Class: Rfm::Record

Inherits:
CaseInsensitiveHash show all
Defined in:
lib/rfm/record.rb

Overview

The Record object represents a single FileMaker record. You typically get them from ResultSet objects. For example, you might use a Layout object to find some records:

results = myLayout.find({"First Name" => "Bill"})

The results variable in this example now contains a ResultSet object. ResultSets are really just arrays of Record objects (with a little extra added in). So you can get a record object just like you would access any typical array element:

first_record = results[0]

You can find out how many record were returned:

record_count = results.size

And you can of course iterate:

results.each (|record|
  // you can work with the record here
)

Accessing Field Data

You can access field data in the Record object in two ways. Typically, you simply treat Record like a hash (because it is a hash…I love OOP). Keys are field names:

first = myRecord["First Name"]
last = myRecord["Last Name"]

If your field naming conventions mean that your field names are also valid Ruby symbol named (ie: they contain only letters, numbers, and underscores) then you can treat them like attributes of the record. For example, if your fields are called “first_name” and “last_name” you can do this:

first = myRecord.first_name
last = myRecord.last_name

Note: This shortcut will fail (in a rather mysterious way) if your field name happens to match any real attribute name of a Record object. For instance, you may have a field called “server”. If you try this:

server_name = myRecord.server

you’ll actually set server_name to the Rfm::Server object this Record came from. This won’t fail until you try to treat it as a String somewhere else in your code. It is also possible a future version of Rfm will include new attributes on the Record class which may clash with your field names. This will cause perfectly valid code today to fail later when you upgrade. If you can’t stomach this kind of insanity, stick with the hash-like method of field access, which has none of these limitations. Also note that the myRecord[] method is probably somewhat faster since it doesn’t go through method_missing.

Accessing Repeating Fields

If you have a repeating field, RFM simply returns an array:

val1 = myRecord["Price"][0]
val2 = myRecord["Price"][1]

In the above example, the Price field is a repeating field. The code puts the first repetition in a variable called val1 and the second in a variable called val2.

It is not currently possible to create or edit a record’s repeating fields beyond the first repitition, using Rfm.

Accessing Portals

If the ResultSet includes portals (because the layout it comes from has portals on it) you can access them using the Record::portals attribute. It is a hash with table occurrence names for keys, and arrays of Record objects for values. In other words, you can do this:

myRecord.portals["Orders"].each {|record|
  puts record["Order Number"]
}

This code iterates through the rows of the Orders portal.

As a convenience, you can call a specific portal as a method on your record, if the table occurrence name does

not have any characters that are prohibited in ruby method names, just as you can call a field with a method:

myRecord.orders.each {|portal_row|
  puts portal_row["Order Number"]
}

Field Types and Ruby Types

RFM automatically converts data from FileMaker into a Ruby object with the most reasonable type possible. The type are mapped thusly:

  • Text fields are converted to Ruby String objects

  • Number fields are converted to Ruby BigDecimal objects (the basic Ruby numeric types have much less precision and range than FileMaker number fields)

  • Date fields are converted to Ruby Date objects

  • Time fields are converted to Ruby DateTime objects (you can ignore the date component)

  • Timestamp fields are converted to Ruby DateTime objects

  • Container fields are converted to Ruby URI objects

Attributes

In addition to portals, the Record object has these useful attributes:

  • record_id is FileMaker’s internal identifier for this record (not any ID field you might have in your table); you need a record_id to edit or delete a record

  • mod_id is the modification identifier for the record; whenever a record is modified, its mod_id changes so you can tell if the Record object you’re looking at is up-to-date as compared to another copy of the same record

Direct Known Subclasses

Base

Instance Attribute Summary collapse

Class Method Summary collapse

Instance Method Summary collapse

Methods inherited from Hash

#_create_accessor, #_merge_object!, #rfm_filter, #rfm_only, #to_cih

Constructor Details

#initialize(*args) ⇒ Record

resultset, attributes



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 136

def initialize(*args) # resultset, attributes
  @mods            ||= {}
  @portals        ||= Rfm::CaseInsensitiveHash.new
  options = args.rfm_extract_options!
  if args[0].is_a?(Resultset)
    @layout = args[0].layout
  elsif self.is_a?(Base)
    @layout = self.class.layout
    @layout.field_keys.each do |field|
      self[field] = nil
    end
    self.update_attributes(options) unless options == {}
    self.merge!(@mods) unless @mods == {}
    @loaded = true
  end
  _attach_as_instance_variables(args[1]) if args[1].is_a? Hash
  #@loaded = true
  self
end

Dynamic Method Handling

This class handles dynamic methods through the method_missing method

#method_missing(symbol, *attrs, &block) ⇒ Object (private) 



