Question

I have a Sentence model that will contain a single sentence in the body column. It is important to have only one sentence per row. However, users may enter more than one sentence in the form. Not a problem. I actually want to encourage that.

So what I need to do is split the sentences and save only one sentence per row. I am able to do this in the controller fairly easily (a simple .split(“. “) will do it), however that becomes a bit unmaintainable after time. I really feel like the model should handle this.

So what I am thinking is doing some sort of before_save hook in my Sentence model and doing the split in there. Obviously that creates some problems of its own as well.

Is there a better way to do it?

Answer 1

I would refractor it into a class method, such as:

Semi-Pseudo Code:

class Sentence << ActiveRecord::Base

  def self.split_into_sentences(input)
    input.split(".")
  end

  def self.create_sentences_from_body(body)
    split_into_sentences(body).each{|s| Sentence.create(:body => s)}
  end

end

So you could call in your controller:

Sentence.create_sentences_from_body(params[:text])