Rails double nested routes, broken up

Question

I have these routes:

  map.resources :categories do |category|
    category.resources :sub_categories
  end

  map.resources :sub_categories do |sub_category|
    sub_category.resources :events
  end

This is only so that the url doesnt have to be doubly nested, I want to keep the url to a max of two objects deep.

The problem is that for events, I want to require there to a /sub_categories/:sub_category_id as a path_prefix, but using

  map.resources :events, path_prefix => '/sub_categories/:sub_category_id'

gives me routes like

  event_path

What I want to have is

  sub_category_event_path

BECAUSE any time a user wants to get to a *sub_category*, i want the url to require a *category_id* be provided, but if a user wants to see an event, a sub_category_id must be provided.

Answer 1

I just managed to get this working.. but I'm going to leave it here in hopes of people voting for a custom helper as @wuputah suggested, or my method.

map.resources :events, :path_prefix => 'sub_categories/:sub_category_id', :name_prefix => 'sub_category_'

produces the routes I'm looking for..

Answer 2

You're right, it does generate event_path, but that event_path will require a :sub_category_id option. To get a sub_category_event_path helper, just write one:

class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base
  private
  def sub_category_event_path(sub_category, event) 
    event_path(event, :sub_category_id => sub_category)
  end
  helper_method :sub_category_event_path
end

Unfortunately, if you ever want sub_category_event_url, you'll have to write that one too.

Rails 3 does have some new support for shallow routes that might interest you. Consider upgrading!