Wicked Focused

This gem is wicked tweaked for use with focused controller.

Use wicked to make your Rails controllers into step-by-step wizards. To see Wicked in action check out the example Rails app or watch the screencast.

Why

Many times I'm left wanting a RESTful way to display a step by step process that may or not be associated with a resource. Wicked gives the flexibility to do what I want while hiding all the really nasty stuff you shouldn't do in a controller to make this possible. At it's core Wicked is a RESTful(ish) state machine, but you don't need to know that, just use it.

Install

Add this to your Gemfile

  gem 'wicked-focused'

Then run bundle install and you're ready to start

Quicklinks

• Build an object step-by-step using Partial Validation of Active Record Objects
• Show Current Wizard Progress to User
• Example App
• Screencast
• Watch Railscasts episode: #346 Wizard Forms with Wicked

How

We are going to build an 'after signup' wizard. First create a controller:

  rails g controller after_signup

Add Routes into config/routes.rb:

  resources :after_signup

Next include Wicked::Wizard in your controller

  class AfterSignupController
    # base Wizard Action class of Controller must be called 'Action'
    # and must include of Wizard::Action
    class Action < FocusedAction
      include Wizard::Action

      steps :confirm_password, :confirm_profile, :find_friends    
    end

    # creates Focused Action :index 
    include Wicked::Wizard 

The wizard is set to call steps in order in the show action, you can specify custom logic in your show using a case statement like below. To send someone to the first step in this wizard we can direct them to after_signup_path(:confirm_password).

class AfterSignupController
  class Action < FocusedAction
    include Wizard::Action

    steps :confirm_password, :confirm_profile, :find_friends    
  end
  include Wicked::Wizard 

  class Show < Action
    def run
      wizard_redirect and return if super()
      @user = current_user
      case step
      when :find_friends
        @friends = @user.find_friends
      end
      render_wizard
    end
  end
end

Note: Wicked uses the :id parameter to control the flow of steps, if you need to have an id parameter, please use nested routes see Partial Validation of Active Record Objects for an example. It will need to be prefixed, for example a Product's :id would be :product_id

You'll need to call render_wizard at the end of your action to get the correct views to show up.

By default the wizard will render a view with the same name as the step. So for our controller AfterSignupController with a view path of /views/after_signup/ if call the :confirm_password step, our wizard will render /views/after_signup/confirm_password.html.erb

Then in your view you can use the helpers to get to the next step.

   <%= link_to 'skip', next_wizard_path %>

You can manually specify which wizard action you want to link to by using the wizard_path helper.

   <%= link_to 'skip', wizard_path(:find_friends) %>

In addition to showing sequential views we can update elements in our controller. Note: Here we demonstrate the use of wicked macros.

class AfterSignupController
  use_wicked_macros

  wicked_base_action do
    steps :confirm_password, :confirm_profile, :find_friends
  end    

  wizard_action :show do
    wizard do
      render_wizard
    end
  end  

  wizard_action :update do
    wizard do
      @user = current_user
      case step
      when :confirm_password
        @user.update_attributes(params[:user])
      end
      sign_in(@user, :bypass => true) # needed for devise
      render_wizard @user
    end
  end
end

We're passing render_wizard our @user object here. If you pass an object into render_wizard it will show the next step if the object saves or re-render the previous view if it does not save.

To get to this update action, you simply need to submit a form that PUT's to the same url

    <%= form_for @user, :url => wizard_path, :method => :put do |f| %>
      <%=  f.password_field :password  %>
      <%=  f.password_field :password_confirmation  %>

      <%= f.submit "Change Password" %>
    <% end %>

We explicitly tell the form to PUT above. If you forget this, you will get a warning about the create action not existing, or no route found for POST. Don't forget this.

In the controller if you find that you want to skip a step, you can do it simply by calling skip_step

  wicked_base_action do
    steps :why_us, :subscribe, :login, :payment

    optional_steps: why_us # allow skip
    command_steps :subscribe, :login, :payment
  end    


  show_wizard do
    wizard do
      @user = current_user
      case step
      when :find_friends
        if @user.has_facebook_access_token?
          @friends = @user.find_friends
        else
          skip_step
        end
      end
      render_wizard
    end
  end

Now you've got a fully functioning AfterSignup controller! If you have questions or if you struggled with something, let me know on twitter, and i'll try to make it better or make the docs better.

Using the Command pattern

To better encapsulate Business logic, it is recommended for Controllers to create and perform commands. This can fx be done using the imperator gem.

  show_wizard do
    wizard do
      @user = current_user
      skip_step if !command_step? step # skip if step not mapped to a command
      command_for step # execute command of same name as step
      render_wizard
    end
  end

Quick Reference

Macros

use_wicked_macros enables use of the Wicked macros. Otherwise you must explicitly create equivalent classes and methods.

wicked_base_action name, &block

Created the Focused Controller action base class, from which any Wizard Action class will inherit from.

wizard_action name, &block

Creates a Focused Controller action class inheriting from the base action class of the controller. The block contains the class definition. The wizard actions are show and update. To further abstract this, the shorthand macros: show_wizard &block and update_wizard &block are also available.

wizard &block

Creates a #run method as "required" by a Focused Controller action class.

The run method generated also:

• calls super() which calls setup_wizard
• auto-handles redirects to first or last step (*)
• skips step (*)

(*) if params indicate this is requested behavior

View/URL Helpers

  wizard_path                  # Grabs the current path in the wizard
  wizard_path(:specific_step)  # Url of the :specific_step
  next_wizard_path             # Url of the next step
  previous_wizard_path         # Url of the previous step

  # These only work while in a Wizard, and are not absolute paths
  # You can have multiple wizards in a project with multiple `wizard_path` calls

Controller Tidbits:

  steps  :first, :second       # Sets the order of steps
  step                         # Gets symbol of current step
  next_step                    # Gets symbol of next step
  skip_step                    # Tells render_wizard to skip to the next logical step
  render_wizard                # Renders the current step
  render_wizard(@user)         # Shows next_step if @user.save, otherwise renders current step

Finally:

Don't forget to create your named views

  app/
   views/
    controller_name/
      first.html.erb
      second.html.erb
      # ...

Finish Wizard Path

You can specify the url that your user goes to by over-riding the finish_wizard_path in your wizard controller action.

  def finish_wizard_path
    user_path(current_user)
  end

Testing with RSpec

  # Test find_friends block of show action
  get :show, :id => :find_friends

  # Test find_friends block of update action
  put :update, {'id' => 'find_friends', "user" => { "id" => @user.id.to_s }}

About

Please poke around the source code, if you see easier ways to get a Rails controller do do what I want, let me know.

If you have a question file an issue or, find me on the Twitters @schneems.

This project rocks and uses MIT-LICENSE.