How to have ruby conditionally check if variables exist in a string? - ruby

So I have a string from a rendered template that looks like
"Dear {{user_name}},\r\n\r\nThank you for your purchase. If you have any questions, we are happy to help.\r\n\r\n\r\n{{company_name}}\r\n{{company_phone_number}}\r\n"
All those variables like {{user_name}} are optional and do not need to be included but I want to check that if they are, they have {{ in front of the variable name. I am using liquid to parse and render the template and couldn't get it to catch if the user only uses 1 (or no) opening brackets. I was only able to catch the proper number of closing brackets. So I wrote a method to check that if these variables exist, they have the correct opening brackets. It only works, however, if all those variables are found.
here is my method:
def validate_opening_brackets?(template)
text = %w(user_name company_name company_phone_number)
text.all? do |variable|
next unless template.include? variable
template.include? "{{#{variable}"
end
end
It works, but only if all variables are present. If, for example, the template created by the user does not include user_name, then it will return false. I've also done this loop using each, and creating a variable outside of the block that I assign false if the conditions are not met. I would really, however, like to get this to work using the all? method, as I can just return a boolean and it's cleaner.

If the question is about how to rewrite the all? block to make it return true if all present variable names have two brackets before them and false otherwise then you could use something like this:
def validate_opening_brackets?(template)
variables = %w(user_name company_name company_phone_number)
variables.all? do |variable|
!template.include?(variable) || template.include?("{{#{variable}")
end
end

TL;DR
There are multiple ways to do this, but the easiest way I can think of is to simply prefix/postfix a regular expression with the escaped characters used by Mustache/Liquid, and using alternation to check for each of your variable names within the template variable characters (e.g. double curly braces). You can then use String#scan and then return a Boolean from Enumerable#any? based on the contents of the Array returned by from #scan.
This works with your posted example, but there may certainly be other use cases where you need a more complex solution. YMMV.
Example Code
This solution escapes the leading and trailing { and } characters to avoid having them treated as special characters, and then interpolates the variable names with | for alternation. It returns a Boolean depending on whether templated variables are found.
def template_string_has_interpolations? str
var_names = %w[user_name company_name company_phone_number]
regexp = /\{\{#{var_names.join ?|}\}\}/
str.scan(regexp).any?
end
Tested Examples
template_string_has_interpolations? "Dear {{user_name}},\r\n\r\nThank you for your purchase. If you have any questions, we are happy to help.\r\n\r\n\r\n{{company_name}}\r\n{{company_phone_number}}\r\n"
#=> true
template_string_has_interpolations? "Dear Customer,\r\n\r\nThank you for your purchase. If you have any questions, we are happy to help.\r\n\r\n\r\nCompany, Inc.\r\n(555) 555-5555\r\n"
#=> false

Related

Use embedded string as variable name

I have a YAML file that uses the encoding __firstname__ as a placeholder which signifies that an existing method firstname should be used, rather than the literal string in a subsequent process.
I am trying to understand the most ruby way to to do this. Basically, I need to extract the part between the underscores and send it to an object. Here is pseudocode:
variable = '__firstname__'
if variable is prefixed and suffixed with underscores
result = object.send(variable.removeunderscores)
else
result = variable
end
puts result
I was about to write this procedurally like this, but this is the type of thing that I think ruby can less clunkily if only I knew the language better.
What is a clean why to write this?
There's nothing wrong with verbose code if it's clear to read IMO.
I'd do something like this using String#start_with? and String#end_with?:
variable = '__firstname__'
if variable.start_with?("__") && variable.end_with?("__")
result = object.send(variable[2...-2])
else
result = variable
end

Replacing scan by gsub in Ruby: how to allow code in gsub block?

