An "else" condition for link_to_unless_current

Apr 18 ’07

Filed in ruby on rails

Every time I get frustrated with an aspect of Rails, it turns out that it's just my idiocy and not actually something to do with Rails.

Most recently, I wanted to code this algorithm:

If on the current page
  show <a href="blah1">link 1</a>
else
  show <a href="blah2>link 2

Rails has, of course, the nifty link_to_unless_current, but all that does is show the text of the link:

If on the current page
  show link
else
  show <a href="blah">link</a>

That's not quite what I'm looking for. But when I was looking up link_to_unless_current in the docs, I realized that there IS an else condition on link_to_unless_current. The function takes a block as its last parameter, and that's what gives you the "else."

This code, in a view:

<%= link_to_unless_current('Link text', my_url) { 'Alternate text' } %>

produces this algorithmic result:

If on the current page
  show Alternate text
else
  show <a href="my_url">Link text</a>

Mission accomplished.

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