FileUtils, action_controller rescues

This is going to be a relatively short post, mainly because I have more I want to write about - but it all deservers its own write up, after I've done a bit more work with it. However today I will quickly go over a simple file uploading model and how to use.

For us newbs I am going to be as thourough as possible with this somewhat simple task. First make certain you have a model named upload (thus you would have a table called uploads, where you would store all sorts of info about your files). Inside your model put the following code:

This over-simplified method takes 3 arguments. First is the file that was uploaded (through a POST transfer, via your multipart HTML form). Second argument is the directory that you want to save the file, relative to your public document root. Third is the file name you want to save this as.

In this simple setup we are not inserting anything into the database or even checking for the type of file - instead I leave that up to you. The only check I do is for:

That makes certain there is a file (not some randomly entered text in the file field). If you fail to do this you may get this error when you submit a faulty filepath:

Now all you need to do is add the following to the target method in your controller:

This snippet assumes that the field you are using to upload your file has name = 'file'. Thats it, you should be able to upload files (as long as your directory is write enabled).

Next I thought I would take a second to share a simple mod you can make to the error pages for action_controller exception messages (this is great for your testing environment.. especially if you are like me and see these often).

On my machine the file to edit was hidden away in:

Its nice to change the color around a bit and add your own touches to that drab white page.

Well, thats it for this short post. Theres more to learn and more to write about, so - I'll be back here soon enough!