Why polymorphic association doesn't work for STI if type column of the polymorphic association doesn't point to the base model of STI?

Question

I have a case of polymorphic association and STI here.

# app/models/car.rb
class Car < ActiveRecord::Base
  belongs_to :borrowable, :polymorphic => true
end

# app/models/staff.rb
class Staff < ActiveRecord::Base
  has_one :car, :as => :borrowable, :dependent => :destroy
end

# app/models/guard.rb
class Guard < Staff
end

In order for the polymorphic assocation to work, according to the API documentation on Polymorphic Assocation, http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveRecord/Associations/ClassMethods.html#label-Polymorphic+Associations that I have to set borrowable_type to the base_classof STI models, that is in my case is Staff.

The question is: Why doesn't it work if the borrowable_type set to STI class?

Some test to prove it:

# now the test speaks only truth

# test/fixtures/cars.yml
one:
  name: Enzo
  borrowable: staff (Staff)

two:
  name: Mustang
  borrowable: guard (Guard)

# test/fixtures/staffs.yml
staff:
  name: Jullia Gillard

guard:
  name: Joni Bravo
  type: Guard 

# test/units/car_test.rb

require 'test_helper'

class CarTest < ActiveSupport::TestCase
  setup do
    @staff = staffs(:staff)
    @guard = staffs(:guard) 
  end

  test "should be destroyed if an associated staff is destroyed" do
    assert_difference('Car.count', -1) do
      @staff.destroy
    end
  end

  test "should be destroyed if an associated guard is destroyed" do
    assert_difference('Car.count', -1) do
      @guard.destroy
    end
  end

end

But it seems to be true only with Staff instance. The results are:

# Running tests:

F.

Finished tests in 0.146657s, 13.6373 tests/s, 13.6373 assertions/s.

  1) Failure:
test_should_be_destroyed_if_an_associated_guard_is_destroyed(CarTest) [/private/tmp/guineapig/test/unit/car_test.rb:16]:
"Car.count" didn't change by -1.
<1> expected but was
<2>.

Thanks

Answer 1

Good question. I had exactly the same problem using Rails 3.1. Looks like you can not do this, because it does not work. Probably it is an intended behavior. Apparently, using polymorphic associations in combination with Single Table Inheritance (STI) in Rails is a bit complicated.

The current Rails documentation for Rails 3.2 gives this advice for combining polymorphic associations and STI:

Using polymorphic associations in combination with single table inheritance (STI) is a little tricky. In order for the associations to work as expected, ensure that you store the base model for the STI models in the type column of the polymorphic association.

In your case the base model would be "Staff", i.e. "borrowable_type" should be "Staff" for all items, not "Guard". It is possible to make the derived class appear as the base class by using "becomes" : guard.becomes(Staff). One could set the column "borrowable_type" directly to the base class "Staff", or as the Rails Documentation suggests, convert it automatically using

class Car < ActiveRecord::Base
  ..
  def borrowable_type=(sType)
     super(sType.to_s.classify.constantize.base_class.to_s)
  end

Answer 2

An older question, but the issue in Rails 4 still remains. Another option is to dynamically create/overwrite the _type method with a concern. This would be useful if your app uses multiple polymorphic associations with STI and you want to keep the logic in one place.

This concern will grab all polymorphic associations and ensure that the record is always saved using the base class.

# models/concerns/single_table_polymorphic.rb
module SingleTablePolymorphic
  extend ActiveSupport::Concern

  included do
    self.reflect_on_all_associations.select{|a| a.options[:polymorphic]}.map(&:name).each do |name|
      define_method "#{name.to_s}_type=" do |class_name|
        super(class_name.constantize.base_class.name)
      end
    end
  end
end

Then just include it in your model:

class Car < ActiveRecord::Base
  belongs_to :borrowable, :polymorphic => true
  include SingleTablePolymorphic
end