Display inactive record objects to JSON / XML [RoR]
I am testing a small whois API using the ruby whois gem, and because the whois response format is quite funny, I was sometimes asked not to use ActiveRecord to save responses.
Simply put, this is how it works:
- User enters domain name in form from view (action 'lookup' = create request)
- The controller catches this parameter, then sends it to the model (non activerecord), initiating the request object [containing the whois response]
- The model uses the whois gem and sends back the whois response to the controller
- The controller sends the response in different formats (html / json / xml), but only the html object receives the object.
Here is the code for the "search" action for my "requests" controller:
def lookup
domain = params[:domain]
@request = Request.new.search(domain)
respond_to do |format|
if @request != nil
format.html
format.json { render :json => @request}
format.xml {render :xml => @request}
else
format.html { render :new }
format.json { render json: @request.errors, status: :unprocessable_entity }
end
end
Obviously I'm having a hard time because I'm not using ActiveRecord, and since RoR is expecting it, it keeps spilling nilClass exceptions.
So, when I go to localhost:8080/requests/lookup
, everything displays fine and @request contains all the data I want. But wether localhost:8080/requests/lookup.json
or localhost:8080/requests/lookup.xml
nothing shows up and if I try to give instructions in the builders (Jbuilder / XMLBuilder) it throws a nilClass exception, proving that the variable scope is not so global ...
And no, I don't think including a variable in the session is a good idea: I will only use it for one request.
If necessary, I'll be happy to provide more of my own code if it helps you understand my problem. I know AR is the way to go, but nevertheless I'm curious to know how to get around it for situations like this.
Thank!
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You can use ActiveModel even if you are not using ActiveRecord. Rails 4 made this very easy. You can also add ActiveModel :: Serialization which allows you to serialize objects using .to_json
and.to_xml
class WhoisLookup
include ActiveModel::Model
include ActiveModel::Serializers::JSON
include ActiveModel::Serializers::Xml
attr_accessor :search_term # ...
# you can use all the ActiveModel goodies
validates :search_term, presence: true, length: {in:2..255}
end
ActiveModel :: Serialization will allow you to use:
format.json { render :json => @result } # calls @result.to_json
PS. don't use @request
for variable names (maybe @result?), you are bound to run into problems and confusion with ActionDispatch::Request
.
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