How to use simple_format or a view to format HTML in model after_create callback

Question

I am using the mandrill-api (from MailChimp) to send an email to many people in a single API call. It takes a HTML parameter that I would like to be generated from a view rather than directly in my model where I have no access to simple_format to apply to the plain text (self.body) I have saved in the database.

Example code:

class Request < ActiveRecord::Base

  after_create :attempt_send

  def attempt_send
    require 'mandrill'
    m = Mandrill::API.new
    message = {
     :subject=> "Subject",
     :html => "#{self.body}"
    }
    sending = m.messages.send(message)
    puts sending
  end

end

This scenario is causing me an MVC headache. The rest of my app uses Rails action mailer so email content is handled cleanly in the view layer.

If you could tell me how to use simple_format somehow that would be a quick fix to achieve the formatting I need on self.body. I'm open to more elegant solutions to make this function more like Rails mailer though. One option I've considered is using a controller method to return the email html but then I think that would result in a self-referencing http request which wouldn't be an efficient way to go about it. Open to ideas!

Answer 1

You can include the module ActionView::Helpers::TextHelper

http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActionView/Helpers/TextHelper.html#method-i-simple_format

class Request < ActiveRecord::Base
  include ActionView::Helpers::TextHelper

  after_create :attempt_send

  # ...
  
    :html => "#{simple_format(self.body})"

--

Another option which doesn't include all of the TextHelper methods, just the one(s) you need is to use delegate.

delegate :simple_format, to: 'ActionController::Base.helpers'