Resource This

Not scaffolding. Resourcing. Creates extremely customizable resource controllers with one line of code.

class PostsController &lt; ActionController::Base
 resource_this
end

...will generate the following code:

class PostsController &lt; ActionController::Base
  before_filter :load_post, :only => [ :show, :edit, :update, :destroy ]
  before_filter :load_posts, :only => [ :index ]
  before_filter :new_post, :only => [ :new ]
  before_filter :create_post, :only => [ :create ]
  before_filter :update_post, :only => [ :update ]
  before_filter :destroy_post, :only => [ :destroy ]

protected
  def load_post
    @post = Post.find(params[:id])
  end

def new_post
  @post = Post.new
end

def create_post
  returning true do
    @post = Post.new(params[:post])
    @created = @post.save
  end
end

def update_post
  returning true do
    @updated = @post.update_attributes(params[:post])
  end
end

def destroy_post
  @post = @post.destroy
end

def load_posts
  @posts = Post.find(:all)
end

public
  def index
    respond_to do |format|
      format.html
      format.xml  { render :xml => @posts }
      format.js
    end
  end
end

def show          
  respond_to do |format|
    format.html
    format.xml  { render :xml => @post }
    format.js
  end
end

def new          
  respond_to do |format|
    format.html { render :action => :edit }
    format.xml  { render :xml => @post }
    format.js
  end
end

def create
  respond_to do |format|
    if @created
      flash[:notice] = 'Post was successfully created.'
      format.html { redirect_to @post }
      format.xml  { render :xml => @post, :status => :created, :location => @post }
      format.js
    else
      format.html { render :action => :new }
      format.xml  { render :xml => @post.errors, :status => :unprocessable_entity }
      format.js
    end
  end
end

def edit
  respond_to do |format|
    format.html
    format.js
  end
end

def update
  respond_to do |format|
    if @updated
      flash[:notice] = 'Post was successfully updated.'
      format.html { redirect_to @post }
      format.xml  { head :ok }
      format.js
    else
      format.html { render :action => :edit }
      format.xml  { render :xml => @post.errors, :status => :unprocessable_entity }
      format.js
    end
  end
end

def destroy          
  respond_to do |format|
    format.html { redirect_to :action => posts_url }
    format.xml  { head :ok }
    format.js
  end
end

Nested Resources

class CommentsController &lt; ActionController::Base
  resource_this :nested => [:posts]
end

This generates a very similar controller to the one above with adjusted redirects and one additional before_filter / loader method pair to grab the parent resource. In this case:

before_filter :load_post

def load_post
  @post = Post.find(params[:post_id])
end

Sorting, etc

class CommentsController &lt; ActionController::Base
  resource_this :finder_options => {:order => 'created_on'}
end

...or, for lazily evaluated sorting options:

class CommentsController &lt; ActionController::Base
  resource_this :finder_options => Proc.new { finder_options }

protected

def finder_options
  order = case params[:sort]
    when 'date_reverse'          then 'created_on desc'
    else 'created_on'
  end
  {:order => order, :limit => params[:limit] || 10 }
end

end

will_paginate

will_paginate support is baked right in:

class CommentsController &lt; ActionController::Base
  resource_this :will_paginate => true
end

This works with the :finder_options option as well

Opinionated Software

The separation of logic – DB operations in before_filters, rendering in the standard resource controller methods – makes this approach ridiculously easy to customize. Need to load an additional object for the :show action? Slap another before_filter on it. Need to change the path that the :update action redirects to? Override the :update action with your new rendering behavior.