Retrieve random photo form each gallery

[tconley79]

Hi guys. I'm trying to find the cleanest way to perform this opration.

I have two models: A Gallery and a Photo.

As expected, a Gallery "has many" Photos and a Photo :"belongs to" a Gallery.

Now on my gallery/index page, I want to list all my galleries (by name) and underneath each gallery name, display a random photo from that gallery. This scenario seems to encroach into the territory of both models.

I'm guessing that since the controller should return a collection of Photos, the Photo controller should be the one to use...but it makes since to use the "gallery/index" URL...

Any thoughts?

Thanks.

[MiiJaySung]

Assuming Rails 1.2.x

Your routes will be something like:

map.resources :galleries do |gallery|
  gallery.resources :photos
end

Now you will have URLs / Path's like ... galleries_path, photos_path(gallery), photo_path(glallery, photo)

in you controllers....

class GalleriesController < ApplicationController
  # Show all galleies: /galleries (galleries_path)
  def index
  end
end

class PhotosController < ApplicationController
  before_filter :find_gallery
  attr_reader :gallery
  helper_method :gallery

  # Show photos for a given gallery
  def index
    # All your photos are in gallery.photos
  end

  # Show a photo: /galleries/:gallery_id/photos/:id (photos_path(gallery, photo))
  def show
    @photo = gallery.photos.find params[:id]
    # Other stuff here
  end

  private

  def find_gallery
    @gallery = Gallery.find params[:gallery_id]
  end
end

You won't need a show method in the galleries controller, as the photos controller index will be pretty much the same thing.