I have an order form that is comprised of a lot of :has_many and
:has_one associations. I want to load the object into the session, with
all associations and edit it.
I want the whole submission process to be done atomically for objects at
once. So if I add or edit items on the order, I don't want to be saved
to the database until the user clicks submit.
The problem is that I save the order in the session, but the
associations get refreshed every time the page reloads. I looked at the
code in ction_controller/session_management.rb and
clear_persistent_model_associations() takes care of removing
associations.
I have an order form that is comprised of a lot of :has_many and
:has_one associations. I want to load the object into the session, with
all associations and edit it.
I want the whole submission process to be done atomically for objects at
once. So if I add or edit items on the order, I don't want to be saved
to the database until the user clicks submit.
The problem is that I save the order in the session, but the
associations get refreshed every time the page reloads. I looked at the
code in ction_controller/session_management.rb and
clear_persistent_model_associations() takes care of removing
associations.
Any suggestions on how to handle this?
You can serialize and deserialize the whole structure with
to_json and from_json, specifying the includes.
But because cookie sessions are limited to 4KB, you should
probably store associated ids instead. e.g. create a model
attribute that on read converts a has_many to an array of ids,
and on write populates the has_many from an array. The
association is re-loaded, but you re-create the right set of
associates.
code in ction_controller/session_management.rb and
clear_persistent_model_associations() takes care of removing
associations.
Any suggestions on how to handle this?
You can serialize and deserialize the whole structure with
to_json and from_json, specifying the includes.
Marshal dump() and load() saves associated objects, too. Is there some
specific reason why I should use json?
Maybe I need to explain what I want to achieve. I have an order with a
multitude of associated associations which, to further complicate
things, have more associations, like extra charges.
Something like:
order has many containers
container has many extra charges
The user edits the order, adds or deletes containers, adds or deletes
extra charges to the containers. The problem is that I want all the
changes to be saved the the user presses the "Save order" button, not
when he adds or edits each container or extra charge. I wanted to save
the whole order and associations in the session until it's ready to save
in one atomic operation, but it seems there's no easy way to do this
with the way Rails and ActiveRecord works.
Order.find(20).containers.size
=> 1
?> o = Order.find(20)
=> #<ImportOrder:0x46b3934 @attributes=....
o.containers.size
=> 1
o.containers = Hash.new #This will delete all containers in the database, not just in the memory.
=> {}
Order.find(20).containers.size
=> 0
So when I work with activerecord objects, they might get commited to the
database when I don't really want that.
Maybe I need to explain what I want to achieve. I have an order with a
multitude of associated associations which, to further complicate
things, have more associations, like extra charges.
Something like:
order has many containers
container has many extra charges
The user edits the order, adds or deletes containers, adds or deletes
extra charges to the containers. The problem is that I want all the
changes to be saved the the user presses the "Save order" button, not
when he adds or edits each container or extra charge. I wanted to save
the whole order and associations in the session until it's ready to save
in one atomic operation
I found a way to keep all my order objects into the session until they
are ready to be saved: redefine clear_association_cache for class order
and it's subclasses.
def clear_association_cache
return if self.class.to_s =~ /Order$/
super
end