Best way to check session for nil

Hello,

What is the best way in rails to check a session hash value for nil ?
I
have a session hash called user (session[:user]) that sometimes I have
to
check for a certain variable like session[:user].email. however the
following always results in an error

if session[:user].email

and I always have to do

if session[:user] and session[:user].email

Is there a cleaner way to do this then check for nil first everytime and
then a value inside the hash second ? I should also mention that
session[:user] is assigned the User object record from the DB.

thanks
adam

On 4/18/06, Adam D. [email protected] wrote:

if session[:user] and session[:user].email

Is there a cleaner way to do this then check for nil first everytime and
then a value inside the hash second ? I should also mention that
session[:user] is assigned the User object record from the DB.

thanks
adam

One nice way is to make a “null” User object for ‘anonymous or invalid
user’, and make sure that gets set into the session in a
before_filter. That way you don’t have to worry about it being nil;
you just need to check its permissions the way you’d normally do for a
user. Anonymous users simply get no permissions.

Wilson B. wrote:

On 4/18/06, Adam D. [email protected] wrote:

if session[:user] and session[:user].email

Is there a cleaner way to do this then check for nil first everytime and
then a value inside the hash second ? I should also mention that
session[:user] is assigned the User object record from the DB.

thanks
adam

One nice way is to make a “null” User object for ‘anonymous or invalid
user’, and make sure that gets set into the session in a
before_filter. That way you don’t have to worry about it being nil;
you just need to check its permissions the way you’d normally do for a
user. Anonymous users simply get no permissions.

Another way would be to ensure something is entered into
session[:user].email everytime? If nothing is entered, then you put a
space inside or wat, so later if you see a space you know is empty?

Adam D. wrote:

What is the best way in rails to check a session hash value for nil ?

{whatever} if session[:key]

I have a session hash called user (session[:user]) that sometimes I have
to check for a certain variable like session[:user].email. however the
following always results in an error

if session[:user].email

and I always have to do

if session[:user] and session[:user].email

Is there a cleaner way to do this then check for nil first everytime and
then a value inside the hash second ? I should also mention that
session[:user] is assigned the User object record from the DB.

It’s usually better to keep the user_id in the session instead of the
user object. It avoids issues of trying to keep the session object in
sync with the DB version. You can use a before_filter to check that the
user_id is set and load the user model into a @user instance variable.


Josh S.
http://blog.hasmanythrough.com