Don't create view folder on rails generate controller

Question

Is there a way with the usual generators config to turn OFF the creation of the view folders and action templates when you run a rails generate controller?

Answer 1

It's not a well documented feature, but try to add --skip-template-engine (alias --no-template-engine) option to the command.

rails generate controller foo bar --skip-template-engine

demo on a dummy app:

rails g controller my_controller index show --no-template-engine
      create  app/controllers/my_controller_controller.rb
       route  get "my_controller/show"
       route  get "my_controller/index"
      invoke  test_unit
      create    test/functional/my_controller_controller_test.rb
      invoke  helper
      create    app/helpers/my_controller_helper.rb
      invoke    test_unit
      create      test/unit/helpers/my_controller_helper_test.rb
      invoke  assets
      invoke    coffee
      create      app/assets/javascripts/my_controller.js.coffee
      invoke    scss
      create      app/assets/stylesheets/my_controller.css.scss

Answer 2

Just thought I'd try underscoring the --skip-template-engine flag to see if it worked in a generator and it worked a charm! No view templates generated from a bin/rails g controller command in a Rails 4.2 application.

Try:

config.generators do |g|
  g.template_engine false
end

A little late I know but these things stick around in Google! ;)

Answer 3

To skip views from being generated with your controller, disable the template engine.

Once:

rails g controller ControllerName action1 action2 --skip-template-engine

Note that every --skip option also has an aliased --no option.

Default:

# config/application.rb

config.generators do |g|
  g.template_engine false
end

# OR

config.generators.template_engine = false

---

If you have an API-only application (no front end), you may also want to skip assets and helpers from being generated with your controllers.

Once:

rails g controller api/users --no-helper --no-assets --no-template-engine

Default:

# config/application.rb

config.generators do |g|
  g.assets false
  g.helper false
  g.template_engine false
end

# OR

config.generators.assets = false
config.generators.helper = false    
config.generators.template_engine = false

---

Disabling assets skips stylesheets and javascripts from being generated. If you only want to skip one, use --no-stylesheets or --no-javascripts, or in config/application.rb use:

config.generators.stylesheets = false
config.generators.javascripts = false

---

If your default configuration skips something from being generated (e.g. assets and helpers) but you need them in one case, you can generate them like so:

rails g controller foo --helper --assets --skip

where --skip skips generating files that already exist.

Answer 4

If you're creating an API with no front end, you can go ahead and use rails new --api. However, I don't recommend this option if you do plan to create a front end (for example a single page app) because it turns a lot of things off, including the asset pipeline.