On 3 April 2012 18:32, Fearless Fool <[email protected]> wrote: > (This is may be more of a db design question than a rails question.) > > Summary: > > I'm thinking of creating a single AR class to hold constant symbol > values and use it for :has_many_through relations whenever I need a > constant symbol. Is this a good idea or a bad idea? > > Details: > > I notice that I have a lot of models that contain just a name string: > > create_table "natural_resources", :force => true do |t| > t.string "name" > end > > create_table "roles", :force => true do |t| > t.string "name" > end > > ... etc ... > > These moels are always joined through a has_many_through relation to > some other object (e.g. User :has_many :roles, :through => :user_roles), > and the names are treated effectively as constant symbols. > > So I'm thinking of consolidating these models into a single one: > > create_table :symbols, :force => true do |t| > t.string :name > end > add_index :symbols, :name, :unique=>true > > class Util::Symbol < ActiveRecord::Base > validates :name, :presence => true > def self.intern(name) > (r = where(:name => name.to_s)).create! > rescue ActiveRecord::RecordNotUnique > r.first > end > end > > ... and using this wherever I'd previously used separate classes. This > feels DRYer. > > Can anyone give a strong argument for or against this approach?
Do you mean that the only thing in your roles and natural_resources tables are the names? If so then you could put them in one table. Consider the situation where a role and a natural_resource happened to have the same name however. If you decided to change the name of the role then that would also change the name of the natural_resource. Colin -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Ruby on Rails: Talk" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rubyonrails-talk?hl=en.
