Is there a way in the Rails Console to print a table of database contents?

Question

I'm looking for a clean and simple way to print in the Rails Console the contents of my 5 row database with 2 columns.

Any ideas? I Googled around but didn't find much.

Answer 1

I think you should first use the hirb gem which provides a very pleasant way to print your tables columns.

1. Install hirb gem: gem install hirb
2. Add this gem to your project's Gemfile: gem 'hirb'
3. Go to your project's root folder and run Rails console: rails c

4. Enable hirb in the console:

   require 'hirb'
   Hirb.enable
   

If you want to limit the number of rows to display, you can do:

Model.limit(n)

For instance:

User.limit(5)

You can also specify the fields that you want to display using select:

User.select("name, email").limit(5)

Answer 2

You can also checkout table_print, it'll work something like this:

$ gem install table_print
$ rails c
> require 'table_print'
> tp Book.all
AUTHOR            | SUMMARY                         | TITLE
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael Connelly  | Another book by Michael Con...  | The Fifth Witness
Manning Mardale   | From acclaimed historian Ma...  | Malcolm X
Tina Fey          | Worth it. -Trees                | Bossypants

Answer 3

With hirb:

require 'hirb'
puts Hirb::Helpers::Table.render(ARRAY_OF_OBJECT_OR_HASHES)

# Examples:

puts Hirb::Helpers::Table.render([[1, "Terminator I"], [2, "Terminator II"]])

+---+---------------+
| 0 | 1             |
+---+---------------+
| 1 | Terminator I  |
| 2 | Terminator II |
+---+---------------+

puts Hirb::Helpers::Table.render([{ id: 1, name: "Terminator I" }, { id: 2, name: "Terminator II" }])

+----+---------------+
| id | name          |
+----+---------------+
| 1  | Terminator I  |
| 2  | Terminator II |
+----+---------------+

# specifying the order of the fields
puts Hirb::Helpers::Table.render([{ id: 1, name: "Terminator I" }, { id: 2, name: "Terminator II" }], fields: [:name, :id])

+---------------+----+
| name          | id |
+---------------+----+
| Terminator I  | 1  |
| Terminator II | 2  |
+---------------+----+

Answer 4

Yes. Check out hirb gem. Also worth trying is wirble and awesome_print.