My web pages consist of two parts, let's say top and bottom (except header and footer -- those are consistent across pages). What is the best practice to dynamically generate those parts depending on the action?
One approach I have come up with is to have view for the top and partial for the bottom; in the layout call yield for the top and render partial for the bottom. The name of the partial is dynamically substituted depending on the action.
Not sure it is the best way to do it.
I think your idea is fine. In your views you could do:
<%- content_for :top do -%>
[…]
<%- end -%>
<%- content_for :bottom do -%>
<%= render @partial_name %>
<%- end -%>
Of course you should check whether the partial exist and provide some default behavior. But I think you're aware of that anyway.
And then in your layout:
<div id="top">
<%= yield :top %>
</div>
<div id="bottom">
<%= yield :bottom %>
</div>
Here is a very simplified version of a view DSL I've used in the past. Worked well for us. In reality we parameterized the the helper methods so we could choose from many layout partials on the fly (to have pages with sidebars, multiple columns, etc).
# app/views/shared/_screen.erb
<div id="screen">
<div class="screen_header">
<%= yield :screen_header %>
</div>
<div class="screen_body">
<%= yield :screen_body
</div>
<div class="bottom">
<%= yield :footer %>
</div>
</div>
# app/helpers/screen_helper.rb
module ScreenHelper
def screen(&block)
yield block
concat(render :partial => 'shared/screen')
end
def screen_header
content_for :screen_header do
yield
end
end
def screen_body
content_for :screen_body do
yield
end
end
def footer
content_for :footer do
yield
end
end
end
# app/views/layouts/application.erb
# only showing the body tag
<body>
<%= yield :layout
<body>
# Example of a page
# any of the sections below (except screen) may be used or omitted as needed.
# app/views/users/index.html.erb
<% screen do %>
<% screen_header do %>
Add all html and/or partial renders for the header here.
<%end%>
<% screen_body do %>
Add all html and/or partial renders for the main content here.
<% end %>
<% footer do %>
Add all the html and/or partial renders for the footer content here.
<% end %>
<% end %>