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Define: Mongrel interfaces with web server to provide dynamic pages through HTTP interface instead of CGI

Define: database migrations each migration file represents a change that you want to make to the database, expressed in source file in database-independent terms

Define: Rails scaffold autogenerated framework for manipulating a model

Define: crud create , read , update, delete

Define: MVC architecture model - view - controller

How does a web request work on Ruby on Rails architecture

1.)request goes to Controller -

2.) Controller calls the Model

3.) which interacts with database and returns control to Controller

4.)Controller then call the View which creates html

5.) View send HTML to the browser

What is in the /components directory of rail app In old days, this dir. was supposed to contain chunks of view code and controller code. This is being deprecated

What is the /lib directory in rails app Holds the application code that doesn't fit neatly into the model, view or controller. Good place to put code that is shared among models, view, or controllers

What is the naming convention for code placed in the /lib directory

for a class called PdfStuff::Receipt the file would be receipt.rb in the directory lib/pdf_stuff

Where does third party code go in rails app /vendor directory

What is meant by Edge Rails using the very latest release (on bleeding edge)

What is Active Support set of libraries that are shared by all Rails components. Extends some of Ruby's built in classes in interesting and useful ways.

What are Builder templates Builder is a freestanding library that lets you express structured text (such as XML) in code. Has an extension of .rxml

Rails component that allows the handling of email Action Mailer

Define: filter a function that defines code to be run either before or after a controller's action is executed

Define: around filter combination of before and after filter

What is the module for handling business logic and database communication ActiveRecord

The component that handles browser requests and facilitates communication between the model and the view ActionController

The component that handles the presentation of pages returned to the client ActionView

Naming convention for class names and file names

class names are written in CamelCase (each word beginning with a capital letter, with no spaces between words)

filename are written lowercase, with underscores separating each word

Define: ERb embedded Ruby

Component for dealing with email in applications ActionMailer

Define: fixture Files that contain sample data for unit testing purposes - when we run the test suit, Rails will wipe the database and populate our tables using the fixtures.

Define: YAML lightweight format for representing data, with extension .yml . Like XML but no confusing tags and easier for humans to read.

Define: migration file a special file that can be used to adjust the database schema in a variety of ways. Can be a handy way to make alterations to your database as your application evolves.

Define: rake a tool for executing a set of tasks that are specific to your project similar to make for a C program

Define: global helpers helper files defined in app/helpers/application_helper.rb file and are available to all controller

Define: flash name fo the internal subcontainer (actually a kind of hash) that Rails uses for temporary storage

Syntax to grab a params value or a default if params is null

params[:var] || "default"

Statement that outputs a YAML representation of an object with all its information that aids debugging debug object

Statement to stop the code for the debugger breakpoint

How would you do benchmarking in sections of code

wrapping the code in benchmarking class method

self.class.benchmark('descriptive name') do

...........................

end

What object holds all the parameters passed in a browser request params[:name]

Where do you put helper methods for controller in the app/helpers directory there is a file for each controller created

What does rails use to store Unicode UTF-8

What is the rule for using Multibyte strings - i.e. Unicode convert those strings into Chars objects

How would you return text from the controller action to the browser

render :text => "stuff to send back"

Where do you put helper functions for a given controller

You put it in a file called controllername_helper.rb in the app/helpers directory

What method can be used as a catch all for a controller to be called when unknown method is sent method_missing

How can you make a method in controller public but don't want it to be accessible as an action

hide it using hide_action

:hide_action :method_name

Controller environment variable that is a hash of HTTP headers that will be used by the response headers

Controller method that renders a particular template render

What is the outcome of calling render(:action => ...)

Does not invoke the action method - it simply renders that action's default behavior

Controller method to send a data stream to the client

send_data

Controller method to send the contents of a file to the client send_file

What type of value can be passed to a cookie value in Controller must be a string - no implicit conversion is performed

How do you set the cookie expiration time

:expires => option

Controller method that clears out a session reset_session

Controller method to run a set of code before every action in controller

create a method then declare it as a before_filter

before_filter :method_name

Controller method to run a set of code after every action in controller after_filter

Controller method to run a set of code before and after every action in controller

around_filter

use the keyword yield to indicate where the action should be run

Rails abstraction to allow verification that certain conditions are met before an action is attempted

verify mechanism ex:

verify :only = :post_comment, :session = :user_id, ......

How would you set up a block of code that acts like a switchboard for the different requests in controller file

respond_to do |wants|

wants.html { .......code for html page requestin here }

wants.js { .... code for AJAX request ....}

end

What is the session container session[:var_name]

Contrast: private with protected methods

private are only available withing the classes in which they're stored, period

protected just like private but available to classes which inherit from the class in which the protected method is defined

How do you create your own helper methods helper_method :method_name

How do you access the action name of the controller controller.action_name

What object exposes all the information about browser request request object

How can you determine if request was a post request.post?

How do you tell the controller to redirect request to a different view redirect_to :action = 'view_name'

How can you output all the values in the parameters list params.inspect

How do you change the HTTP method generated by clicking a link

:method parameter

link_to 'Text of link', contact_url, :id => contact, :method => :delete

Helper function to create a header field that points to the RSS/Atom XML feed URL auto_discovery_link_tag

How is paging large records sets handled

on the controller you use paginate function when finding records @user_pages,

@users = paginate(......)

in the view file you use the paginate_links helper to put the paging links on page

pagination_links(....)

How can you created a cached portion on a view template

surround it with a cache block

<% cache do %>

...............

<% end %>

2 forms for ERb tag pairs

<%= ..... %> for regular output. The output of a Ruby expression between these tags will be displayed in browser

<%.... %> For code not intended to be displayed

Syntax to display any data validation problems

error_messages_for 'Object'

Helper method to format special characters for HTML display like h("text here")

Helper function to format a number to currency number_to_currency( x )

Function to truncate text to a certain number of characters truncate( text, num_of_characters)

Built-in helper function for Views that formats time difference in words

distance_of_time_in_words

time_ago_in_words

Built-in helper function for Views that format number as a currency

number_to_currency

Ruby on Rails Flashcards