Identify keyword in active record query-rails

Question

@zipcode = ZipCodes.identify(params[:zip_code])

I am new to rails. Can anyone tell me what does the keyword 'identify' do. Is this related to active record query?

Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

The gem zip-codes provides the ZipCodes class with a identify class method that simply reads a zip code and returns the state, city and timezone.

ZipCodes.identify('30301')
# => {:state_code=>"GA", :state_name=>"Georgia", :city=>"Atlanta", :time_zone=>"America/New_York"}

How do I/you know this? I guess you are new to the project where you saw this line:

1. First look inside your project? Do you have a class called ZipCodes ? Yes, look in there.
2. No, look into your Gemfile , do you have anything mentioning ZipCodes or similar? Yes, search for the gem documentation.
3. No, Google a code snippet ZipCodes.identify and search among the results.

Here is the documentation for zip-codes : https://github.com/monterail/zip-codes