UIDAttribute -- Globally Unique Identifiable Attributes
machina to automatically generate UUIDs upon object instantiation.
Example
require File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__),'lib','uid_attribute')
class MyObject
include UIDAttribute
attr_accessor :uid
uid_attribute :uid # this is optional e.g. to change the UID attribute
end
puts MyObject.new.uid
# => 4981a86e-239c-45dd-b4b3-283c435fb8ad
Use case
Some projects are confined by regulations (or requirements) that demand data can not be used to identify individuals. In such cases data must be scrubbed i.e. identifiable object names must be removed before unauthorized users can see said data. For example, when a developer needs to recreate a bug on their own system that was reported by a customer using customer-specific data.
One method to do this is to use globally unique identifiers within the system to identify any given object.
Installation
% gem install uid_attribute
License
Copyright (c) 2010 [Paul Belt], released under the MIT license