I am parsing a Wiki text from an XML dump, for a string named 'section' which includes templates in double braces, including some arguments, which I want to reorganize.
This has an example named TextTerm:
section="Sample of a text with a first template {{TextTerm|arg1a|arg2a|arg3a...}} and then a second {{TextTerm|arg1b|arg2b|arg3b...}} etc."
I can use scan and a regex to get each template and work on it on a loop using:
section.scan(/\{\{(TextTerm)\|(.*?)\|(.*?)\}\}/i).each { |item| puts "1=" + item[1] # arg1a etc.}
And, I have been able to extract the database of the first argument of the template.
Now I also want to replace the name of the template "NewTextTerm" and reorganize its arguments by placing the second argument in place of the first.
Can I do it in the same loop? For example by changing scan by a gsub(rgexp){ block}:
section.gsub!(/\{\{(TextTerm)\|(.*?)\|(.*?)\}\}/) { |item| '{{NewTextTerm|\2|\1}}'}
I get:
"Sample of a text with a first template {{NewTextTerm|\\2|\\1}} and then a second {{NewTextTerm|\\2|\\1}} etc."
meaning that the arguments of the regexp are not recognized. Even if it worked, I would like to have some place within the gsub block to work on the arguments. For example, I can't have a puts in the gsub block similar to the scan().each block but only a string to be substituted.
Any ideas are welcome.
PS: Some editing: braces and "section= added", code is complete.
When you have the replacement as a string argument, you can use '\1', etc. like this:
string.gsub!(regex, '...\1...\2...')
When you have the replacement as a block, you can use "#$1", etc. like this:
string.gsub!(regex){"...#$1...#$2..."}
You are mixing the uses. Stick to either one.
Yes, changing the quote by a double quote isn't enough, #$1 is the answer. Here is the complete code:
section="Sample of a text with a first template {{TextTerm|arg1a|arg2a|arg3a...}} and then a second {{TextTerm|arg1b|arg2b|arg3b...}} etc."
section.gsub(/\{\{(TextTerm)\|(.*?)\|(.*?)\}\}/) { |item| "{{New#$1|#$3|#$2}}"}
"Sample of a text with a first template {{NewTextTerm|arg2a|arg3a...|arg1a}} and then a second {{NewTextTerm|arg2b|arg3b...|arg1b}} etc."
Thus, it works. Thanks.
But now I have to replace the string, by a "function" returning the changed string:
def stringreturn(arg1,arg2,arg3) strr = "{{New"+arg1 + arg3 +arg2 + "}}"; return strr ; end
and
section.gsub(/\{\{(TextTerm)\|(.*?)\|(.*?)\}\}/) { |item| stringreturn("#$1","|#$2","|#$3") }
will return:
"Sample of a text with a first template {{NewTextTerm|arg2a|arg3a...|arg1a}} and then a second {{NewTextTerm|arg2b|arg3b...|arg1b}} etc."
Thanks to all!
There is probably a better way to manipulate arguments in MediaWiki templates using Ruby.

ruby block questions loop variables

comics = load_comics( '/comics.txt' )
Popup.make do
h1 "Comics on the Web"
list do
comics.each do |name, url|
link name, url
end
end
end
I am new to ruby. This is a piece of code from a ruby website.
I cant find what 'link' and 'list' keyword in the menu.
can someone explain it a little bit those two keywords, and where is the definition of those two keyword .
I am also confused on how they read the variables name and url, they are reading it by the space at the same line or what?
so if I have
Comics1 link_of_comics_site_1
Comics2 link_of_comics_site_2
Comics3 link_of_comics_site_3
so for the first iteration, name=Comics1, and url =link_of_comics_site_1
Thanks.
That's not just Ruby. That's a template for a webpage using ruby add-on methods for HTML generation.
But presumably, the result of the call to load_comics is a Hash, where the keys are names and the values are URLs. You could make one of those yourself:
my_comics_hash = { "name1" => "url1", "name2" => "url2" }
which you can then iterate over the same way:
my_comics_hash.each do |name, url|
puts "Name #{name} goes with URL #{url}"
end
In your code, it's building up an HTML list inside a popup window, but it's the same idea. The each method iterates over a collection - in this case a Hash - and runs some code on every item in that collection - in this case, each key/value pair. When you call each, you pass it a block of code inside do ... end; that's the code that gets run on each item. The current item is passed to the code block, which declares a variable to hold it inside the pipes right after the word do. Since we're iterating over key/value pairs, we can declare two variables, and the key goes in the first and the value in the second.
In ruby function, parenthesis is optional and the ";" end of statement is also optional. ej
link "click here" , "http://myweb.com"
is equivalent to :
link("click here", "http://myweb.com");
But If you have more than one statement in a line the ";" is a must, ej
link("click here1", "http://myweb.com"); link("click here2", "http://myweb.com");
In your code it could be written in
link(name, url)
or just
link(name, url);
or
link name, url
But it is highly recommended to put parenthesis around function parameters for readability unless you have other reason . The ";" is not common in ruby world .

