Is there a special code you have to place in the routes so filtering results through the URL works?
For example, Ruby Forum does it with:
http://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/new?forum_id=3 http://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/new?forum_id=5 http://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/new?forum_id=7 etc.
Any ideas?
Hi Bob,
It seems that the example you gave may be doing something different that what you describe. I believe the forum_id will be used as a value in a new topic form, not as a "filter" for a list of topics.
You might look at this: http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActionController/Resources.html#M000696 Specifically the part about routing association.
If you wanted to "filter" a list of topics by forum_id you might do something like the following: # routes.rb map.resources :forums do |forums| forums.resources :topics end
This would generate routes like forum_topics and new_forum_topic so you could call the following in your controllers & views: # some_view.html.erb <%= link_to "click here to see #{@my_forum.name} topics", forum_topics_path(@my_forum) %>
This would result in a link to /forums/7/topics where @my_forum's id is 7.
For a complete list of routes you've defined try this in your command line: $ rake routes
When GETing the path above, your topics_controller index action will be called. In that method you'll need to look for params[:forum_id] when finding your list of topics for the desired forum: # topics_controller def index if params[:forum_id] #find topics belonging to a specified forum @forum = Forum.find(params[:forum_id]) @topics = @forum.topics else # find all topics @topics = Topic.find(:all) end ... end
Good luck.
*untested code examples
Really appreciate the help, gsterndale! =)
Very detailed. Thank you so much!