Prevents ActionController::API from sending responses

[ened]

My API controller methods try to render JSON responses using jbuilder:

  def companies    
    render template: 'api/v1/users/companies', 
        format: :json,
        locals: { companies: current_user.companies }
  end

However, all responses are now empty.

As a fix, I removed the call to ActionController::Base.send :include and ActionController::API.send :include in https://github.com/ankane/ahoy/blob/master/lib/ahoy.rb#L119 and include the modules now manually:

class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base
  protect_from_forgery
  
  include Ahoy::Controller

class Api::ApiController < ActionController::API
  include Ahoy::Controller

I personally prefer this a lot, as it removes the magic and activates Ahoy explicitly.

Also see this PR for a similar discussion: rails/strong_parameters#144

[coryschires]

Background

I am having a similar problem. I've added Ahoy tracking to my application and it's working splendidly. Because Ahoy::Controller is automatically included in ActionController::Base, it's tracking visits for all users regardless which controller / action they have visited. For most users, I assume, this is the desired behavior.

Problem

In my case, however, I only need to track visits / events on a small part of my application (really just one controller). As a result, I'm currently tracking a lot of unnecessary visits. To be clear, everything works but ideally I'd like to avoid recording unnecessary visits (i.e. writes to my db, cluttered data, etc).

Solution

I'd like to suggest adding a configuration option which would allow you to opt out of the default track-everything-automatically behavior. For example, it would look something like:

# add a new config option
mattr_accessor :track_visits_automatically
self.track_visits_automatically = true

# include `Ahoy::Controller` conditionally
ActiveSupport.on_load(:action_controller) do
  if Ahoy.track_visits_automatically
    ActionController::Base.send :include, Ahoy::Controller
    ActionController::API.send :include, Ahoy::Controller if defined?(ActionController::API)
  end
end

This would solve not only my problem but also @ened problem. Furthermore, it would be a non-breaking change so should be a smooth release.

@ankane Are you open to this idea? If yes, I'd be happy to make a PR. Please let me know.

[coryschires]

@ankane Just following up on this issue. Are you open to the idea of adding a new configuration option as described above?

[ankane]

Hey @coryschires, Ahoy does not track anything server-side automatically.

[coryschires]

Thanks for the quick response!

After reading the source a bit more, I understand it does not track automatically on the server unless you set Ahoy.track_visits_immediately = true. So my concern is much less significant than I thought before. Thanks for clarifying.

That said, Ahoy still mixes in a bunch of functionality (e.g. set cookies, etc). Ideally, I would like to include Ahoy::Controller myself – in the one place that I need it rather than globally in ActionController. So I think my suggestion still makes sense – at least for those users who:

1. Would like to opt-out of the auto-include behavior.
2. Set Ahoy.track_visits_immediately = true but are only using Ahoy in part of their app.

Finally, now that I understand the situation better, I think a better config option name would be something like automatically_include_ahoy_controller.

@ankane What do you think?

[ankane]

Hey @coryschires, thanks for the suggestions 👍 However, I don't see a strong reason for adding an option for this. Feel free to fork and comment out the "magic" if needed.