Rails load YAML to hash and reference by symbol

Question

I am loading a YAML file in Rails 3.0.9 like this:

APP_CONFIG = YAML.load(File.read(File.expand_path(\'../app.yml\', __FILE__)))

It loads the a

Answer 1

You are probably used to the params hash in Rails, which is actually a HashWithIndifferentAccess rather than a standard ruby Hash object. This allows you to use either strings like 'action' or symbols like :action to access the contents.

With a HashWithIndifferentAccess, you will get the same results regardless of what you use, but keep in mind this only works on HashWithIndifferentAccess objects.

So to make this work with YAML, you'll have to load the result of YAML.load into a HashWithIndifferentAccess, like so:

APP_CONFIG = HashWithIndifferentAccess.new(   YAML.load(File.read(File.expand_path('../app.yml', __FILE__)))   )