Question

I’ve got a (rather simple) model representing a comment:

class Comment < ActiveRecord::Base

    STATES = [:processing, :accepted, :declined]

    belongs_to :note
    belongs_to :author, :class_name => 'User'

    validates_inclusion_of :state, :in => STATES
    validates_presence_of :author

    default_scope :order => 'created_at DESC'

    def initialize( attributes={} )
        super(attributes)

        self.state ||= 'processing'
    end
end

However, everytime I save a comment (with its fields set properly), the author relation always fails to save (well, actually the comment saves successfully, it just leaves out the author…). This goes as far as Comment.first.valid? returning false due to the validation on the author field (Comment.first.author is nil).

My suspicion is that I handle the default value for state-field in a wrong way? If so, how should I set the default value instead?

thx for your help in advance

Answer 1

About the state attribute, it would be better to use an after_initialize callback to set the default instead of overriding the initialize function :

def after_initialize 
 self.state ||= 'processing'
end

To properly override a function you should pass params and args this way :

def initialize(*args,&block)
  super(*args,&block)
  #what-you-want-to-execute
end

Notice that there is often a better way than using this !