find, using a link instead of a form

rubyonrails-talk
1

Hello; Here's the latest puzzle stumping me. Seems it should be simple but I'm feeling like a moron. I would like to have a link that, when clicked, returns the results of a pre-set find.

Here's the deal. I'm working on a contact management and scheduling app for the photo studio I work for. I want our staff to be able to create assignments (think of them as events). Most of the time when an assignment is booked, a date and time are established. But sometimes the date isn't certain. Other times we find that an assignment needs to be rescheduled but the client doesn't yet know when.

In either of those cases, the database column "starts_at" (of type datetime) will be empty.

I would like the user interface to have a link (something like "Pending Assignments") which, when clicked, would find and display all assignments for which starts_at is empty. Or starts_at.year, or starts_at.day or whatever.

I want this to be a link rather than a form input because the find criteria is always going to be the same.

I installed the Searchlogic gem but can't come up with how to get it to do what I want.

I have an index action in the assignments_controller that basically does an @assignments = Assignment.find(:all). Can I leverage that so that it returns a select set if there is some criteria and all Assignments if not? I guess the "some criteria" part is what eludes me.

Thanks for any suggestions and pointers.

Steve

2

Uh, why not just create an appropriate controller method, something like 'pending', and use that as the link, e.g. '/assignments/pending' ?

FWIW,

3

Thanks;

Uh, why not just create an appropriate controller method, something like 'pending', and use that as the link, e.g. '/assignments/pending' ?

I'll give that a try. I'm probably over-thinking things - was trying named_scopes and other new (to me) stuff - but probably basic is better here? Steve

4

You could use a named_scope in your model -- I would -- and then combine that with a custom route/controller method to invoke it.

That seems pretty minimalist :slight_smile:

5

Thanks again.

That seems pretty minimalist :slight_smile:

I like minimalist. Will head in that direction and shout if I fall down any holes along the way. Which is likely.

Steve