Question

I’m studing Ruby on Rails with the “RoR Bible” by Thimothy Fisher. But one of the examples doesn’t work. It’s code – http://pastebin.com/gtjLsdt0
The error is: NoMethodError in Contact#new where line #4 raised:

undefined method `merge' for "first_name":String

that’s my contact_controller. I’m just retyping example’s code, and there weren’t any words about merge

class ContactController < ApplicationController
  def index
    @contacts = Contact.find(:all);
  end

  def show
  end

  def new
    @contact = Contact.new;
  end

  def create
  end

  def update
  end

end

What is wrong??

Answer 1

Lol that example is completely wrong!

Instead of writing sth like this:

<%= f.text_field 'contact', 'first_name' %>

You should write

<%= f.text_field :first_name %>

Because by using f.field_type you assign the field to the :contact form which provides the f methods by iteration! Also you can write

<%= f.label :first_name, "description of first_name" %>

Instead of writing it manual!

// I loked up the book you refered it seems to be quit outdated. You may buy “The Rails 3 Way” or sth. that can hold up to the current rails version!