Steve Polito is a Full Stack Web Developer in the Boston Area

Convert a belongs_to Association to a has_many :through Association in Ruby on Rails

Posted on November 22, 2018 - 7 Minute Read

I was tasked with converting a belongs_to association to a has_many :through association. The challenge was that the app was live, and there were existing relationships. I was able to convert the belongs_to association to a has_many :through association while still maintaining existing relationships by creating a custom migration file, and updating the existing models.

In order to understand how to create this conversion, let's create a sample app.

If you want to skip ahead to the solution click here.

1. Create a Sample Rails App

Run the following commands in a new terminal window.

rails new association-converter --database=postgresql
cd association-converter/
rails g scaffold Author name:string
rails g scaffold Book name:string author:references
rails db:migrate

2. Create the belongs_to Association

Update the Book and Author models so they are associated with a belongs_to association.

class Book < ApplicationRecord
  belongs_to :author
end
class Author < ApplicationRecord
  has_many :books, dependent: :destroy
end

3. Seed the database

Install Faker and seed the database with sample data.

  1. Add gem 'faker', '~> 1.9', '>= 1.9.1' to your Gemfile
  2. Run bundle install
  3. Open seeds.db and add the following: 
100.times do |i|
  Author.create(name: Faker::Name.name)
end

Author.all.each do |author|
    author.books.create(name: Faker::Book.title)
end
  1. Seed the database by running rails db:seed
  2. Open up the Rails Console by running rails c. Confirm there is data in the database by running the following:
2.3.1 :001 > Author.count
   (0.6ms)  SELECT COUNT(*) FROM "authors"
 => 100 
2.3.1 :002 > 
2.3.1 :002 > Book.count
   (14.2ms)  SELECT COUNT(*) FROM "books"
 => 100 
2.3.1 :003 > 
Book.last.author
  Book Load (64.1ms)  SELECT  "books".* FROM "books" ORDER BY "books"."id" DESC LIMIT ?  [["LIMIT", 1]]
  Author Load (0.3ms)  SELECT  "authors".* FROM "authors" WHERE "authors"."id" = ? LIMIT ?  [["id", 100], ["LIMIT", 1]]
 => #<Author id: 100, name: "Shirlee Mayert DDS", created_at: "2018-11-21 22:22:46", updated_at: "2018-11-21 22:22:46">
  1. Open up schema.rb to confirm the schema looks similar to the following:
ActiveRecord::Schema.define(version: 2018_11_22_151441) do

  # These are extensions that must be enabled in order to support this database
  enable_extension "plpgsql"

  create_table "authors", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.string "name"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
  end

  create_table "books", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.string "name"
    t.bigint "author_id"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
    t.index ["author_id"], name: "index_books_on_author_id"
  end

  add_foreign_key "books", "authors"
end

At this point we have set up a simple belongs_to association. This will be the baseline to understanding how to convert a belongs_to association to a has_many :through association.

4. Create a Join Table

  1. Open a new terminal and run rails g model BooksAuthors book:references author:references.

The new migration file should render something similar to the following:

class CreateBooksAuthors < ActiveRecord::Migration[5.2]
  def change
    create_table :books_authors do |t|
      t.references :book, foreign_key: true
      t.references :author, foreign_key: true
    end
  end
end

  1. Update the migration file to use def up and def down methods. Specifically, add the following:

    • In the def up method use create_table to create a new join table.
    • In the def up method populate the new join table with the existing relationships.
    • In the def up method remove the existing reference column.
    • In the def down method add a reference column.
    • In the def down method populate the reference column.
    • In the def down method use the drop_table method to remove the join table.
class CreateBooksAuthors < ActiveRecord::Migration[5.2]
  def up
    # create join table
    create_table :books_authors do |t|
      t.references :book, foreign_key: true
      t.references :author, foreign_key: true

      t.timestamps
    end
    # populate join table with existing data
    puts "populating books_authors"
    Book.all.each do |book|
      puts "#{book.name} is being added to the books_authors table"
      BooksAuthor.create(book_id: book.id, author_id: book.author_id)
      puts "There are #{BooksAuthor.count} books_authors records"
    end
    # remove obsolete column
    puts "removing old association"
    remove_reference :books, :author, foreign_key: true
  end

