Question

I’m using Devise for authentication in Ruby on Rails and I’m overriding the registration update controller to not require the current password for updates to the User model. So, basically the code below says “if the user does not provide the password, update using update_without_password, otherwise update using update_attributes“.

if resource_params["password"].empty?

    if resource.update_without_password(resource_params)
      if is_navigational_format?
        if resource.respond_to?(:pending_reconfirmation?) && resource.pending_reconfirmation?
          flash_key = :update_needs_confirmation
        end
        set_flash_message :notice, flash_key || :updated
      end
      sign_in resource_name, resource, :bypass => true
      respond_with resource, :location => after_update_path_for(resource)
    else
      clean_up_passwords resource
      respond_with resource
    end

else

    if resource.update_attributes(resource_params)
      if is_navigational_format?
        if resource.respond_to?(:pending_reconfirmation?) && resource.pending_reconfirmation?
          flash_key = :update_needs_confirmation
        end
        set_flash_message :notice, flash_key || :updated
      end
      sign_in resource_name, resource, :bypass => true
      respond_with resource, :location => after_update_path_for(resource)
    else
      clean_up_passwords resource
      respond_with resource
    end

end 

Clearly, there is room to reduce code redundancy here, but I’m still new to ruby and was wondering if anyone could suggest a clean way to write the same thing without duplicating all the code in the nested if.

Thanks!

Answer 1

If I am reading you right, and not missing anything, there is only a single line of difference there. You can write it like this:

result = if resource_params["password"].empty?
    resource.update_without_password(resource_params)
  else 
    resource.update_attributes(resource_params)
  end

if result
  if is_navigational_format?
    if resource.respond_to?(:pending_reconfirmation?) && resource.pending_reconfirmation?
      flash_key = :update_needs_confirmation
    end
    set_flash_message :notice, flash_key || :updated
  end
  sign_in resource_name, resource, :bypass => true
  respond_with resource, :location => after_update_path_for(resource)
else
  clean_up_passwords resource
  respond_with resource
end