Question

Imagine this structure:

   /project
       /templates
          view1.haml
          view2.haml
          misc_views/
             view3.haml
             view4.haml
             even_deeper/
               view5.haml
       /public
          script1.js

The depth of the templates can vary, and I would like to refer to the public directory if I want to include some files from it. Is there a helper or some other gimmick that takes me to the public directory? It seems bad to have something like ../../../public/script1.js , or ../../public/script1.js in my views. Surely there must be a better way.

Answer 1

You can use the settings.public configuration to refer to the public directory. For example:

get "/" do
  js = File.join( settings.public, 'script1.js' )
  File.exists?( js ) #=> true
end

As this is an absolute path, there is no need to make it relative to your view to get the file. You could reach out to this from your view, but I would personally set the path as an instance variable from the controller.

get "/" do
  # If you really only need the directory
  @public = settings.public

  # If you actually need the path to a specific file
  @main = File.join( settings.public, 'main.js' )

  # If you actually need the contents of a file
  @js = IO.read( File.join( settings.public, 'main.js' ) )
end