In this article we will go over using FriendlyId in Rails 4. It is important to note that the current version of FriendlyId (4.0) does not work with Rails 4. Therefore we will need to use FriendlyId 5.x, which is currently in release candidate status.

First, let’s include the FriendlyId gem in our gemfile.

1

gem "friendly_id", "~> 5.0.1"

FriendlyId no longer overrides finder code by default. Because of this we will need to change the way our controller code works. FriendlyId now exposes it’s functionality via .friendly. For example, to find a post by it’s friendly id, we use something like Post.friendly.find(params[:id]). To get FriendlyId working, you need to modify your controllers to use this behavior. An example is shown below.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

class PostsController < ApplicationController
  def index
    @posts = Post.all
  end

  def show
    @post = Post.friendly.find(params[:id])
  end
end

If you have a large site making extensive use of FriendlyId, you can also restore the old finder override behavior. This isn’t recommended though. An example of how to do this is listed below.

1
2
3
4

class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
  extend FriendlyId
  friendly_id :title, use: [:slugged, :finders]
end

Once you’ve added this, finder override functionality should now be restored. For example, the code listed below will now work as before.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

class PostsController < ApplicationController
  def index
    @posts = Post.all
  end

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

FriendlyId 5 introduces a new slug candidates feature. This feature allows you to tell friendly id what to do in the case of duplicate slugs. See the code listed below for an example of how to utilize this functionality.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11

class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
  extend FriendlyId
  friendly_id :slug_candidates, use: [:slugged, :finders]

  def slug_candidates
    [
      :title,
      [:title, :id]
    ]
  end
end

The code listed above tells FriendlyId you want to use the slug_candidates method to make the slug unique. It will try the list beginning to last, so in the example above, it will try to generate the slug first using title, and then if a post by that title already exists, it will try again by appending the id.

Some other quick things to note when upgrading to FriendlyId 5:
- The default sequence separator has been changed from two dashes (–) to one dash (-). If you have a url scheme in place using the old way of doing things, you might want to find a workaround.
- FriendlyId no longer uses a numeric sequence to differentiate a conflicting slug. Instead it uses a UUID (example: 2bc08962-b3dd-4f29-b2e6-244710c86106). If you dislike this functionality, you can utilize the new slug candidates feature explained above.