Question

This is part of my controller:

if @invite.save
      UserMailer.invite_email(@invite).deliver
      respond_with do |format|
        format.html do
          if request.xhr?
            render :text => "sent" , :layout => false
          else
            flash[:notice] = "Successfully created invite."
            redirect_to @invite
          end
        end
      end
    else
      render :action => 'new'
    end

This is my View:

<h3>Invite a Friend</h3>
<%= form_for @invite, :remote => true do |f| %>
  <%= f.email_field :recipient_email, :class => 'submittable' %></br>
  <%= f.submit %>
<% end %>

What do I need to do so that, for example, the text “sent” or anything I put there appears right above the form on the View?

I tried :update => :status but that didn’t work.

Answer 1

The short answer is that you have to send back javascript that gets executed instead of just sending back text like “sent”. Using your example (and assuming you’re using jQuery):

if request.xhr?
  render :text => "$('#invite_form').before('<div>Sent!</div>');" , :layout => false
else
  ...
end

(Be sure the form has an id and use that instead of #invite_form.)

Since you’re using remote: true on the form it should automatically execute the response. In general though, I think you’d be better served by cleaning up your response logic a little bit and separating the xhr response into its own template. Check out this page under the “Using responds_with” section for some great examples:
http://asciicasts.com/episodes/224-controllers-in-rails-3