Rails String Interpolation in a string from a database

So here is my problem.
I want to retrieve a string stored in a model and at runtime change a part of it using a variable from the rails application. Here is an example:
I have a Message model, which I use to store several unique messages. So different users have the same message, but I want to be able to show their name in the middle of the message, e.g.,
"Hi #{user.name}, ...."
I tried to store exactly that in the database but it gets escaped before showing in the view or gets interpolated when storing in the database, via the rails console.
Thanks in advance.
I don't see a reason to define custom string helper functions. Ruby offers very nice formatting approaches, e.g.:
"Hello %s" % ['world']
or
"Hello %{subject}" % { subject: 'world' }
Both examples return "Hello world".
If you want
"Hi #{user.name}, ...."
in your database, use single quotes or escape the # with a backslash to keep Ruby from interpolating the #{} stuff right away:
s = 'Hi #{user.name}, ....'
s = "Hi \#{user.name}, ...."
Then, later when you want to do the interpolation you could, if you were daring or trusted yourself, use eval:
s = pull_the_string_from_the_database
msg = eval '"' + s + '"'
Note that you'll have to turn s into a double quoted string in order for the eval to work. This will work but it isn't the nicest approach and leaves you open to all sorts of strange and confusing errors; it should be okay as long as you (or other trusted people) are writing the strings.
I think you'd be better off with a simple micro-templating system, even something as simple as this:
def fill_in(template, data)
template.gsub(/\{\{(\w+)\}\}/) { data[$1.to_sym] }
end
#...
fill_in('Hi {{user_name}}, ....', :user_name => 'Pancakes')
You could use whatever delimiters you wanted of course, I went with {{...}} because I've been using Mustache.js and Handlebars.js lately. This naive implementation has issues (no in-template formatting options, no delimiter escaping, ...) but it might be enough. If your templates get more complicated then maybe String#% or ERB might work better.
one way I can think of doing this is to have templates stored for example:
"hi name"
then have a function in models that just replaces the template tags (name) with the passed arguments.
It can also be User who logged in.
Because this new function will be a part of model, you can use it like just another field of model from anywhere in rails, including the html.erb file.
Hope that helps, let me know if you need more description.
Adding another possible solution using Procs:
#String can be stored in the database
string = "->(user){ 'Hello ' + user.name}"
proc = eval(string)
proc.call(User.find(1)) #=> "Hello Bob"
gsub is very powerful in Ruby.
It takes a hash as a second argument so you can supply it with a whitelist of keys to replace like that:
template = <<~STR
Hello %{user_email}!
You have %{user_voices_count} votes!
Greetings from the system
STR
template.gsub(/%{.*?}/, {
"%{user_email}" => 'schmijos#example.com',
"%{user_voices_count}" => 5,
"%{release_distributable_total}" => 131,
"%{entitlement_value}" => 2,
})
Compared to ERB it's secure. And it doesn't complain about single % and unused or inexistent keys like string interpolation with %(sprintf) does.

What is Ruby doing with gsub here?

I'm working on converting code from Ruby to Node.js. I came across these lines at the end of a function and I'm curious what the original developers were trying to accomplish:
url = url.gsub "member_id", "member_id__hashed"
url = url.gsub member_id, member_id_hashed
url
I'm assuming that url at the end is Ruby's equivalent to return url;
as for the lines with gsub, from what I've found online that's the wrong syntax, right? Shouldn't it be:
url = url.gsub(var1, var2)?
If it is correct, why are they calling it twice, once with quotes and once without?
gsub does a global substitute on a string. If I had to guess, the URL might be in the form of
http://somewebsite.com?member_id=123
If so, the code has the following effect:
url.gsub "member_id", "member_id__hashed"
# => "http://somewebsite.com?member_id__hashed=123"
Assuming member_id = "123", and member_id_hashed is some hashed version of the id, then the second line would replace "123" with the hashed version.
url.gsub member_id, member_id_hashed
# => "http://somewebsite.com?member_id__hashed=abc"
So you're going from http://somewebsite.com?member_id=123 to http://somewebsite.com?member_id__hashed=abc
Documentation: https://ruby-doc.org/core-2.6/String.html#method-i-gsub
I'm assuming that the url at the end is Ruby's equivalent to return url;
If that code is part of a method or block, indeed, the line url is the value returned by the method. This is because by default a method in Ruby returns the value of the last expression that was evaluated in the method. The keyword return can be used (as in many other languages) to produce an early return of a method, with or without a return value.
that's the wrong syntax, right? shouldn't it be
url = url.gsub(var1, var2)?
The arguments used to invoke a method in Ruby may stay in parentheses but they may, as well, be listed after the method name, without parentheses.
Both:
url = url.gsub var1, var2
and
url = url.gsub(var1, var2)
are correct and they produce the same result.
The convention in Ruby is to not put parentheses around method arguments but this is not always possible. One such case is when one of the arguments is a call of another method with arguments.
The parentheses are then used to make everything clear both for the interpreter and the readers of the code.
If it is correct, why are they calling it twice, once with quotes and once without?
There are two calls of the same method, with different arguments:
url = url.gsub "member_id", "member_id__hashed"
The arguments of url.gsub are the literal strings "member_id" and "member_id__hashed".
url = url.gsub member_id, member_id_hashed
This time the arguments are the variables member_id and member_id_hashed.
This works the same in JavaScript and many other languages that use double quotes to enclose the string literals.
String#gsub is a method of class String that does search & replace in a string and returns a new string. It's name is short of "global substitute" (it replaces all occurrences). To replace only the first occurrence use String#sub.

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