rails-ajax

• Automatic, unobtrusive and seamless Ajax integration in your Rails application without a single line of code.
• Handles history and bookmarking: whether Javascript is enabled or not in the browser, URL are following the links.
• Adapts to normal links and form buttons too!
• Selectively refresh some elements using Rails partials.
• Handles Rails flash messages.
• Automatically handles redirections.
• Provide user callbacks to better control the Ajax flow.
• Executes Javascript from the updated view if needed.
• Can be deactivated on a per-link basis.

Installation

Add rails-ajax in your Gemfile:

gem 'rails-ajax'

Then install it:

bundle install

Usage

1. Generate rails-ajax configuration files

rake rails-ajax:install

2. Make sure your Rails layout embeds your view in a selectable container

    


      

        <%= render :partial => 'menu' %>
      

      
<%= flash[:notice] %>
      
<%= flash[:error] %>
      
<%= flash[:alert] %>

      

        <%= yield %>
      

    

3. Configure rails-ajax and set the container used for your views

# RailsAjax configuration
RailsAjax.configure do

  # Enable or disable RailsAjax.
  # If disabled, RailsAjax methods will be useless, and corresponding JavaScript will be removed.
  # When changing this switch, you have to:
  # * Precompile your assets in production mode
  # * Restart your server
  enable true

  # Set the default main container that will receive the result of Ajax requests.
  # This container will get what is rendered by default when render is called.
  main_container 'div#Content'

  # Set the containers that will receive Rails' flash messages.
  # Use these if those containers are part of your layout and will not be refreshed by each Ajax call. In this case RailsAjax will still refresh them.
  # If not set for a given flash message type, you have to return the corresponding flash yourself in each Ajax's response.
  flash_containers(
    :notice => '#FlashNotice',
    :error => '#FlashError',
    :alert => '#FlashAlert'
  )

  # Activate debugging alerts in the JS code.
  # This will pop plenty of JS dialogs at each stage of RailsAjax calls, useful to better debug what is going wrong.
  # When changing this switch, you have to:
  # * Precompile your assets in production mode
  # * Restart your server
  debug_alerts false

end

4. Add rails-ajax Javascript libraries to your assets

//= require jquery
//= require jquery_ujs
//
// RailsAjax
//= require jquery.history
//= require jquery.rails-ajax
//= require RailsAjax-Config
//

5. Restart your server

Refresh some parts of your layout on demand

Controllers can use the refresh_dom_with_partial method to specify a CSS selector to be updated with some partial name:

class HomeController < ApplicationController

  def login

    # Refresh the menu in the layout
    refresh_dom_with_partial('div#Menu', 'menu')

    # Continue with the default rendering
  end

end

Contact

Contributions, questions, jokes? Send them to Muriel!