nikoma / hydra_attribute

hydra_attribute is an implementation of EAV pattern for ActiveRecord models

hydra_attribute

hydra_attribute is an implementation of EAV pattern for ActiveRecord models.

Requirements

• ruby >= 1.9.2
• active_record >= 3.1

Installation

Add the following line to Gemfile:

gem 'hydra_attribute'

and run bundle install from your shell.

Then we should generate our migration:

rails generate migration create_hydra_attributes

The content should be:

class CreateHydraAttributeTables < ActiveRecord::Migration
  def up
    create_hydra_entity :products do |t|
      # add here all other columns that should be in the entity table
      t.timestamps
    end
  end
      
  def down
    drop_hydra_entity :products
  end
end

or if we have already the entity table

class CreateHydraAttributeTables < ActiveRecord::Migration
  def up
    migrate_to_hydra_entity :products
  end
      
  def down
    rollback_from_hydra_entity :products
  end
end

Usage

Create model

rails generate model Product type:string name:string --migration=false
rake db:migrate

and add use_hydra_attributes to Product class

class Product < ActiveRecord::Base
  use_hydra_attributes
end

Starting from version 0.4.0 use_hydra_attributes method will be removed.

class Product < ActiveRecord::Base
  include HydraAttribute::ActiveRecord
end

Create some hydra attributes from rails console

Product.hydra_attributes.create(name: 'color', backend_type: 'string', default_value: 'green')
Product.hydra_attributes.create(name: 'title', backend_type: 'string')
Product.hydra_attributes.create(name: 'total', backend_type: 'integer', default_value: 1)

Creating method accepts the following options:

• name. The required parameter. Allowed any string.

• backend_type. The required parameter. Allowed one of the following strings: string, text, integer, float, boolean and datetime.

• default_value. The optional parameter. Allowed any value. By default is nil.

• white_list. The optional parameter. Should be true or flase. By defauls is false. if pass white_list: true this attribute will be added to white list and will be allowed for mass-assignment. This parameter is in black list for creation by default so if you want to pass it, you have to pass the role as: :admin too.

    Product.hydra_attributes.create({name: 'title', backend_type: 'string', white_list: true}, as: :admin)

Create several objects

Product.create.attributes
# {"id"=>1, created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"green", "title"=>nil, "total"=>1}
Product.create(color: 'red', title: 'toy').attributes
# {"id"=>1, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"red", "title"=>"toy", "total"=>1}
Product.create(title: 'book', total: 2).attributes
# {"id"=>1, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"green", "title"=>"book", "total"=>2} 

Add the new attribute in runtime

Product.hydra_attributes.create(name: 'price', backend_type: 'float', default_value: 0.0)
Product.create(title: 'car', price: 2.50).attributes
# {"id"=>4, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"green", "title"=>"car", "price"=>2.5, "total"=>1} 

Obtain data

Product.where(color: 'red').map(&:attributes)
# [{"id"=>2, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"red", "title"=>"toy", "price"=>0.0, "total"=>1}] 
Product.where(color: 'green', price: nil).map(&:attributes)
# [{"id"=>1, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"green", "title"=>nil, "price"=>0.0, "total"=>1},  
#  {"id"=>3, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"green", "title"=>"book", "price"=>0.0, "total"=>2}] 

Notice: the attribute price was added in runtime and records that were created before have not this attribute so they matched this condition where(price: nil)

Order data

Product.order(:color).first.attributes
# {"id"=>1, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"green", "title"=>nil, "price"=>0.0, "total"=>1} 
Product.order(:color).reverse_order.first.attributes
# {"id"=>2, "created_at"=>..., "updated_at"=>..., "color"=>"red", "title"=>"toy", "price"=>0.0, "total"=>1}

Select concrete attributes

Product.select([:color, :title]).map(&:attributes)
# [{"id"=>1, "color"=>"green", "title"=>nil}, {"id"=>2, "color"=>"red", "title"=>"toy"},  
#  {"id"=>3, "color"=>"green", "title"=>"book"}, {"id"=>4, "color"=>"green", "title"=>"car"}]

Notice: id attribute will be added if we want to select hydra attribute

Group by attribute

Product.group(:color).count
# {"green"=>3, "red"=>1}

Notice

The each new minor version doesn't guarantee back compatibility with previous one until the first major version will be released.

Contributing

1. Fork it
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Added some feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature)
5. Create new Pull Request