  def down
    # add reference column back
    add_reference :books, :author, foreign_key: true
    # Using a model after changing its table
    # https://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveRecord/Migration.html#class-ActiveRecord::Migration-label-Using+a+model+after+changing+its+table
    Book.reset_column_information
    # associate book with author, even though it will just be one.
    BooksAuthor.all.each do |book_author|
      Book.find(book_author.book_id).update_attribute(:author_id, book_author.author_id)
    end
    # remove join table
    drop_table :books_authors
  end
end
  1. Update the database by running rails db:migrate in a terminal window.
  2. Open schema.rb to confirm the schema looks similar to the following:
ActiveRecord::Schema.define(version: 2018_11_22_151828) do

  # These are extensions that must be enabled in order to support this database
  enable_extension "plpgsql"

  create_table "authors", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.string "name"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
  end

  create_table "books", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.string "name"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
  end

  create_table "books_authors", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.bigint "book_id"
    t.bigint "author_id"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
    t.index ["author_id"], name: "index_books_authors_on_author_id"
    t.index ["book_id"], name: "index_books_authors_on_book_id"
  end

  add_foreign_key "books_authors", "authors"
  add_foreign_key "books_authors", "books"
end
  1. Open the Rails Console by running rails c. Enter the the following to confirm the data was migrated correctly:
2.3.1 :001 > BooksAuthor.count
   (0.1ms)  SELECT COUNT(*) FROM "books_authors"
 => 100

  1. Update the existing models.

    • Update books_author.rb

      class BooksAuthor < ApplicationRecord
    belongs_to :book
    belongs_to :author
end

    • Update book.rb

      class Book < ApplicationRecord
    has_many :books_authors
    has_many :authors, through: :books_authors, dependent: :destroy
end

    • Update author.rb

      class Author < ApplicationRecord
    has_many :books_authors
    has_many :books, through: :books_authors, dependent: :destroy
end

  2. Open a terminal winow and run rails c. Then run the following:

2.3.1 :003 > Book.last.authors
  Book Load (0.4ms)  SELECT  "books".* FROM "books" ORDER BY "books"."id" DESC LIMIT $1  [["LIMIT", 1]]
  Author Load (0.6ms)  SELECT  "authors".* FROM "authors" INNER JOIN "books_authors" ON "authors"."id" = "books_authors"."author_id" WHERE "books_authors"."book_id" = $1 LIMIT $2  [["book_id", 100], ["LIMIT", 11]]
 => #<ActiveRecord::Associations::CollectionProxy [#<Author id: 100, name: "Claude O'Keefe", created_at: "2018-11-22 15:16:51", updated_at: "2018-11-22 15:16:51">]>

5. Rolling Back The Conversion

If you need to rollback the conversion, follow these steps.

  1. Open up a terminal window and run rails db:rollback.
  2. The schema.rb should look similar to the following:
ActiveRecord::Schema.define(version: 2018_11_22_151441) do

  # These are extensions that must be enabled in order to support this database
  enable_extension "plpgsql"

  create_table "authors", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.string "name"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
  end

  create_table "books", force: :cascade do |t|
    t.string "name"
    t.datetime "created_at", null: false
    t.datetime "updated_at", null: false
    t.bigint "author_id"
    t.index ["author_id"], name: "index_books_on_author_id"
  end

  add_foreign_key "books", "authors"
end
  1. Open up a terminal and run rails c. Then run the following:
2.3.1 :001 > Book.last
  Book Load (0.5ms)  SELECT  "books".* FROM "books" ORDER BY "books"."id" DESC LIMIT $1  [["LIMIT", 1]]
 => #<Book id: 100, name: "To Sail Beyond the Sunset", created_at: "2018-11-22 15:16:52", updated_at: "2018-11-22 15:26:07", author_id: 100>
  1. Finally, make sure to remove the join table model, and revert the Book and Author models back to a belongs_to association.
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