Rails creating multiple records in nested form

Question

I've been at this for hours now but can't find a solution and am now wondering if I'm approaching this correctly.

I have an employee form and in it I'm creating multiple ee_pay records (which store a reference to the company_pay type they are). The problem is accessing the company_pay associated with the ee_pay that I'm creating in the form.

The code below works but I keep getting the description of the second @taxable_pays type in the variable @description in _pay_types.html.erb

I'm not entirely sure why this is happening. I've tried multiple ways of passing the description of each one. I know there's two in that collection because the correct ids are getting stored in two separate ee_pay records that get saved when I submit the form.

Can anyone tell me how I can pass the value of each @taxable_pays.description to the view? And also tell me if I'm approaching this in the best way?

Thanks for looking. Here's my code:

employees_controller.rb

I have a before_action that does the following:

@taxable_pays = CompanyPay.where(company_id: current_company.id).order(:id)

Then:

  def new
    @taxable_pays.each do |pt|
    pay_type = @employee.ee_pay.build(company_pay_id: pt.id)
    @description = pt.description
  end

_form.html.erb

      
            
            Description           
           
            
            Amount           
           
            
            Rate           
           

            <%= f.fields_for :ee_pay do |builder| %>
              <%= render "pay_types", :f => builder %>              
            <% end %>

_pay_types.html.erb

  
    <%= @description %>
    
   
  
    <%= f.text_field :amount, class: "number_input" %>
    
    
    
    <%= f.text_field :rate, class: "number_input" %>

Edit 1 (updated)

After advice from Mark G. below my code now looks like:-

employees_controller.rb

  @pay_types = []
  @taxable_pays.each do |pt|
    @pay_types << @employee.ee_pay.build(company_pay_id: pt.id)
    puts "Debug for the pay_types"
    puts @pay_types
  end

_form.html.erb

    
      <% @pay_types.each do |ee_pay| %>
        <%= f.fields_for :ee_pay do |builder| %>
          <%= render "pay_types", :f => builder, :ee_pay => ee_pay %>              
        <% end %>                 
      <% end %>

_pay_types.html.erb

    <%= f.hidden_field :company_pay_id %>  (not on original edit)

    
      <%= ee_pay.company_pay.description %>
      
     
    
      <%= f.text_field :amount, class: "number_input" %>
      
      
    
      <%= ee_pay.company_pay.units %>
      
      
      
      <%= f.text_field :rate, class: "number_input" %>

I originally thought this was each of the @pay_types printing twice but looking at it again it's the description printing twice, each time with each of the company_pay_ids

*description*        *company_pay_id*    
Basic                   2
Basic                   8
Time & 1/2              2
Time & 1/2              8

I'm really stumped with this.

Edit 2

This is the console output I'm getting when I try create a new employee

        CompanyPay Load (0.7ms)  SELECT  "company_pays".* FROM "company_pays"  WHERE "company_pays"."id" = $1 LIMIT 1  [["id", 2]]
          Rendered employees/_pay_types.html.erb (2.8ms)
        Debug in the _form view fields_for
        #
          Rendered employees/_pay_types.html.erb (0.5ms)
        Debug in the _form view fields_for
        #
          CompanyPay Load (0.8ms)  SELECT  "company_pays".* FROM "company_pays"  WHERE "company_pays"."id" = $1 LIMIT 1  [["id", 8]]
          Rendered employees/_pay_types.html.erb (2.4ms)
        Debug in the _form view fields_for
        #
          Rendered employees/_pay_types.html.erb (0.7ms)
        Debug in the _form view fields_for
        #
          Rendered employees/_form.html.erb (37.5ms)
          Rendered employees/new.html.erb within layouts/application (38.3ms)

I'm giving up for the night. Been looking at it for too long and getting nowhere. Thanks for the help. Will try again tomorrow

Al D · Accepted Answer

I went around in circles with this using Mark's method so asked another question on stackoverflow which can be found here. This might help someone else who lands here.

Basically, the code should be:-

employees_controller

@taxable_pays.each do |tp|
  @employee.ee_pay.build(company_pay_id: tp.id)
end

_form

<%= f.fields_for :ee_pay do |builder| %>
   <%= render "pay_types", :f => builder %>    
<% end %>

_pay_types

    
        <%= f.hidden_field :company_pay_id %> 
        
          <%= f.object.company_pay.description %>
          
         
                 
              
              <%= f.text_field :rate, class: "number_input" %>
              


            
            
              <%= f.text_field :amount, class: "number_input" %>

Notice how in the _pay_types partial, the company_pay associated with the ee_pay being built can be accessed using <%= f.object.company_pay.description %>, as long as all the associations are set up correctly. So simple.

Rails creating multiple records in nested form

Answers (2)

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