Question

In my app I have a article and comment model. I implemented a reply-feature, so that a user can reply to another comment by simply putting the id of the comment they want to quote in the comment form like this: #26 (to quote comment with id 26). This all works fine, with the regex and reply to user_id attr:
extract from my comments_controller create action:

  if @comment.content.match(/(#([1-9]+))\s/)
  iteration_fragment = $2
  iteration_id = %Q{#{ iteration_fragment }}
  if @replied_to_comment = @article.comments.where(:iteration_id => iteration_id).first
    @comment.in_reply_to_user_id = @replied_to_comment.user_id
  end
  end

Now, without creating a new model, I just want to put a ‘html helper layer’ on top of my comment system, so that these fragments such as “#33” automatically are converted to a “#33” onmouseover link, showing the content of comment 33 onmouseover. So I don’t want bb code quoting, but rather be really minimalist.
Does anybody know, what I’m looking for and how it should be approached?

Answer 1

The word automatic makes me think that the only way you could do this is with jQuery..

$("input#your_selected_input").keyup(function(){
  $this = $(this);
  if ($this.val().match(/(#([1-9]+))\s/) {
    $matches = $this.val().match(/(#([1-9]+))\s/
    $this.parent().after($this.html().replace( $matches[0], $("<a/>").html()));
  }
});

That’s the automatic part..

To make the page load with the content in Rails, it would be something like :

In your comment model

def special_sauce_text
   matches = content.match(/(#([1-9]+))\s/)
   magic_sauce_links = []
   new_content = content
   if matches.present?
     for match in matches do
       magic_sauce_link << link_to(match, match, :class => 'your-special-stuff')
       new_content.gsub(match, magic_sauce_link)
     end
   end
   return new_content
end

Then you apply it liberally with :

Comment.special_sauce_text