Best way to highlight current page in Rails 3? — apply a css class to links conditionally

Question

For the following code:

<%= link_to \"Some Page\", some_path %>

How do I apply a css class current using the

Answer 1

I think if would be good idea if you generate whole link_to from your helper method. Why to repeat the same code ( :-) DRY principle)

def create_link(text, path)
  class_name = current_page?(path) ? 'current' : 'any_other_class'

  link_to text, path, class: class_name
end

Now you can use like:

<%= create_link 'xyz', any_path %> (in views) which would render as <a href="/any" class="current">xyz</a>

Hope it helps!

Answer 2

In app/helpers/application_helper.rb

def cp(path)
  "current" if current_page?(path)
end

In your views:

<%= link_to "All Posts", posts_path, class: cp(posts_path) %>

Basically write a simple wrapper around it. Additionally you could extend the method to allow additional classes to be applied by adding arguments. Keeps the views concise/dry. Or, without extending the method, you could just do simple String interpolation like so to add additional classes:

<%= link_to "All Posts", posts_path, class: "#{cp(posts_path)} additional_class" %>