Ruby-on-rails – ruby on rails find_or_initialize

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Is there any better way to achieve this in Ruby on Rails?

I'm searching for 11 fields and all are required also, and if not found initialize it.

There will be more required fields adding to it.

This query works perfect for me, but it just doesn't look like the best way to do this.

find_or_initialize_by_make_and_country_and_engine_and_power_and_body_and_doors_and_fuel_and_cylinders_and_transmission_and_gears_and_wheels(model,country,engine,power,body, doors, fuel, cylinders, transmission,gears,wheels)

Best Answer

On rails 3.2 I would do

attributes = {}
Model.where(attributes).first_or_initialize

Documentation http://apidock.com/rails/ActiveRecord/Relation/first_or_initialize

Related Solutions

Ruby-on-rails – How to get a random number in Ruby

Use rand(range)

From Ruby Random Numbers:

If you needed a random integer to simulate a roll of a six-sided die, you'd use: 1 + rand(6). A roll in craps could be simulated with 2 + rand(6) + rand(6).

Finally, if you just need a random float, just call rand with no arguments.

As Marc-André Lafortune mentions in his answer below (go upvote it), Ruby 1.9.2 has its own Random class (that Marc-André himself helped to debug, hence the 1.9.2 target for that feature).

For instance, in this game where you need to guess 10 numbers, you can initialize them with:

10.times.map{ 20 + Random.rand(11) } 
#=> [26, 26, 22, 20, 30, 26, 23, 23, 25, 22]

Note:

Using Random.new.rand(20..30) (using Random.new) generally would not be a good idea, as explained in detail (again) by Marc-André Lafortune, in his answer (again).
But if you don't use Random.new, then the class method rand only takes a max value, not a Range, as banister (energetically) points out in the comment (and as documented in the docs for Random). Only the instance method can take a Range, as illustrated by generate a random number with 7 digits.

This is why the equivalent of Random.new.rand(20..30) would be 20 + Random.rand(11), since Random.rand(int) returns “a random integer greater than or equal to zero and less than the argument.” 20..30 includes 30, I need to come up with a random number between 0 and 11, excluding 11.

Ruby-on-rails – How to understand nil vs. empty vs. blank in Ruby

.nil? can be used on any object and is true if the object is nil.

.empty? can be used on strings, arrays and hashes and returns true if:

String length == 0
Array length == 0
Hash length == 0

Running .empty? on something that is nil will throw a NoMethodError.

That is where .blank? comes in. It is implemented by Rails and will operate on any object as well as work like .empty? on strings, arrays and hashes.

nil.blank? == true
false.blank? == true
[].blank? == true
{}.blank? == true
"".blank? == true
5.blank? == false
0.blank? == false

.blank? also evaluates true on strings which are non-empty but contain only whitespace:

"  ".blank? == true
"  ".empty? == false

Rails also provides .present?, which returns the negation of .blank?.

Array gotcha: blank? will return false even if all elements of an array are blank. To determine blankness in this case, use all? with blank?, for example:

[ nil, '' ].blank? == false
[ nil, '' ].all? &:blank? == true

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ruby-on-rails – How to get a random number in Ruby

Ruby-on-rails – How to understand nil vs. empty vs. blank in Ruby

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