Forms

Introduction

These projects will give you a chance to actually build some forms, both using nearly-pure HTML and then graduating to using the helper methods that Rails provides.

Project: Bare metal forms and helpers

In this project, you’ll build a form the old fashioned way and then the Rails way.

Assignment

Set up the Back end

1. Build a new Rails app:

   • Build a new Rails app (called “re-former”):

     rails new re-former

   • Create a new GitHub repo and connect the remote to your local git repo. Check in and commit the initial stuff.
   • Modify your README file to say something you’ll remember later.

2. Create and migrate a User model:

   • Create and migrate a User model with :username, :email, and :password:

     rails generate model User username:string email:string password:string
     rails db:migrate

   • Add validations for presence to each field in the model.
   • Create the :users resource in your routes file.

3. Build UsersController:

   • Write empty methods for #new and #create in your UsersController:

     rails generate controller Users new create

   • Create your #new view in app/views/users/new.html.erb.

4. HTML form:

   • Build a form for creating a new user in app/views/users/new.html.erb.

5. Railsy forms with #form_tag:

   • Comment out your entire HTML form.
   • Convert your tag to use a #form_tag helper and all of your inputs into the proper helper tags via #*_tag methods.

6. Railsy-er forms with #form_with:

   • Modify your #new action in the controller to instantiate a blank User object and store it in an instance variable called @user.
   • Rebuild the form using #form_with and the @user from your controller.

7. Editing:

   • Update your routes and controller to handle editing an existing user.
   • Create the Edit view at app/views/users/edit.html.erb and copy/paste your form from the New view.

8. Save to Git and GitHub:

   • Initialize a git repository in your project folder if you haven't already:

     git init

   • Add all files to the staging area:

     git add .

   • Commit the changes:

     git commit -m "Initial commit"

   • Create a new repository on GitHub.
   • Push your local repository to GitHub:

     git remote add origin https://github.com/USERNAME/Forms.git
     git branch -M main
     git push -u origin main

Console Usage

To interact with the application via the Rails console:

1. Open the Rails console:

   rails console

2. Create a new user:

   user = User.new(username: "example_user", email: "user@example.com", password: "password123")
   user.save

3. Find existing users:

   users = User.all

4. Update user attributes:

   user = User.find_by(username: "example_user")
   user.update(email: "new_email@example.com")

5. Delete a user:

   user = User.find_by(username: "example_user")
   user.destroy

Additional Resources

• Rails Guides: Form Helpers