Default Page

Rails
1

Hi there,

I want to have a default index page which just uses the layout (from
layout/application.html.erb) - however the default index page in public
does not seem to use the layouts, it doesnt need to call any controller
at this point just display the default layout, how can I achieve this?

Thanks

2

Hi Pete,

On Fri, 2009-08-14 at 19:15 +0200, Pete M. wrote:

Hi there,

I want to have a default index page which just uses the layout (from
layout/application.html.erb) - however the default index page in public
does not seem to use the layouts, it doesnt need to call any controller
at this point just display the default layout, how can I achieve this?

You have to get rid of public/index.html. All pages delivered by Rails
result from calls to controller methods. If all you want is to render
the default layout, then just define an empty view that gets rendered
via an empty controller method and either call the method explicitly or
make it your default with map.root.

HTH,
Bill

3

bill walton wrote:

Hi Pete,

On Fri, 2009-08-14 at 19:15 +0200, Pete M. wrote:

Hi there,

I want to have a default index page which just uses the layout (from
layout/application.html.erb) - however the default index page in public
does not seem to use the layouts, it doesnt need to call any controller
at this point just display the default layout, how can I achieve this?

You have to get rid of public/index.html. All pages delivered by Rails
result from calls to controller methods. If all you want is to render
the default layout, then just define an empty view that gets rendered
via an empty controller method and either call the method explicitly or
make it your default with map.root.

HTH,
Bill
Thanks Bill,

So I should just set a empty view in one of my controllers, or should I
create a dummy controller just for this index page?

Pete

4

On Fri, 2009-08-14 at 19:34 +0200, Pete M. wrote:

Thanks Bill,

You’re welcome.

So I should just set a empty view in one of my controllers, or should I
create a dummy controller just for this index page?

After thinking about your earlier post a bit more though I’d say you may
want to think this thing through a bit more.

A layout contains the base html for the site’s pages including the

section and components of the section that are common to all the pages that will use that layout. Headers, footers, navigation, etc. Each 'page' delivers its content into the <%= yield %> in the layout.

If all the rest of the site’s pages will display everything that’s on
the index page, then either of the approaches you mention would work and
it’s just a judgment call. That would be a pretty unusual index page,
though. At least in my experience.

Best regards,
Bill

5

Well in this case its the start of a admin section of a site, where
firstly it just displays the left nav and the main content is blank.
Perhaps in the future the main content won’t be blank but for now thats
how it is.

Its also makes me think about how controllers should work in this case,
as this is effectively a home page and doesn’t use any of the other
controllers until a option has been selected from the nav - so using a
blank def from one of the other controllers seems a bit odd.

I was thinking perhaps there should be a ‘home’ controller and home
model, which at the moment the home model did nothing, but perhaps did
something later…

Thanks again for your help!

Pete