Let's say that you have a students model/view/controller. You can start by doing things like:
| http://localhost:3000/students | uses index.html.erb, def index |
| http://localhost:3000/students/new | uses new.html.erb, def new |
| http://localhost:3000/students/1 | uses show.html.erb, def new |
- http://localhost:3000/students/feedme
- http://localhost:3000/students/1/feedme
What's happening is that you are requesting a custom action called "feedme." (Normally Ruby's restful interface only allows 7 actions, see more commentary below).
Let me show you how to add custom actions.
Getting http://localhost:3000/students/feedme Working
Step 1:
To class StudentsController add a method:
def feedme
#do something here...
end
Step 2:
To app/views/students/ folder add the following file:
feedme.html.erb
and write the html you want to execute.
Step 3:
To your routes.rb file add
map.resources :students, :collection => {:feedme => :get}
Read the above line something like this: Add a custom action called "feedme" that empoys a http "get" request on the students model.
Note that you will likely already have "map.resources :students" in the routes.rb file to start.
Getting http://localhost:3000/students/1/feedme Working
Do the exact same steps except the routes.rb file should include
map.resources :students, :member => {:feedme => :get}
WARNING
Creating a custom action ought to be done sparingly. Ruby's latest incarnation enforces a restful architecture - part of which includes a uniform interface for all your controls. When you add custom controls you break the uniform interface on this model - so do it only when necessary!
Futher resources:
