Rails has_many through form with checkboxes and extra field in the join model

Question

I\'m trying to solve a pretty common (as I thought) task.

There\'re three models:

class Product < ActiveRecord::Base  
  validates :name, presence         


        

Answer 1

use accepts_nested_attributes_for to insert into intermediate table i.e. categorizations view form will look like -

# make sure to build product categorizations at controller level if not already
class ProductsController < ApplicationController
  before_filter :build_product, :only => [:new]
  before_filter :load_product, :only => [:edit]
  before_filter :build_or_load_categorization, :only => [:new, :edit]

  def create
    @product.attributes = params[:product]
    if @product.save
      flash[:success] = I18n.t('product.create.success')
      redirect_to :action => :index
    else
      render_with_categorization(:new)
    end
  end 

  def update
    @product.attributes = params[:product]
    if @product.save
      flash[:success] = I18n.t('product.update.success')
      redirect_to :action => :index
    else
      render_with_categorization(:edit)
    end
  end

  private
  def build_product
    @product = Product.new
  end

  def load_product
    @product = Product.find_by_id(params[:id])
    @product || invalid_url
  end

  def build_or_load_categorization
    Category.where('id not in (?)', @product.categories).each do |c|
      @product.categorizations.new(:category => c)
    end
  end

  def render_with_categorization(template)
    build_or_load_categorization
    render :action => template
  end
end

Inside view

= form_for @product do |f|
  = f.fields_for :categorizations do |c|
   %label= c.object.category.name
   = c.check_box :category_id, {}, c.object.category_id, nil
   %label Description
   = c.text_field :description