DTB, DataTable Builder

DataTable Builder provides simple building blocks to build complex filterable queries and turn them into easy to render datatables using Rails.

Add this line to your application's Gemfile:

gem "dtb"

And then execute:

$ bundle install

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install dtb

This gem is a toolkit for generating complex data tables for Rails. For the most common use case, you'll define a Query object that encapsulates the logic of what to load and how to filter it.

Then, you'll pass your filtering parameters and any other context information to the query, and #run it, which will generate a set of rows. You can then build a DataTable with information from that query and those rows, and render it in your views.

For example, here's a simple query to illustrate some of the features:

class ProductsQuery < ApplicationQuery
  default_scope { Current.store.products.order(created_at: :desc) }

  column :name
  column :price, ->(scope) { scope.select(:price_in_cents) }
  column :status
  column :category,
    ->(scope) { scope.joins(:product_categories).select(categories: :name) }
  column :purchases,
    ->(scope) { scope.select(:purchases_count) },
    if: -> { Current.user.admin? }

  filter :name,
    ->(scope, value) { scope.where("name ILIKE ?, "%#{value}%") },
    type: TextFilter

  # The default for a filter is ->(scope, value) { scope.where(name => value) },
  # where in this case `:status` is the name, so no need to type it out for
  # simple filters.
  filter :status,
    type: SelectFilter,
    options_for_select: -> { Product.statuses }
end

Now you can run the query like this:

results = ProductsQuery.run({filters: {status: "published"})
results #=> #<ActiveRecord::Relation [#<Product ...>, ...]>

(Normally, you'd just pass the params Hash to .run.)

Normally you will want to build a Data Table out of the results, which you can pass to the view layer for rendering. You can use DataTable.build:

@products = DTB::DataTable.build(ProductsQuery, params)

The DataTable object exposes the following convenience methods:

• #rows (an Enumerable with the result of running the query)
• #columns (an Enumerable with the column definitions for the query)
• #filters (an Enumerable with the filter definitions for the query, including the current value, to render the form)
• #options (any options passed to the data table / query)
• #empty_state (an object to help you render empty states—see below)

DTB has no opinions on how a Data Table should look like, so it's up to you to provide the HTML. DTB makes it easy to hook partials or view components or similar for every object. For example, you can define this in your ApplicationQuery:

class ApplicationQuery < DTB::Query
  options[:render_with] = "data_tables/data_table"
end

If you rather use components, you can just pass the component class instead:

class ApplicationQuery < DTB::Query
  options[:render_with] = DataTableComponent
end

You can of course override the component used per Query, if you have a data table that needs to look different. You can also override it when you run the query, like this:

results = ProductsQuery.run(params, render_with: "admin/data_table")

Or

data_table = DTB::DataTable.build(
  ProductsQuery, params, render_with: "admin/data_table"
)

You can then render this in the view by calling the #renderer method of the DataTable:

<%= render data_table.renderer %>

In all these cases, the "renderer" will be passed a hash with a :data_table key. If using a partial, that will be made available as a local variable. If using a component, that will be passed as a keyword to the initializer. For example:

<%= render partial: "data_tables/data_table",
           locals: {data_table: the_data_table_object} %>

Or

DataTableComponent.new(data_table: the_data_table_object)

If you need to pass other options to the renderer, you can pass then from the view:

<%= render data_table.renderer(extra: :option) %>

Or if you always want to pass extra options you can override the rendering_options method on your query:

def rendering_options
  # NOTE: Don't forget to call `super` here!
  super.merge(extra: :option)
end

Finally, if you need more control over the renderer, you can specify a Proc:

class ApplicationQuery < DTB::Query
  options[:render_with] = ->(...) {
    component = Current.user.admin? ? Admin::DataTableComponent : DataTableComponent
    component.new(...)
  }
end

Same as Query, the Filter class has a render_with option you can use to define how to render the form component:

class TextFilter < DTB::Filter
  options[:render_with] = TextFilterComponent
end

The default renderer for filters is a partial named after the filter itself. For example, "filters/text_filter" for TextFilter, or "filters/select_filter" for SelectFilter.

