Question

I have this terribly large controller in my app. I’d really like to make it as skinny as possible. Below is some of the code, showing the types of things I’m currently doing.. I’m wondering what things I can move out of this?

A note – this is not my exact code, a lot of it is similar. Essentially every instance variable is used in the views – which is why I dont understand how to put the logic in the models? Can models return the values for instance variables?

  def mine

    #For Pusher
    @push_ch = "#{current_user.company.id}"+"#{current_user.id}"+"#{current_user.profile.id}"

    #Creating a limit for how many items to show on the page
    @limit = 10
    if params[:limit].to_i >= 10
      @limit = @limit + params[:limit].to_i     
    end

    #Setting page location
    @ploc="mine"

    @yourTeam = User.where(:company_id => current_user.company.id)
    #Set the user from the param
    if params[:user]
      @selectedUser = @yourTeam.find_by_id(params[:user])
    end

    #Get all of the user tags
    @tags = Tag.where(:user_id => current_user.id)    

    #Load the user's views
    @views = View.where(:user_id => current_user.id)

    if !params[:inbox]

         #Hitting the DB just once for all the posts
         @main_posts = Post.where(:company_id => current_user.company.id).includes(:status).includes(:views)
         @main_posts.group_by(&:status).each do |status, posts|
           if status.id == @status.id
             if @posts_count == nil
               @posts_count = posts
             else
               @posts_count = @posts_count + posts
             end
           elsif status.id == @status_act.id
             if @posts_count == nil
               @posts_count = posts
             else
               @posts_count = @posts_count + posts
             end
           end
         end

         if params[:status] == "All" || params[:status] == nil
           @posts = Post.search(params[:search]).status_filter(params[:status]).user_filter(params[:user]).order(sort_column + " " + sort_direction).where(:company_id => current_user.company.id, :status_id => [@status.id, @status_act.id, @status_def.id, @status_dep.id, @status_up.id]).limit(@limit).includes(:views)
         else
           @posts = Post.search(params[:search]).status_filter(params[:status]).user_filter(params[:user]).order(sort_column + " " + sort_direction).where(:company_id => current_user.company.id).limit(@limit).includes(:views)
         end

    elsif params[:inbox] == "sent"

         @yourcompanylist = User.where(:company_id => current_user.company.id).select(:id).map(&:id)
          @yourcompany = []
          @yourcompanylist.each do |user|
            if user != current_user.id
            @yourcompany=@yourcompany.concat([user])  
            end
          end

          if params[:t]=="all"
            @posts = Post.search(params[:search]).status_filter(params[:status]).user_filter(params[:user]).tag_filter(params[:tag], current_user).order(sort_column + " " + sort_direction).where(:user_id => current_user.id).includes(:views, :tags).limit(@limit)
          elsif params[:status]!="complete"
            @posts = Post.search(params[:search]).status_filter(params[:status]).user_filter(params[:user]).tag_filter(params[:tag], current_user).order(sort_column + " " + sort_direction).where(:user_id => current_user.id).includes(:views, :tags).limit(@limit)
          elsif params[:status]!=nil
            @posts = Post.search(params[:search]).status_filter(params[:status]).user_filter(params[:user]).tag_filter(params[:tag], current_user).order(sort_column + " " + sort_direction).where(:user_id => current_user.id).includes(:views, :tags).limit(@limit)
          end

    end

    respond_to do |format|
      format.html # index.html.erb
      format.js # index.html.erb
      format.xml  { render :xml => @posts }
    end
  end

Answer 1

You can start by moving logic into the model…

A line like this screams of feature envy:

@push_ch = "#{current_user.company.id}"+"#{current_user.id}"+"#{current_user.profile.id}"

I would recommend moving it into the model:

#user.rb
def to_pusher_identity
  "#{self.company_id}#{self.id}#{self.profile_id}"
end

And then in your controller

@push_ch = current_user.to_pusher_identity

At this point you could even move this into a before_filter.

before_filter :supports_pusher, :only => :mine

Another thing you can do is create richer associations, so you can express:

@tags = Tag.where(:user_id => current_user.id)    

as

@tags = current_user.tags

Another example would be for main posts, instead of

Post.where(:company_id => current_user.company.id).includes(:status).includes(:views)

you would go through the associations:

current_user.company.posts.includes(:status).includes(:views)