My Pragmatig life

Update: switch to acts_as_taggable_on_steroids more features, less pain/bugs

Need simple input/output for tags and got acts_as_taggable_on_steroids ?

#vendor/plugins/acts_as_taggable_on_steroids/lib/acts_as_taggable.rb
#new @ LINE 189
        def tags_as_text
          tag_list
        end

        def tags_as_text= text
          self.tag_list = text
        end

and in your forms:

f.text_area('tags_as_text')

Done!

#Spec:
  it "does not create duplicated tags" do
    @taggable.tags_as_text = "Bad, Bad, Evil"
    @taggable.save!
    @taggable.tags.size.should == 2
  end

#Often need count of Tags ?
#taggings.rb
belongs_to :tag, :counter_cache=>'taggings_count'

Too many crappy tutorials around, with wrong or only partial information of how to get started. Took me almost 2 hours to get it working, so here comes a short How To/Summary for future reference.

1. sudo apt-get install hyperestraier
2. sudo nano /etc/default/hyperestraier (change NO_START from 1 to 0) -> autostart on boot
3. sudo /etc/init.d/hyperestraier start
4. http://localhost:1978/ -> admin/admin -> create new nodes (xx_test/xx_dev/xx_prod)
5. script/plugin install svn://poocs.net/plugins/acts_as_searchable
6. database.yml (for ever environment):

   estraier:
     host: localhost
     user: admin
     password: admin
     port: 1978
     node: xx_dev
   

7. >ModelName<.rb: acts_as_searchable details
8. default settings will look for body, so define it (def body; “Hello Hyper”;end; )
9. Add all current models to the fulltext search:
   script/console test
   >ModelName<.reindex!
10. Check back in the corresponding node @ http://localhost:1978/ to see if documents have been created
11. play around with >ModelName<.fulltext_search

Hope this helps

more detailed help

Auto complete solution, with customizable results (return just the word or word+id…) and no framework dependency, just use a plain text_field + class=> autocomplete and every autocomplete libary you like (included: jQuery).

# Controller
class BlogController < ApplicationController
  simple_auto_complete_for :post, :title
end

#Customized....
simple_auto_complete_for :post, :title do |items,method|
  render :text => items.map{|item| "#{item.send(method)} -- #{item.id}"}.join("\n")
end

# View
<%= text_field :post, title, :class => 'autocomplete', 'autocomplete_url'=>auto_complete_for_post_title_posts_path %>

#JS
#any library you like
#(includes examples for jquery jquery.js + jquery.autocomplete.js + jquery.autocomplete.css )
jQuery(function($){//on document ready
  //autocomplete
  $('input.autocomplete').each(function(){
    var input = $(this);
    input.autocomplete(input.attr('autocomplete_url'));
  });
});

.

Not as thought free as the default version, but gives you a lot more control.

script/plugin install http://small-plugins.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/simple_auto_complete/
README

Since no one wants to write the documentation, the simplest solution would be to let everyone write documentation, without noticing…

Normal documentation:

An Organisation is a firm or school that has an
address(required) and can have users as members.

Pragmatig documentation with examples:

Organisation:
- requires an address
  organisation.address
- can have users as members
  organisation.members << User

Test:

describe Organisation do
  it "requires an address" do
    @organisation.should_not be_valid?
    @organisation.address = Address.new
    @organisation.should be_valid
  end

  it "can have users as members" do
    @organisation.should be_valid
    @organisation.members << User.new
    @organisation.should be_valid
  end
end
#before :each omitted

With the help of some spec -f or agiledox magic, we can extract:

An Organisation:
- requires an address
- can have users as members

looks familliar ?

I prefer this kind of testing, since it does not generate so many 3-liners(2(do/end)+1) nor uses “it should” all the time, which makes it look more documentation-ish.

DISCLAIMER: This way of writing tests is not RSpec-pure in that it does not use ‘it should’ and has more than on assertion (should) per example.

In case of failure the normal should be_redirect and its friends are far from helpful…

expected redirect? to return true, got false

expected "new", got nil

Now you can have this:

Status should be redirect but was 200(success)
 - rendered addresses/new
 - Flash:
    :error = Address contains errors!
 - Errors:Errors on @address(Address):
     City can't be blank

Usage

• response.should have_succeeded
• response.should have_been_success
• have_failed+have_been_error
• have_missed+have_been_missing
• have_redirected+have_been_redirect
• response.should redirect_to / render_template as normal

Install

script/plugin install http://small-plugins.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/rspec_response_enhancer/

And as added benefit you no longer need to build should be_success when you already have a should render_template, since render_template now gives detailed error messages!