# Where to place code used by many views? **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [February 18, 2007, 8:50pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996 "2007-02-18T20:50:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 8:50pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/1 "2007-02-18T20:50:07Z")
Where should I put code (let’s call it a library function, perhaps) that is to be made available in several views, even views related to different models / controllers? Is that what the “lib” directory is for? Or maybe the controllers/ application.rb file? And, how do I access this code later, in a given code? I’m guessing I have to do “require”. I am wary of experimenting with such things in RoR, because I’d like to start following best practices, as viewed by the community. ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 9:38pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/2 "2007-02-18T21:38:10Z")
Can you give an example of what you’re trying to accomplish? ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 10:14pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/3 "2007-02-18T22:14:12Z")
On Feb 18, 4:37 pm, “Jay Jansheski” [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > Can you give an example of what you’re trying to accomplish? One example would be a navigation bar to be shown at the top of each page. I’ve done that a lot in PHP, using a subroutine that prints out text elements and links to go under the elements, highlighting one of these elements if it’s the present page. Thus, a lot of pages would call this function, e.g. the second in the list would call navbar(2) which means that when navbar() prints out it’s list, the second item should be highlighted to indicate that this is the present page. The pages need just this navbar() call; if I decide to add new pages (and thus new tabs), I only have to alter the shared code (this navbar() function), not the existing pages. I’m sorry to say “PHP” in this post 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 10:47pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/4 "2007-02-18T22:47:15Z")
Jay, this is extraordinarily helpful, and generous. Many thanks. Dan. ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 10:35pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/5 "2007-02-18T22:35:14Z")
For a sitewide navigation bar, you should do a shared partial. In “views,” put a file called \_nav.rhtml (or whatever). Then in your default layout, or wherever you might want to call it, you can put \<%= render :partial=\>‘shared/nav’ %\> The partial should pick up any instance variables (variables prefixed with ‘@’) you send to it, but if you want to define a variable specific to that partial, you can do it like this: \<%= render :partial=\>‘shared/ nav’, :locals=\>{:this\_section=\>‘articles’} %\> Which gives you access to a variable inside the partial called this\_section with the value ‘articles’. If you’re talking about something specific to one of your models, you should put it in the view for that model. Let’s say you want to put user’s account info on every page. You might do something like this: ## VIEW: ## /views/user/\_account\_info.rhtml Hi, \<%= @this\_user.name %\>! ## CONTROLLER: ## application.rb :before\_filter :get\_this\_user def get\_this\_user @this\_user = User.logged\_in\_user(session[:this\_user\_id]) end ## MODEL: ## user.rb def self.logged\_in\_user(id) find(id) end Then anywhere in your application you can put: \<%= render :partial=\>‘user/account\_info’ %\> This may be too much info (or not enough) but I hope it helps. ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 10:59pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/6 "2007-02-18T22:59:20Z")
I see a couple of sloppy errors in my example: The shared partial should go in views/shared (not just views), and before\_filter should not have a colon in front of it. Yes before\_filter :whatever No :before\_filter :whatever Anyway, best of luck. ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2007, 11:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/7 "2007-02-18T23:16:22Z")
I am trying to use the :click\_to\_edit\_text attribute for in\_place\_editor\_field, but nothing shows up. Any trick that I need to be able to pass in a default value for an in place editor? Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2007, 2:46am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/8 "2007-02-19T02:46:37Z")
On Feb 18, 2007, at 5:14 PM, Nathan L. wrote: > I am trying to use the :click\_to\_edit\_text attribute for > in\_place\_editor\_field, but nothing shows up. Any trick that I > need to > be able to pass in a default value for an in place editor? > > Thanks! Well, are you passing the :click\_to\_edit\_text in the right place? There are two hashes at the end of the argument list for in\_place\_editor\_field. If all you want to change is the hover text: \<%= in\_place\_editor\_field ‘person’, ‘eye\_color’ {}, { :click\_to\_edit\_text =\> “Please click me!” } %\> If you just have arguments like \<%= in\_place\_editor\_field ‘person’, ‘eye\_color’, :click\_to\_edit\_text =\> “Please click me!” %\> the option will be part of the hash for the tag\_options rather than the in\_place\_editor\_options. -Rob Rob B. [http://agileconsultingllc.com](http://agileconsultingllc.com) removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid ---
**Author:** ![dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@dankelley](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dankelley)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2007, 6:26pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/where-to-place-code-used-by-many-views/85996/9 "2007-02-20T18:26:38Z")
dankelley wrote: > Where should I put code (let’s call it a library function, perhaps) > that is to be made available in several views, even views related to > different models / controllers? > > Is that what the “lib” directory is for? Or maybe the controllers/ > application.rb file? > > And, how do I access this code later, in a given code? I’m guessing I > have to do “require”. > > I am wary of experimenting with such things in RoR, because I’d like > to start following best practices, as viewed by the community. Use helpers, in the app/helpers directory) to define a common set of libraray functions.