validates_uniqueness_of
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- What's this?
validates_uniqueness_of(*attr_names)
public
Validates whether the value of the specified attributes are unique across the system. Useful for making sure that only one user can be named "davidhh".
class Person < ActiveRecord::Base validates_uniqueness_of :user_name, :scope => :account_id end
It can also validate whether the value of the specified attributes are unique based on multiple scope parameters. For example, making sure that a teacher can only be on the schedule once per semester for a particular class.
class TeacherSchedule < ActiveRecord::Base validates_uniqueness_of :teacher_id, :scope => [:semester_id, :class_id] end
When the record is created, a check is performed to make sure that no record exists in the database with the given value for the specified attribute (that maps to a column). When the record is updated, the same check is made but disregarding the record itself.
Because this check is performed outside the database there is still a chance that duplicate values will be inserted in two parallel transactions. To guarantee against this you should create a unique index on the field. See add_index for more information.
Configuration options:
- :message - Specifies a custom error message (default is: "has already been taken")
- :scope - One or more columns by which to limit the scope of the uniqueness constraint.
- :case_sensitive - Looks for an exact match. Ignored by non-text columns (true by default).
- :allow_nil - If set to true, skips this validation if the attribute is nil (default is: false)
- :allow_blank - If set to true, skips this validation if the attribute is blank (default is: false)
- :if - Specifies a method, proc or string to call to determine if the validation should occur (e.g. :if => :allow_validation, or :if => Proc.new { |user| user.signup_step > 2 }). The method, proc or string should return or evaluate to a true or false value.
- :unless - Specifies a method, proc or string to call to determine if the validation should not occur (e.g. :unless => :skip_validation, or :unless => Proc.new { |user| user.signup_step <= 2 }). The method, proc or string should return or evaluate to a true or false value.
:case_sensitive is on by default?
In contrast to what the documentation said, :case_sensitive seems to be on by default. This is the case with MySQL at least, I’m not sure about other databases.