Joining Fields in a Select

[mattmate]

Hey all,

Does anyone know if you can join fields in a drop down box in ruby?

For example, in the database Firstname and Lastname are stored in separate columns, can they be joined so that the full name is displayed in the drop down box in a ruby form?

Cheers,

[Fenrir2]

class Person < ActiveRecord::Base
  # ...
  
  def full_name
    first_name + ' ' + last_name
  end
end

# ...

@person = Person.find(1)
@person.full_name # => "ABC XYZ"

[mattmate]

Thanks for the reply,

Any idea on how I can render this in a form as a drop down list? I have tried a few things and I cant figure out how to combine them.

Cheers

[iackay]

Will this work for you?

class CreateDatabases < ActiveRecord::Migration
 
  def self.up
    #...

    create_table :people do |t|
        t.column :first_name, :string, :limit => 20, :null => false
        t.column :last_name, :string, :limit => 20, :null => false
    end
    #...
  end

  def self.down
     #...

     drop_table :people

     #...
  end

end

class PeopleController < ApplicationController
  # ...

  def list
     @all_persons = Person.find(:all, :order=>"last_name")
  end

  #...
end

class Person < ActiveRecord::Base
  # ...

  def full_name
     last_name + ', ' + first_name
  end

  #...
end

View would contain :

<%= collection_select(:person, :id, @all_persons, :id, :full_name) %>