Question

I want the user to click a link that will modify an ActiveRecord entry. The record is called feed.disabled and the link will toggle that record between true and false. I made a helper method to determine the text for the link:

def disable_button(feed)
  if feed.disabled?
    return 'Enable Feed'
  else
    return 'Disable Feed'
  end
end

So my question is really two-fold. Will that helper work to display the correct text in the view, and how do I get that link to modify the feed.disabled record to true or false depending on what the current state is?

Edit to add methods based on Dave’s guide:

feeds_controller.rb:

def toggle_disabled_record
  @feed = Project.find(params[:project_id]).feeds.find(params[:id])
  @feed.toggle!(:disabled)
  render :nothing => true
end

projects->show.html.erb:

<%= link_to toggle_disable_button(feed), toggle_disabled_record_project_feed_path(feed) %>

routes.rb:

resources :projects do
  resources :feeds
end

resources :feeds do
  resources :xml_fields
  get toggle_disabled_record, :on => :member
end

Answer 1

Take a look at (my) this blog post; it’s a link, not a button, but more or less directly addresses this.