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 250

def method_missing (symbol, *attrs, &block)
  method = symbol.to_s
  return self[method] if self.key?(method)
  return @portals[method] if @portals and @portals.key?(method)

  if method =~ /(=)$/
    return self[$`] = attrs.first if self.key?($`)
  end
  super
end

Instance Attribute Details

#layout ⇒ Object

, :resultset



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 111

def layout
  @layout
end

#mod_id ⇒ Object (readonly)

Returns the value of attribute mod_id.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 112

def mod_id
  @mod_id
end

#portals ⇒ Object (readonly)

Returns the value of attribute portals.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 112

def portals
  @portals
end

#record_id ⇒ Object (readonly)

Returns the value of attribute record_id.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 112

def record_id
  @record_id
end

Class Method Details

.new(*args) ⇒ Object

This is called during the parsing process, but only to allow creation of the correct type of model instance. This is also called by the end-user when constructing a new empty record, but it is called from the model subclass.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 117

def self.new(*args) # resultset
  record = case
    # Get model from layout, then allocate record.
    # This should only use model class if the class already exists,
    # since we don't want to create classes that aren't defined by the user - they won't be persistant.
  when args[0].is_a?(Resultset) && args[0].layout && args[0].layout.model
    args[0].layout.modelize.allocate
    # Allocate instance of Rfm::Record.
  else
    self.allocate
  end

  record.send(:initialize, *args)
  record
  # rescue
  #   puts "Record.new bombed and is defaulting to super.new. Error: #{$!}"
  #   super
end

Instance Method Details

#[](key) ⇒ Object

Gets the value of a field from the record. For example:

first = myRecord["First Name"]
last = myRecord["Last Name"]

This sample puts the first and last name from the record into Ruby variables.

You can also update a field:

myRecord["First Name"] = "Sophia"

When you do, the change is noted, but *the data is not updated in FileMaker*. You must call Record::save or Record::save_if_not_modified to actually save the data.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 197

def [](key)
  # Added by wbr, 2013-03-31
  return super unless @loaded
  return fetch(key.to_s.downcase)
rescue IndexError
  raise Rfm::ParameterError, "#{key} does not exists as a field in the current Filemaker layout." unless key.to_s == '' #unless (!layout or self.key?(key_string))
end

#[]=(key, val) ⇒ Object

Raises:



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 210

def []=(key, val)
  key_string = key.to_s.downcase
  return super unless @loaded # is this needed?
  raise Rfm::ParameterError, "You attempted to modify a field (#{key_string}) that does not exist in the current Filemaker layout." unless self.key?(key_string)
  # @mods[key_string] = val
  # TODO: This needs cleaning up.
  # TODO: can we get field_type from record instead?
  @mods[key_string] = if [Date, Time, DateTime].member?(val.class)
    field_type = layout.field_meta[key_string.to_sym].result
    case field_type
    when 'time'
      val.strftime(layout.time_format)
    when 'date'
      val.strftime(layout.date_format)
    when 'timestamp'
      val.strftime(layout.timestamp_format)
    else
      val
    end
  else
    val
  end
  super(key, val)
end

#field_names ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 235

def field_names
  layout.field_names
end

#replace_with_fresh_data(record) ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 239

def replace_with_fresh_data(record)
  self.replace record
  [:@mod_id, :@record_id, :@portals, :@mods].each do |var|
    self.instance_variable_set var, record.instance_variable_get(var) || {}
  end
  self
end

#respond_to?(symbol, include_private = false) ⇒ Boolean

Returns:

  • (Boolean) 


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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 205

def respond_to?(symbol, include_private = false)
  return true if self.include?(symbol.to_s)
  super
end

#save ⇒ Object

Saves local changes to the Record object back to Filemaker. For example:

myLayout.find({"First Name" => "Bill"}).each(|record|
  record["First Name"] = "Steve"
  record.save
)

This code finds every record with Bill in the First Name field, then changes the first name to Steve.

Note: This method is smart enough to not bother saving if nothing has changed. So there’s no need to optimize on your end. Just save, and if you’ve changed the record it will be saved. If not, no server hit is incurred.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 169

def save
  # self.merge!(layout.edit(self.record_id, @mods)[0]) if @mods.size > 0
  self.replace_with_fresh_data(layout.edit(self.record_id, @mods)[0]) if @mods.size > 0
  @mods.clear
end

#save_if_not_modified ⇒ Object

Like Record::save, except it fails (and raises an error) if the underlying record in FileMaker was modified after the record was fetched but before it was saved. In other words, prevents you from accidentally overwriting changes someone else made to the record.



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# File 'lib/rfm/record.rb', line 178

def save_if_not_modified
  # self.merge!(layout.edit(@record_id, @mods, {:modification_id => @mod_id})[0]) if @mods.size > 0
  self.replace_with_fresh_data(layout.edit(@record_id, @mods, {:modification_id => @mod_id})[0]) if @mods.size > 0
  @mods.clear
end