Nested Form¶ ↑

A Rails plugin to conveniently manage multiple nested models in a single form. It does so in an unobtrusive way through jQuery.

This is in early development, so some of this documentation is not yet applicable.

Install¶ ↑

This is currently only available as a plugin.

script/plugin install git://github.com/ryanb/nested_form.git

Usage¶ ↑

When installing this plugin it will add a file at public/javascripts/nested_form.js which should be included after jQuery.

<%= javascript_include_tag 'jquery', 'nested_form' %>

You can then generate a nested form using the nested_form_for helper method.

<% nested_form_for @project do |f| %>

Use this form just like normal, including the fields_for helper method for nesting models. The benefit of this plugin comes from the link_to_add and link_to_remove helper methods on the form builder.

<% f.fields_for :tasks do |task_form| %>
  <%= task_form.text_field :name %>
  <%= task_form.link_to_remove "Remove this task" %>
<% end %>
<%= f.link_to_add "Add a task", :tasks %>

This generates links which dynamically add and remove fields.

Partials¶ ↑

It is often desirable to move the nested fields into a partial to keep things organized. If you don’t supply a block to fields_for it will look for a partial and use that.

<%= f.fields_for :tasks %>

In this case it will look for a partial called “task_fields” and pass the form builder as an f variable to it.

Arguments¶ ↑

Wrapping tag

Default operation is to wrap field in div tag. Alternate tags can be specified, by adding the tag argument to the fields_for and link_to_add.

<% f.fields_for :tasks, :tag => 'li'  do |task_form| %>
  <%= task_form.text_field :name %>
  <%= task_form.link_to_remove "Remove this task" %>
<% end %>
<%= f.link_to_add "Add a task", :tasks, :tag => 'li' %>

Special Thanks¶ ↑

This plugin is based on the solution by Tim Riley in his complex-form-examples fork.

github.com/timriley/complex-form-examples/tree/unobtrusive-jquery-deep-fix2