Better way to concatenate options to collection_select?

rubyonrails-talk
1

I've just been through 4 pages of similar threads, but nothing quite satisfying.

What I'm trying to achieve:

<select>   <option value="-1">Please select</option>   <option value="0">ALL</option>   <option value="1">Forum 1</option>   <option value="2">Forum 2</option>   ... <select>

The way I'm currently doing it:

# Plugin class FakeModel   def initialize(hash)     @hash = hash   end

  def id     @hash[:id]   end

  def method_missing(meth_id)     @hash[meth_id]   end end

# Controller @forums = [   FakeModel.new(:id => -1, :name => 'Please select'),   FakeModel.new(:id => 0, :name => 'ALL') ] + Forum.all(:order => 'name')

# View <%= collection_select :thread, 'forum_id', @forums, :id, :name %>

Just wondering if there's a more natural (and undocumented) way of doing it...

2

# View <%= collection_select :thread, 'forum_id', @forums, :id, :name %>

Just wondering if there's a more natural (and undocumented) way of doing it...

In a small experiment,

collection_select :thread, 'forum_id', @forums, :id, :name, :prompt => true, :include_blank => 'All'

seems to work for me. If that doesn't work out, i'd use select instead of collection_select - collection_select is trying to make one use case of select easier, but if you're jumping through hoops then it's no longer easier than just using select.

Fred

3

Frederick Cheung wrote:

In a small experiment,

collection_select :thread, 'forum_id', @forums, :id, :name, :prompt => true, :include_blank => 'All'

seems to work for me. If that doesn't work out, i'd use select instead of collection_select - collection_select is trying to make one use case of select easier, but if you're jumping through hoops then it's no longer easier than just using select.

Overwriting ActionView::Helpers::InstanceTag#add_options() could also work:

module ActionView   # Find original in /usr/lib64/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-2.3.5/lib/action_view/helpers/form_options_helper.rb   module Helpers     class InstanceTag       private         def add_options(option_tags, options, value = nil)           if options[:start_with]             options[:start_with].reverse_each do |element|               option_text, option_value = option_text_and_value(element)               selected_attribute = ' selected="selected"' if options[:selected] && option_value_selected?(option_value, options[:selected])               option_tags = "<option value=\"#{html_escape(option_value.to_s)}\"#{selected_attribute}>#{html_escape(option_text.to_s)}</option>\n" + option_tags             end           end           if options[:end_with]             options[:end_with].reverse_each do |element|               option_text, option_value = option_text_and_value(element)               selected_attribute = ' selected="selected"' if options[:selected] && option_value_selected?(option_value, options[:selected])               option_tags += "<option value=\"#{html_escape(option_value.to_s)}\"#{selected_attribute}>#{html_escape(option_text.to_s)}</option>\n"             end           end           if options[:include_blank]             option_tags = "<option value=\"\">#{options[:include_blank] if options[:include_blank].kind_of?(String)}</option>\n" + option_tags           end           if value.blank? && options[:prompt]             prompt = options[:prompt].kind_of?(String) ? options[:prompt] : I18n.translate('support.select.prompt', :default => 'Please select')             "<option value=\"\">#{prompt}</option>\n" + option_tags           else             option_tags           end         end     end   end end

Now I could do:

:start_with => [['- Select category -', -1], ['- All -', 0]]

However, select() might be a wiser approach.