ActiveRecordPrettyKey

A Ruby gem for generating and managing pretty, human-readable keys in ActiveRecord models.

The gem automatically generates pretty keys by creating unique integer "tickets" and encoding them with the Sqids library to produce short, URL-safe string identifiers. Keys are generated before saving records, ensuring both uniqueness and consistency.

Inspried by:

• Flickr Ticket Servers: Distributed Unique Primary Keys on the Cheap
• Hashids

Pretty keys offer a middle ground between auto-incrementing integers and UUIDs — they're human-readable identifiers that remain secure, performant, and user-friendly.

Add this line to your application's Gemfile:

gem 'active_record_pretty_key'

And then execute:

$ bundle install

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install active_record_pretty_key

First, run the generator to create the required tickets table:

rails generate active_record_pretty_key:install

This will create a migration that sets up the tickets table needed for generating unique IDs.

Configration of a customized Sqids ID alphabet can be done by setting Rails credentials like so:

sqids:
  alphabet: "ENwUpVBslGq25afc6i0hyD4tnjxRY31Wouz7HFTeMKgSbmPZvJ9ALXCQdrkI8O"

This can be used to configure a randomized alphabet to obfuscate object IDs.

To generate a shuffled alphabet:

require 'sqids'
puts Sqids::DEFAULT_ALPHABET.split('').shuffle.join

Pretty keys require that your model use a string primary key:

class CreatePosts < ActiveRecord::Migration[8.0]
  def change
    create_table :posts, id: :string do |t|
      t.string :title

      t.timestamps
    end
  end
end

You may choose to configure ActiveRecord to always generate migrations with a string primary key:

  # application.rb

  # Default string primary key in migrations for use with Sqids
  config.generators do |generate|
    generate.orm :active_record, primary_key_type: :string
  end

Include the concern in your ApplicationRecord to use everywhere:

class ApplicationRecord < ActiveRecord::Base
  primary_abstract_class
  include ActiveRecordPrettyKey::Concern
end

OR

Include the concern on a model by model basis:

class Post < ApplicationRecord
  include ActiveRecordPrettyKey::Concern
end

Keys are generated before-save automatically:

post = Post.create(title: "My Awesome Post")
post.id
# => "BnJe"

Or the generation helper can be called manually:

post = Post.new(title: "My Awesome Post")
post.generate_pretty_key
# => "9LW9"

post.save!

When working with Active Storage remember to properly set the attachments foreign key type:

class FixAttachmentsFks < ActiveRecord::Migration[8.0]
  def change
    change_column :active_storage_attachments, :record_id, :string, null: false
  end
end

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake spec to run the tests. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.

To install this gem onto your local machine, run bundle exec rake install. To release a new version, update the version number in version.rb, and then run bundle exec rake release, which will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and the created tag, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/noreastergroup/active_record_pretty_key. This project is intended to be a safe, welcoming space for collaboration, and contributors are expected to adhere to the code of conduct.

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.

Everyone interacting in the ActiveRecordPrettyKey project's codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms and mailing lists is expected to follow the code of conduct.