Question

I’ve got a user model which contains a field called, lets say, text1. In the users/new form I want to have 4 individual text boxes for this text1. In my model I will take values from these boxes and concatenate them together as comma separated values and store them in the DB. To give you an understanding, this is what I want.

<input type="text" name="user[text1][]" />
<input type="text" name="user[text1][]" />
<input type="text" name="user[text1][]" />
<input type="text" name="user[text1][]" />

How do I get this using form_for helper method? For now please don’t worry yourself about the accessor method in the model, that is all taken care of. Thanks a ton.

Answer 1

Add few virtual attributes to your User model

class User < ActiveRecord::Base
  attr_accessor :text1_part1  
  attr_accessor :text1_part2  
  attr_accessor :text1_part3  
  attr_accessor :text1_part4

  def before_validation
      self.text1 = "#{self.text1_part1}#{self.text1_part2}#{self.text1_part3}#{self.text1_part4}"
  end
  # make sure you fill the correct values for
  # the text parts for an existing record.
  # This can be done by implementing `after_find` or overriding
  # `text1=`.
end  

In your view code use the new attributes instead of text1

<% form_for(:user) do |f| %>
   #some code
   <%= f.text_field :text1_part1>
   <%= f.text_field :text1_part2>
   <%= f.text_field :text1_part3>
   <%= f.text_field :text1_part4>
   #some code
   <%= f.submit "Save">
<% end %>