Rails plugin/ActiveRecord gem that creates 'virtual' attributes, which can be added on the fly without overhead or migrations, while storing all the data in a never-changing translations table. This keeps the attatched model light and allows to add/remove fields on the fly without migrations.

Validations work like normal with current field (e.g. title) or any translation (e.g. title_in_en)

Usage

As Rails plugin rails plugin install git://github.com/grosser/translated_attributes.git
As gem gem install translated_attributes
generate migrations: rails generate translated_attributes(Rails2: do it by hand)
rake db:migrate

Adding attributes: class Product < ActiveRecord::Base translated_attributes :description, :title, :additional_info end

Setting / getting #getter product.title -> 'Hello' #when I18n.locale is :en product.title_in_fr -> 'Bonyour' product.title_in_de -> 'Hallo'

#setter
product.title = 'Simple setting' #sets title_in_en when I18n.locale == :en
product.title_in_de = 'Spezifisches speichern'

#generic setter/getter
product.set_title('Specific setting', :en)
product.get_title(:en) -> 'Specific setting'

Usage with saving works exactly like normal saving, e.g. new/create/update_attributes... Product.new(:title_in_en=>'Hello').save! product.update_attribute(:title, 'Goodbye')

Translations are stored on 'save'
blank translations are NOT stored
translations are accessable via .translations or as hash via .translated_attributes

Options

translated_attributes :title, :heading,
:table_name => 'user_translations', # default is translations
:nil_to_blank => true, # return unfound translations as blank strings ('') instead of nil (default false),
:translatable_name => 'translated' # name of the associated translatable (Product has_many :translations a Translation belongs_to XXX), default is :translatable
:attribute_column => 'attribute' # switch to the old Rails 2 default (default: translated_attribute)