowest priority.
map.connect ':controller/:action/:id'
end
Default Routing

Collections wooandy - flickr

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resources :records
end
class RecordsController < ApplicationController
def index; end
def show; end
# ...
end
Mixed

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|
map.resource :record_list
map.resources :records
end
class RecordListsController < ApplicationController
def show; end
# ...
end
class RecordsController < ApplicationController
def show; end
# ...
end
Separated

Audience Participation!
where’s rails bitten you?

Thanks!
ben scofield
ben.scofield@viget.com
http://www.viget.com/extend
http://www.culann.com