Routing root to display user's posts for logged in users and static page for non-logged in

Question

Story: A non logged in user should see a welcome static page and when he's logged in he should see a list of his blog posts.

I suppose the right way to do this is to route root to the action that lists all the user's posts which then checks for authentication. If the user isn't logged in then it renders the welcome page?

I need help with writing an action for the posts controller which displays posts for the logged in user.

Answer 1

I had this problem but didn't want a redirect (adds delay and changes url) so I'm deciding between constraints suggested in User-centric Routing in Rails 3 or scoped routes mentioned in Use lambdas for Rails 3 Route Constraints

Constraints

root :to => "landing#home", :constraints => SignedInConstraint.new(false)

Scoped routes

scope :constraints => lambda{|req| !req.session[:user_id].blank? } do
  # all signed in routes
end

Answer 2

routes.rb:

root :to => "posts#index"

post_controller.rb

class PostsController < ApplicationController
  before_filter :authenticate_user!

  def index
    @posts = current_user.posts.all
  end
end

If the user is not logged in, the before filter catches this and redirects somewhere (login? error message?). Otherwise the index method is called and the index view rendered. This would work out of the box with devise, if you roll another authentication you need to adapt and/or write your own helpers, eg something like this:

application.html.erb

class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base
  protect_from_forgery

  helper_method :current_user
  helper_method :user_signed_in?

  private  
    def current_user  
      @current_user ||= User.find_by_id(session[:user_id]) if session[:user_id]  
    end

    def user_signed_in?
      return 1 if current_user 
    end

    def authenticate_user!
      if !current_user
        flash[:error] = 'You need to sign in before accessing this page!'
        redirect_to signin_services_path
      end
    end 
end