Re-open an ActiveRecord model that's provided by a gem

Question

I\'m trying to extend an ActiveRecord model (Vote) that a gem (https://github.com/peteonrails/vote_fu) provides to my application. (I.e., there is no vote.rb<

Answer 1

Your issue might be due to the fact that you are monkey patching the class. When rails tries to reload the constants it is not considering your file.

Try to use module technique as given below.

Add a file called lib/vote_fu_extension.rb

module VoteFuExtension
  def self.included(base)
    base.has_one :activity_stream_event
    base.after_create :create_activity_stream_event
  end
  def create_activity_stream_event
    # something..
  end  
end
Vote.send(:include, VoteFuExtension)

Add an initializer called config/initializers/vote_fu.rb

require "vote_fu_extension"

Note

If you want to add class methods to the Vote model refer to this answer.

Shameless plug: My fork of the vote_fu gem has some new features and enhancements.