Rails InheritedResources - respond_with JSON, using `find_and_return_for_some_grid` instead of `find(:all)`?

Question

I have a model, say User. I want to call /users (users_controller#index) and pass it basically a scope so it returns data based on:

1. The format (js, json, html)
2. The chart/grid/layout it will be rendered in (highcharts, basic html table, jquery flexigrid, etc.)

With inherited_resources and has_scope, you can do something like that but it's not quite it.

I want to return [{:page => 10, :cells => [{:name => "User A"}...]}] if params are something like {:action => "index", :format => "js", :grid => "flexigrid"}, and return [#<User name='User A'>...] rendered in a haml template if it's just html.

How do I do that RESTfully in Rails with inherited resources?

Something like this:

class UsersController < InheritedResources::Base
  respond_with :js, :method => :find_and_return_for_grid
end

Does this require me creating my own Responder?

Answer 1

You need to override the index method, something like:

def index
  index! do |format|
    format.html
    format.js do
      if(params[:grid] == "flexigrid")
        render :json => format_for_grid(collection).to_json
      end
    end
  end
end

With format_for_grid a method that convert an array of Users to the data format you want

Personaly speaking I won't format the js response like this, I mean splitting the response in cells is something I would do on view side with js, beacause has to do with the way you want to display the data, I think it would taste more Restful to just return the non display-oriented collection.to_json