Question

I am using devise for my application authentication. I am having a User model which is the sign-in/up model.

The functionality is in such a way that when the client i.e. the user signs up, he’ll be taken to fill in the mandatory user-profile page. Everything worked fine using devise.

Now I have a new functionality, User can be of different types( lets say A, B,C)

If the user is of type A, then he has to follow the same sign up process and the same profile page.

If the user is of type B, then the sign up screen differs and awaits validation from administrator. Different changes for type C too.

All the different types have different profile pages and the fields differ.

So I decided to have a polymorphic association and this is how my models look

class User < ActiveRecord::Base

  devise :database_authenticatable, :registerable,
         :recoverable, :rememberable, :trackable, :validatable

  attr_accessible :email, :password, :password_confirmation, :remember_me

  belongs_to :user_type, :polymorphic => true

end

class A
    has_one :user, :as => :user_type
end

class B
    has_one :user, :as => :user_type
end

class C
    has_one :user, :as => :user_type
end

I just wanna know is this the right way to go about the scenario or is there an better way to implement this?

Answer 1

You want Rails’ magic type column.

# user.rb
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
  # create_table 'users' do |t|
  #   t.string :name
  #   t.string :type
  # end
end

# user_a.rb
class UserA < User
end

# user_b.rb
class UserB < User
end

# user_c.rb
class UserC < User
end

---

UserA.create(name: "bricker")
user_a      = User.where(type: "UserA").first
same_user_a = UserA.all.first

user_a == same_user_a #=> true
user_a.class          #=> UserA
user_a.is_a? User     #=> true

Update

class UserLogin < ActiveRecord::Base
  # create_table :user_logins do |t|
  #   t.integer :user_id
  #   t.string  :user_type
  #   t.string  :login
  #   t.string  :encrypted_password
  # end

  # devise ...
  belongs_to :user, polymorphic: true
end

class User < ActiveRecord::Base
  self.abstract_class = true
  has_one :user_login, as: :user
end

class Admin < User
  # create_table :admins do |t|
  #   t.integer :user_login_id
  #   t.string  :admin_name
  # end
end

class Moderator < User
  # create_table :moderators do |t|
  #   t.integer :user_login_id
  #   t.string  :moderator_name
  # end
end