Where to put custmized files in Rails app?

rubyonrails-talk
1

All,

This is the first time to play on Rails application. Simple questions: where to locate/store my own *.rb, and *.txt files in my Rails app? I put my *.rb in the components folder so that controllers can see them without problems. Is this the right place to do that? But I may not know where to put *.txt files and how to locate them in controllers.

Thank you in advance.

2

the "components" dir is deprecated and removed in v2.0+ AFAIK

you'd be better off using the lib dir or making a plugin.

3

Thank you for the response.

I am practicing on v1.7 and it works fine. But, if I move the code from components to comp dir in lib, the controller can not fine those fine any more. If I put those files in lib directly, it woks fine again. How can I maintain a structure of directories in Rails?

Thanks,

4

Why do you need to maintain a directory of files? There are preset directories already for anything you do with the Rails MVC framework and the lib directory gives you a spot to put additional modules. Static files that get pushed to the users belong in the public/ directory, etc.

You will need to require the files manually if you use your own subdirectories.

5

The lib directory is included by rails automatically, so any file in there will be included. If you put it elsewhere you'll have to specifically require them yourself.

6

I may not want to have a directory of files anywhere that much but, what if I want to separate my *rb files from *xml files? The case I am having now is that I have to put all my own files in a signal lib directory which I may not like it very much. Is this ture that I cannot have a sub directory in lib?

7

you can have as many subdirectories in lib or anywhere else you want. you will just have to explicitly require those files or write something to auto-require the files in those dirs.

e.g. if you make "lib/myfiles/foo.rb", you'll have to put "require 'myfiles/foo.rb'" to use it

8

Thank you, jemminger.

That works for me now. However, I've got another issue. I have an my_parse.rb file to parse an xml file. The directory for these files is lib/myfiles/my_parse.rb, and lib/myfiles/xml/aa.xml. And also I have a test file in test/unit/my_parse_test.rb. The error message is: Errno::ENOENT: No such file or directory - xml/aa.xml when I put the path to the aa.xml flie like this - xml/aa.xml in my_parse_test.rb. But, it is OK if the aa.xml is in the same dir as my_parse.rb is with the path - aa.xml. So, what is the right path to the aa.xml in my_parse.rb if I put aa.xml file in xml/aa.xml? (like this: lib/myfiles/my_parse.rb, and lib/myfiles/xml/aa.xml)

9

All right, I got it. I should use __FILE__ to identify the path of my_parser.rb and then to locate the xml file.