Question

I want to model messages between users, here is the requirement:

1. User has received and sent messages, and should be retrieved by user.received_messages and user.sent_messages

2. Message has sender and receiver, and should be retrieved by message.sender and message.receiver.

I have created the User model as:

script/generate model User name:string 

and Message model as:

script/generate model Message content:text sender_id:integer receiver_id:integer 

I have come up with the Message like below, and it works as wish

class Message < ActiveRecord::Base     belongs_to :sender, :class_name=>'User', :foreign_key=>'sender_id'     belongs_to :receiver, :class_name=>'User', :foreign_key=>'receiver_id' end 

but I don’t know how to model the User, any advise is appreciated.

Answer 1

Just as in the Message model:

class User < ActiveRecord::Base   has_many :sent_messages, :class_name => 'Message', :foreign_key => 'sender_id'   has_many :received_messages, :class_name => 'Message', :foreign_key => 'receiver_id' end