Creating a Nested Association with Has_Many :Through

Question

I am not sure if my title is properly using the vocabulary. I found a few SO posts where people had similar issues (I couldn't find a solution in those posts), so I used a similar title to those. I am trying to allow users to create clubs and automatically assign the user as a member of the club. However, it seems like I have something out of order when I tried to create the club.

I have three models:

###Models###
#user
  has_many :club_memberships, :class_name => 'ClubMembership', :foreign_key => :member_id, :primary_key => :id 
  has_many :clubs, :through => :club_memberships 

#club
  attr_accessor :club_name, :club_type

  has_many :club_memberships
  has_many :members, :through => :club_memberships
#clubmembership
   attr_accessor :club_id, :member_id, :membership_type 

   belongs_to :club 
   belongs_to :member, :class_name => "User", :foreign_key => :member_id, :primary_key => :id 

Here are the relevant parts of the controllers

###Controllers###
#Clubs
  def new
    @club = Club.new
  end

  def create
    @club = Club.new(club_params)
    if @club.save
     @club_membership = ClubMembership.create(
        member_id: current_user.id,
        club_id: @club.id,
        membership_type: 'founder'
      )
      flash[:success] = "Club Created!"
      redirect_to root_url
    else
      render @club.errors.full_messages
    end
  end

  private
    def club_params
      params.require(:club).permit(:club_name, :club_type)
    end

#ClubMemberships
  def create
    @club_membership = ClubMembership.new(club_membership_params)

    if @club_membership.save
      render @club_membership
    else
      render @club_membership.errors.full_messages
    end
  end

  private
    def club_membership_params
      params.require(:club_membership).permit(:member_id, :club_id, :membership_type)
    end

My form_for

###View###
#club#new
    = form_for(@club) do |f|
        .field.center-align
            = f.label :club_name
            = f.text_field :club_name, :class => "form-control fieldbox", autofocus: true
        .field.center-align
            = f.label :club_type
            = f.text_field :club_type, :class => 'form-control fieldbox', autofocus: true
        .actions.center-align
            = f.submit "Create Club!", :class => "btn hoverable padtop"

And finally, here is what the log shows on post

#log
Started POST "/clubs" for at 2015-09-03 22:32:41 +0000
Cannot render console from ! Allowed networks: 127.0.0.1, ::1, 127.0.0.0/127.255.255.255
Processing by ClubsController#create as HTML
  Parameters: {"utf8"=>"✓", "authenticity_token"=>"Ar2dv41/Tqk9EVjwfLLeD8bnpLoVWQIdDxG3Ju1GO3stLLvPd/FFgoFF9YuHobWbgb2byqkgAMiWRJAg5YcGKQ==", "club"=>{"club_name"=>"Test Club", "club_type"=>"Test Type"}, "commit"=>"Create Club!"}
   (0.2ms)  BEGIN
  Club Exists (0.4ms)  SELECT  1 AS one FROM `clubs` WHERE `clubs`.`club_name` = BINARY 'Test Club' LIMIT 1
  SQL (0.3ms)  INSERT INTO `clubs` (`created_at`, `updated_at`) VALUES ('2015-09-03 22:32:41', '2015-09-03 22:32:41')
   (3.4ms)  COMMIT
  User Load (0.1ms)  SELECT  `users`.* FROM `users` WHERE `users`.`id` = 56 LIMIT 1
   (0.1ms)  BEGIN
  ClubMembership Exists (0.3ms)  SELECT  1 AS one FROM `club_memberships` WHERE (`club_memberships`.`member_id` = BINARY 56 AND `club_memberships`.`club_id` IS NULL) LIMIT 1
  SQL (1.6ms)  INSERT INTO `club_memberships` (`created_at`, `updated_at`) VALUES ('2015-09-03 22:32:41', '2015-09-03 22:32:41')
   (3.1ms)  COMMIT
Redirected to c9
Completed 302 Found in 71ms (ActiveRecord: 11.1ms)

I'll be honest. I have no clue what is happening in that POST or where to tackle this from next. It seems like the parameters I want are going through, but then they aren't. Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

I figured it out. I tried two things at once and it worked, so I can't say for sure what helped, but I am pretty sure the second thing was most important.

First, I removed the attr_accessor from both model's (Club and ClubMembership). Why did I put it in there in the first place? No idea. I probably saw it somewhere and thought it was cool.

Second, also in the models, I had validators that I didn't post because I didn't think they were important. I had:

validates :club_name, :club_type, :presence => true validates :club_name, :uniqueness => true

I changed this to:

validates :club_name, presence: true 
validates :club_type, presence: true

Turns out that was important and everything is working fine now.