Question

I am using Mongoid as my backend and I am in need to return json with an “id” attribute instead of the default “_id” used by mongoid

for instance, I have now

[{
  "_id": "4f2d8b971773eb18e6000001",
  "name": "Scooter"
}, {
  "_id": "4f2d8d9f1773eb18fd000001",
  "name": "Coldplay"
}]

from a call to render:

  format.json { render :json => @groups, only:[:name, :_id] }

but need,

[{
  "id": "4f2d8b971773eb18e6000001",
  "name": "Scooter"
}, {
  "id": "4f2d8d9f1773eb18fd000001",
  "name": "Coldplay"
}]

Any shortcuts?

Thank you!!

Answer 1

If you’re able to add an attribute accessor for _id called just id, then this should be easily solved by overriding as_json in your model.

def id
  self._id
end

def as_json(options={})
  options.merge!(:except => :_id, :methods => :id)
  super(options)
end

Update: Made the override a bit more friendly to the parent method.