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Rails Generate helper

Reference & Command Builder

Published: 2023-05-11
Author: Harrison Broadbent
Type: Reference & Command Builder

Rails Generate Helper

Rails Generate Helper (rails g helper) is the generator for ActionView helpers. Rails automatically includes helper methods into your views, giving you a place to put shared view logic.

Rails ships with tons of built-in helpers — you're probably familiar with Rails helper methods like #time_ago_in_words, #image_tag and #button_to.

You can use the Rails helper generator to create your own helper methods; The generator will create a new module in app/helpers for you, which is automatically included into all your views —

❯ rails g helper example --no-helper-specs
      create  app/helpers/example_helper.rb
 
# app/helpers/example_helper.rb
module ExampleHelper
end

Despite writing your helpers inside modules like ExampleHelper, you call the methods directly; The modules just help you organize your helper methods.

To use your helper methods outside your views, you access them on the helpers object (Rails 5+). For example, you would access a helper method inside a controller like this —

class HomeController
  def index
    # "about 1 hour"
    helpers.time_ago_in_words(1.hour.ago)
  end
end

Command Builder for rails g helper

rails g helper

Helper name

Generator Options

Runtime Options

# Command Options
❯ rails g helper

Usage:
  rails generate helper NAME [options]

Options:
      [--skip-namespace], [--no-skip-namespace]              # Skip namespace (affects only isolated engines)
      [--skip-collision-check], [--no-skip-collision-check]  # Skip collision check
  -t, [--test-framework=NAME]                                # Test framework to be invoked
                                                             # Default:

Runtime options:
  -f, [--force]                    # Overwrite files that already exist
  -p, [--pretend], [--no-pretend]  # Run but do not make any changes
  -q, [--quiet], [--no-quiet]      # Suppress status output
  -s, [--skip], [--no-skip]        # Skip files that already exist
# Command Description
Description:
    Generates a new helper. Pass the helper name, either CamelCased
    or under_scored.

    To create a helper within a module, specify the helper name as a
    path like 'parent_module/helper_name'.

Example:
    `bin/rails generate helper CreditCard`

    Credit card helper.
        Helper:     app/helpers/credit_card_helper.rb