ValueObject

A very small library to help you define and create immutable value objects. Mainly to reduce the amount of code I needed for ActiveRecord composed_of classes.

overview

Start off by creating a class which derives from ValueObject::Base. Call has_fields to define a list of fields for the class.

class Route < ValueObject::Base
  has_fields :from, :to
end

You can now create instances of this class with positional arguments:

m1_motorway    = Route.new("London", "Leeds")
channel_tunnel = Route.new("Calais", "Dover")

Or with hashes:

route_66 = Route.new(:from => "Santa Monica", :to => "Chicago")

You can read their attributes, but you can't write them.

m1_motorway.from     # => "London"
channel_tunnel.to    # => "Dover"
route_66.from = "IL" # => NoMethodError

You can test whether they are equal with == or eql?, which are aliases.

m1_motorway == channel_tunnel                 # => false
m1_motorway.eql?(Route.new("London", "Leeds)) # => true

You can also create instances where one or more fields are nil. You can check whether all fields are nil with the empty? message.

m1_motorway.empty?                 # => false
Route.new("somewhere", nil).empty? # => false
Route.new(nil, nil).empty?         # => true

You can even subclass them again to add more fields!

class Railway < Route
  has_fields :serviced_by
end

a_railway = Railway.new("Aberdeen", "Inverness", "ScotRail")

a_railway.from        # => 'Aberdeen'
a_railway.to          # => 'Inverness'
a_railway.serviced_by # => 'ScotRail'

Create a hash from a value object by sending to_hash.

a_railway.to_hash
# => {
       :from        => "Aberdeen",
       :to          => "Inverness",
       :serviced_by => "ScotRail"
     }

copy_with allows you to make a copy of a value object while updating certain attributes.

a_railway.copy_with(:serviced_by => "Virgin")
# => #<Railway:0x3914490
    @from="Aberdeen",
    @to="Inverness",
    @serviced_by="Virgin">

Value objects also define hash, which depends on the values of the fields as well as the class of which they are an instance.

a_railway.hash   # => 1160641176