# Is STI the right way here? **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [August 28, 2007, 3:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-sti-the-right-way-here/113188 "2007-08-28T15:12:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/f04885/32.png) [@jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/jawosis)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2007, 3:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-sti-the-right-way-here/113188/1 "2007-08-28T15:12:18Z")
I want to store information about links, podcasts, blogs, wikis … Each item will have a link, user\_id, created\_at, headline, description… additional a podcast item will have fields like filetype\_id, duration, mb…, blogs will have a additional field like audience… So my intention is to make a big table with the type field and use STI. Is this the recommended way to store such data or is there a more elegant way to solve this? Thanx ---
**Author:** ![jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/f04885/32.png) [@jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/jawosis)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2007, 5:27pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-sti-the-right-way-here/113188/2 "2007-08-28T17:27:49Z")
why not a polimorphic association? ---
**Author:** ![jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/f04885/32.png) [@jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/jawosis)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2007, 9:03pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-sti-the-right-way-here/113188/3 "2007-08-28T21:03:47Z")
Jochen K. wrote: > I want to store information about links, podcasts, blogs, wikis … > > Each item will have a link, user\_id, created\_at, headline, > description… additional a podcast item will have fields like > filetype\_id, duration, mb…, blogs will have a additional field > like audience… > > So my intention is to make a big table with the type field and use > STI. > > Is this the recommended way to store such data or is there a more > elegant way to solve this? If you can manage to fairly narrowly define which columns you’ll need up front then I do think that STI would be the best option here. After all, it’s all content plus a couple of extras here and there. An important operative word in polymorphic associations [1] is “associations”. You could model it such that you have a generalized and polymorphic association called something like “content”, but when you look at it from a functional perspective it really isn’t that much of an association at all – it’s contained within the same object. The point I’m trying to make here is that I think that using polymorphic associations would be a bit of a stretch to make it happen. So in all: STI is a safe bet and seems fit for use in this case. [1] [http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/UnderstandingPolymorphicAssociations](http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/UnderstandingPolymorphicAssociations) – Roderick van Domburg > **[De domeinnaam Nedforce.nl is te koop.](http://www.nedforce.nl)** > > Deze mooie domeinnaam kan al over een paar minuten van jou zijn. Betalen gaat eenvoudig en vertrouwd via iDEAL. Direct na de betaling ontvang je de verhuiscode per e-mail en kun je aan de slag. ---
**Author:** ![jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/f04885/32.png) [@jawosis](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/jawosis)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2007, 6:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-sti-the-right-way-here/113188/4 "2007-08-28T18:12:47Z")
Raffaele Tesi schrieb: > why not a polimorphic association? ?? Never heard of this… – Jochen K. [railswerk.de](http://railswerk.de), [gissmoh.de](http://gissmoh.de), [figgfrosch.de](http://figgfrosch.de), [ror-ror.de](http://ror-ror.de)