DataMarshaller

DataMarshaller is an ActiveRecord mixin for serializing data to a "bytea" column.

Installation

Copy this project as a submodule to your own, or simply copy data_marshaller.rb into whatever
directory you use for libraries / utilities.  Require data_marshaller.rb from your startup
code (environment.rb or other initializers).

Add the following line to your model:

  marshal <column name or names>

You can then use the following methods to access that column as a hash:

  get_data(key)
  set_data(  { key => value } )
  set_data!( { key => value } )   # saves

Note that setting data will not overwrite existing data (see Hash#merge)


Example

  add_column :products, :configuration_options, :binary

  class Product
    marshal :configuration_options
    ...
  end

  >> p = Product.create( :name => 'widget', :configuration_options => { :frame => 'aluminum' } )

  >> p.get_configuration_options(:frame)
  => 'aluminum'

  >> p.set_configuration_options(:face => 'glass')
  => 'glass'

  >> pp p.configuration_options
  ==> {:frame=>"aluminum", :face=>"glass"}


Copyright © 2010 Michael Stangel, Geni.com; Published under The MIT License, see LICENSE