How do I run multiple lines of Ruby in html.erb file

If you need extra functions in your view, you normally declare those inside a helper.

For each controller, if there is a helper it is automatically loaded. For instance, if you have a PeopleController, in the app/helpers folder, there should be a people_helper.rb, and it should look like this

module PeopleHelper  def name    #do something    username  endend

Another, very clean alternative, is to use the Presenter pattern, but i think it is less common (unfortunately).

Otherwise, if you do need multiple lines of ruby code inside a erb view, which i try to avoid, i prefer the following style:

<%   counter_1 = 0   counter_2 = 1   do_some_more_prep_here %><% @records.each do |rec|%>  <%# do something with the prepped date in each row %><% end %>

Also for me code indentation is more important than html indentation, so i will prefer something like

<table>   <% @rows.each do |row| %>    <tr>      <td><%= row.item1 %></td>      <% if row.some_test %>        <td><%= row.item2 %></td>      <% end %>    </tr>  <% end %></table>

But i am always very interested to hear different opinions in this matter.

It is unusual to define a method in an ERB file, so I recommend against it.

If you want to call a block like #each, you can do something like the following:

<% names.each do |name| %>  <%= name %><% end %>

Don't forget the <% end %>.

I can imagine someone needing it in one particular template (no point in creating a helper) to not duplicate html markup. That is, when resulting html page has a couple of similar blocks of html markup. Though, it can easily be abused (unreadable code).

<% def f1(a, b, c) %>  test: <%= a %>, <%= b %>, <%= c %><% end %><% f1(1, 2, 3) %><% f1(4, 5, 6) %>