Niceties

Niceties is a curated collection of small, thoughtful additions to Rails. Nothing fancy, nothing heavy — just expressive, elegant helpers that make everyday code smoother and more joyful.

It’s the kind of thing you might monkey-patch in your own app and forget about. Niceties gives those private little helpers a permanent, public home.

Niceties is built on a few quiet principles:

• Ergonomics matter. Tiny syntax improvements compound across projects and years.
• Less is more. This isn’t a kitchen sink. Every addition is judged by feel.
• No surprises. If you have to explain what it’s doing, it probably doesn’t belong here.
• Ruby’s voice, not ours. Every method should read like Ruby. Nothing flashy, nothing clever for its own sake.

You should be able to drop Niceties into your app and feel like it’s always been there.

Niceties provides the following methods so far:

# Object.try_each
@user.try_each(:full_name, :nickname, :username) # instead of @user&.full_name || @user&.nickname || @user&.username

# Object.coalesce
@user.coalesce(:full_name, :nickname, "Valued Customer") # instead of @user&.full_name || @user&.nickname || "Valued Customer"

# Object.not_a?
@user.not_a? Widget # instead of !@user.is_a? Widget

# Array.tidy
["", nil, 4].tidy => [4] # instead of ["", nil, 4].select { it.present? } 

# Integer.percent_of
25.percent_of(200) => 50 # instead of (200 / 100.0) * 25

# Float.percent_of
16.6.percent_of(1000) => 166 # instead of (1000 / 100.0) * 16.6

# Numeric.plus_or_minus
5.plus_or_minus(2) => 3..7 # instead of (5-2)..(5+2)

User.where(created_at: Time.current.minus_upto(1.hour))

More methods will be coming soon and contributions are very much welcomed!

Niceties is open to anyone with an idea that makes Ruby or Rails feel better to use.

If you’ve ever written a helper method and thought:

"This is too small for a gem, but I wish it lived somewhere..."

That’s exactly what Niceties is for.

Guiding questions for contributors:

• Does this make everyday code more readable or expressive?
• Does it align with Ruby’s style and philosophy?
• Would I be delighted if this existed in the language?

If yes — open a PR or start a discussion.