Ruby convert Object to Hash

Question

Let\'s say I have a Gift object with @name = \"book\" & @price = 15.95. What\'s the best way to convert that to the Hash {na

Answer 1

Might want to try instance_values. That worked for me.

Answer 2

Produces a shallow copy as a hash object of just the model attributes

my_hash_gift = gift.attributes.dup

Check the type of the resulting object

my_hash_gift.class
=> Hash

Answer 3

I started using structs to make easy to hash conversions. Instead of using a bare struct I create my own class deriving from a hash this allows you to create your own functions and it documents the properties of a class.

require 'ostruct'

BaseGift = Struct.new(:name, :price)
class Gift < BaseGift
  def initialize(name, price)
    super(name, price)
  end
  # ... more user defined methods here.
end

g = Gift.new('pearls', 20)
g.to_h # returns: {:name=>"pearls", :price=>20}

Answer 4

You can write a very elegant solution using a functional style.

class Object
  def hashify
    Hash[instance_variables.map { |v| [v.to_s[1..-1].to_sym, instance_variable_get v] }]
  end
end

Answer 5

If you are not in an Rails environment (ie. don't have ActiveRecord available), this may be helpful:

JSON.parse( object.to_json )