Warning
As stated in the git repository as the original author of this code: "This library is no longer supported or actively developed by the original author. It never made it to a 1.0 stable version. Use it at your own risk and write lots of tests."
..So why I am trying to make it Rails 3 compatible? Well, I have an application which uses this code, and as I'd like to upgrade it to Rails 3 I guess I should keep this code base up to date too. But, you might want to think twice if you want to use this in your new and shining Rails 3 application..
Are you paranoid?
Destroying records is a one-way ticket--you are permanently sending data down the drain. Unless, of course, you are using this plugin.
Simply declare models paranoid:
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
is_paranoid
end
You will need to add the "deleted_at" datetime column on each model table you declare paranoid. This is how the plugin tracks destroyed state.
Destroying
Calling destroy should work as you expect, only it doesn't actually delete the record:
User.count #=> 1
User.first.destroy
User.count #=> 0
# user is still there, only hidden:
User.count_with_destroyed #=> 1
What destroy does is that it sets the "deleted_at" column to the current time.
Records that have a value for "deleted_at" are considered deleted and are filtered
out from all requests using default_scope ActiveRecord feature:
default_scope :conditions => {:deleted_at => nil}
Restoring
No sense in keeping the data if we can't restore it, right?
user = User.find_with_destroyed(:first)
user.restore
User.count #=> 1
Restoring resets the "deleted_at" value back to nil.
Extra methods
Extra class methods provided by this plugin are:
Model.count_with_destroyed(*args)Model.find_with_destroyed(*args)Model.destroyed# Returns all destroyed, accepts a block with where() etc. See spec for examples.
Pitfalls
validates_uniqueness_ofdoes not ignore items marked with a "deleted_at" flag- various eager-loading and associations-related issues (see "Killing is_paranoid")