Is there a more efficient/proper way to write this in Ruby?

Question

I come from php and am just starting to cut my teeth in ruby and rails.

Is there more efficient or a more 'ruby' way of writing the following?

<% if !@user.twitter_url.empty? %>
    <a class="twitter" href="<%= @user.twitter_url %>">Twitter</a>
<% end %>
<% if !@user.facebook_url.empty? %>
    <a class="facebook" href="<%= @user.facebook_url %>">Facebook</a>
<% end %>
<% if !@user.google_plus_url.empty? %>
    <a class="googleplus" href="<%= @user.google_plus_url %>">Google Plus</a>
<% end %>
<% if !@user.linked_in_url.empty? %>
    <a class="linkedin" href="<%= @user.google_plus_url %>">Linked In</a>
<% end %>

Answer 1

The best way should be to use some Presenter or maybe a helper method. Anyway using metaprogramming you can do

<% [:twitter, :facebook, :google_plus, :linked_in].each do |social| %>
  <% unless @user.send("#{social}_url").blank? %>
    <a class="<%= social %>" href="<%= @user.send("#{social}_url") %>">social.to_s.titleize </a>
  <% end %>
<% end %>

or

<% [:twitter, :facebook, :google_plus, :linked_in].each do |social| %>
  <%= link_to(social.to_s.titleize , @user.send("#{social}_url"), class: social) unless @user.send("#{social}_url").blank? %>
<% end %>

Or even:

<% [:twitter, :facebook, :google_plus, :linked_in].each do |social| %>
  <%= link_to_unless @user.send("#{social}_url").blank?, social.to_s.titleize , @user.send("#{social}_url"), class: social %>
<% end %>

Answer 2

More compact way :

<%= link_to "Twitter", @user.twitter_url if !@user.twitter_url.blank?  %>
<%= link_to "Facebook", @user.facebook_url if !@user.facebook_url.blank?  %>
<%= link_to "Google Plus", @user.google_plus_url if !@user.google_plus_url.blank?  %>
<%= link_to "Linked In", @user.linked_in_url if !@user.linked_in_url.blank?  %>

With present? instead, thanks to Mark Thomas comment :

<%= link_to "Twitter", @user.twitter_url if @user.twitter_url.present?  %>
<%= link_to "Facebook", @user.facebook_url if !@user.facebook_url.present?  %>
<%= link_to "Google Plus", @user.google_plus_url if !@user.google_plus_url.present?  %>
<%= link_to "Linked In", @user.linked_in_url if !@user.linked_in_url.present?  %>

Or you could use unless instead of if ! with blank? , but I generally find code using unless hard to read, bu that's just me!

Answer 3

Use blank? instead of empty? here in case the url fields are nil. While nil.blank? is defined, nil.empty? is not.

<% unless @user.twitter_url.blank? %>
    <%= link_to "Twitter", @user.twitter_url, class: "twitter" %>
<% end %>
<% unless @user.facebook_url.blank? %>
    <%= link_to "Facebook", @user.facebook_url, class: "facebook" %>
<% end %>
<% unless @user.google_plus_url.blank? %>
    <%= link_to "Google Plus", @user.google_plus_url, class: "googleplus" %>
<% end %>
<% unless @user.linked_in_url.blank? %>
    <%= link_to "Linked In", @user.linked_in_url, class: "linkedin" %>
<% end %>