The set of filters itself can be rendered by calling its #renderer:

<%= render data_table.filters.renderer %>

To configure the default renderer for your filters form, you can set the option on the ApplicationQuery as well:

class ApplicationQuery < DTB::Query
  options[:filters][:render_with] = "data_tables/filters"
end

For filters, the renderer will be passed a filters: option with the FilterSet object. You can use this to render a filters form like this:

<%= form_with scope: filters.namespace, method: :get, url: filters.submit_url do |form| %>
  <h3>Filters</h3>

  <% if filters.applied.any? %>
    <p><%= link_to "Clear all", filters.reset_url %></p>
  <% end %>

  <% filters.each do |filter| %>
    <%= render filter.renderer(form: form) %>
  <% end %>

  <%= form.submit %>
<% end %>

Then, for example, this could be the text_filter partial:

<div>
  <%= form.label filter.name, filter.label %>
  <%= form.text_field filter.name, value: filter.value %>
</div>

The value of Filter#label will come from your locale file. See Internationalization below.

"Rows" are not an abstraction provided by DTB, but rather just the results of running the query. Hence, by default, if you're using partials you can just render the "rows" themselves, and use Rails' normal partial resolution for models:

<%= render data_table.rows, locals: {columns: data_table.columns} %>

And then, on app/views/products/_product.html.erb:

<tr>
  <% columns.each do |column| %>
    <td><%= column.value_for(product) %></td>
  <% end %>
</tr>

When using components, you can define a component for the row, and then render it with the collection:

<%= render RowComponent.with_collection(data_table.rows, columns: data_table.columns) %>

And then the RowComponent could have a template very similar to the above (except using row instead of product).

Column objects can also define an optional renderer. This is useful when using components, where you might want different columns to override which component they use to render their value:

class ProductsQuery < ApplicationQuery
  column :status,
    render_with: StatusBadgeCellComponent
end

In this case, you'd probably want a generic CellComponent to use on all other columns. You can override the default class used for building columns and set the default option on it:

class ApplicationQuery < DTB::Query
  class Column < DTB::Column
    options[:render_with] = CellComponent
  end

  options[:default_column_type] = Column
end

Now, all columns will render with CellComponent, unless overridden.

Now your RowComponent can be truly generic, by rendering each cell component separately:

<tr>
  <% columns.each do |column| %>
    <%= render column.renderer(row: row) %>
  <% end %>
</tr>

You can use the Column#value_for(row) method to extract the value for a column given a row. For example, in your column renderer, you might do

<td>
  <%= column.value_for(row) %>
</td>

The behavior of #value_for is controlled by the Column's accessor option. By default, it will try to public_send the column's name to the row object.

class ProductsQuery < ApplicationQuery
  # In this case, `column.value_for(row)` is equivalent to `row.name`
  column :name

  # Here, we're assuming the model defines a `#price` method (e.g. via
  # `composed_of` that returns something that's better to display than
  # the number of cents)
  column :price_in_cents, accessor: :price

  # By using a Proc as the accessor, we can do more advanced formatting of the
  # value, without having to do anything special when rendering the cell.
  column :purchases_count, accessor: ->(row) { "purchase".pluralize(row.purchases_count) }
end

DTB relies heavily on the I18n gem for all user-facing text. Normally, all translations are defined under the queries namespace, and depend on the type of object. For example, the filter labels are defined under:

en:
  queries:
    filters:
      products_query:
        status: Current status

The cell headings can also be sourced from i18n:

en:
  queries:
    columns:
      products_query:
        name: Product Name

DTB assumes that for all tables, you'll want to present a somewhat similar view when the table is empty (whether because there's no data, or because the filters applied by the user are too restrictive).

This is handled by the EmptyState object, which you can render (using #renderer as with everything else, and configure via i18n).

To define the default renderer for empty states, you can set it on the query:

class ApplicationQuery < DTB::Query
  options[:empty_state][:render_with] = "data_tables/empty_state"
end

The partial (or component) will receive an empty_state variable that points to this object, which provides:

• #title
• #explanation
• #update_filters

These are just accessors into the locale file:

en:
  queries:
    empty_states:
      application_query:
        title: Nothing to see here!
      products_query:
        explanation: There are no products yet. Why don't you add one?
        update_filters: Your search didn't find anything. Please change or clear your filters.

When rendering the empty state, it's a good idea to pass the FilterSet as an option, so you can check if filters were applied:

<% if data_table.rows.any? %>
  <!-- Render the data table normally -->
<% else %>
  <%= render data_table.empty_state.renderer(filters: data_table.filters) %>
<% end %>

And then, you can do something like this:

<h1><%= empty_state.title %></h1>
<% if filters.applied.any? %>
  <p><%= empty_state.update_filters %></p>
<% else %>
  <p><%= empty_state.explanation %></p>
<% end %>

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake test 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.

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at repo. This project is intended to be a safe, welcoming space for collaboration, and contributors are expected to adhere to the code of conduct.

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