Constants and Configurations

rubyonrails-talk
1

Hi,

Right now I have some Constants in my application that serve as configurations for my application. I would like to make these configurations "editable" by the users/admins through views.

What is the best strategy to do this?

2

Put them in the database.

Colin

3

Hi Colin,

I see how could that go, but what If my configurations are of different types?

Is there a gem that provides some helper methods that you could recommend?

I am using rails 3.

Tiago Veloso ti.veloso@gmail.com

4

Hi Colin,

I see how could that go, but what If my configurations are of different types?

I don't understand what you mean.

Is there a gem that provides some helper methods that you could recommend?

I don't know of one. It hardly seems worthwhile for a table with one record and whatever fields you want. Perhaps I don now understand your comment above. You are thinking of one row per item. Instead make it one record with a field for each constant of whatever type is appropriate.

Colin

5

I am understanding better what you mean.

I was referring to if you have a config that is of boolean type, another config that is integer and another that is of float type. I was picturing one table per type.

Tiago Veloso ti.veloso@gmail.com

6

I am understanding better what you mean.

Please don't top post, it makes it difficult to follow the thread. Insert your reply at appropriate points in the previous message. Thanks

I was referring to if you have a config that is of boolean type, another config that is integer and another that is of float type. I was picturing one table per type.

As I suggested in my previous post, have one table with a single row and a field for each configuration value.

Colin

7

Hi Tiago,

I don't know the details of your problem but you might wanna look into a NoSQL solution. It will add some overhead in setting it up but it could be a nice fit for your problem. I don't have a complete overview of all NoSQL solutions but Redis or MongoDB should be a good fit.

That said, you will most likely be able to do anything you need with a regular relational DB (as laid out by Colin). It really depends on your overall problem set if it makes sense to add something new into your system.

Hope that helps!

Simon

8

I believe I know what you are trying to ask. I had to setup something similar for an application of mine. I have one table with one column for each value type (boolean_value, string_value, integer_value, decimal_value and datetime_value) and a 'code' column for values such as 'timeout minutes'.

In my maintenance pages I have the code field and 5 other fields, one for each column type. So far I have not used the datetime_value field but you never know. I validate that one and only one of the "value" fields is entered and make sure that if the chosen field is the boolean_value one it is either true or false to avoid mistakes such as the user not entering any values on the screens and pressing Enter. Another thing I am doing for security purposes is that once the record has been created the user must 'unlock' the code field in the editable pages to be able to change it and when he/she does an alert is displayed saying that if the code value is changed the application might stop working.

I hope this helps.