module ActiveRecord module Mixins # Including this mixin if you want to model a tree structure by providing a parent association and an children # association. This mixin assumes that you have a column called parent_id # # class Category < ActiveRecord::Base # include ActiveRecord::Mixins::Tree # end # # Example : # root # \_ child1 # \_ sub-child1 # # root = Category.create("name" => "root") # child1 = root.children.create("name" => "child1") # subchild1 = child1.children.create("name" => "subchild1") # # root.parent # => nil # child1.parent # => root # root.children # => [child1] # root.children.first.children.first # => subchild1 module Tree def self.append_features(base) super base.extend(ClassMethods) end end module ClassMethods def acts_as_tree(options = {}) configuration = { :foreign_key => "parent_id", :order => nil } configuration.update(options) if options.is_a?(Hash) belongs_to :parent, :class_name => name, :foreign_key => configuration[:foreign_key] has_many :children, :class_name => name, :foreign_key => configuration[:foreign_key], :order => configuration[:order], :dependent => true end end end end