No Method Error in Stories#bin

sammyman · January 4, 2010, 9:20pm

I am around page 329 when I noticed this error. It seems like it is not happy with my user login information. This error appears when I try to view the “upcoming stories” page.

Thanks

NoMethodError in Stories#bin

Showing app/views/stories/_story.html.erb where line #4 raised:

You have a nil object when you didn't expect it!
The error occurred while evaluating nil.login
Extracted source (around line #4):

1: &lt;% div_for(story) do %&gt;
2: 	&lt;h3&gt;&lt;%= link_to story.name, story %&gt;&lt;/h3&gt;
3: 	&lt;p&gt;
4: 		Submitted by: &lt;%= story.user.login %&gt; | 
5: 		Score: &lt;%= story.votes_count %&gt;
6: 	&lt;/p&gt;
7: &lt;% end %&gt;
Trace of template inclusion: app/views/stories/index.html.erb

RAILS_ROOT: /Users/slam/Code/shovell

Application Trace | Framework Trace | Full Trace
/Users/slam/Code/shovell/app/views/stories/_story.html.erb:4:in `_run_erb_app47views47stories47_story46html46erb_locals_object_story_story_counter'
/Users/slam/Code/shovell/app/views/stories/_story.html.erb:1:in `_run_erb_app47views47stories47_story46html46erb_locals_object_story_story_counter'
/Users/slam/Code/shovell/app/views/stories/index.html.erb:4:in `_run_erb_app47views47stories47index46html46erb'
/Users/slam/Code/shovell/app/controllers/stories_controller.rb:24:in `bin'

Delameko · January 5, 2010, 9:24am

If you look at the stack trace at the bottom it’s leading you towards the problem:

/Users/slam/Code/shovell/app/controllers/stories_controller.rb:24:in `bin'

stories_controller.rb - line 24, it’s trying to load the bin method, but it’s not finding it.

What does your stories_controller.rb look like?

sammyman · January 5, 2010, 4:59pm

Delameko:

If you look at the stack trace at the bottom it’s leading you towards the problem:
/Users/slam/Code/shovell/app/controllers/stories_controller.rb:24:in `bin'
stories_controller.rb - line 24, it’s trying to load the bin method, but it’s not finding it.

What does your stories_controller.rb look like?

   def bin
     fetch_stories 'votes_count &lt; 5'
     render :action =&gt; 'index'
   end  
   protected
   def fetch_stories(conditions)
     @stories = Story.find :all,
        :order =&gt; 'id DESC', 
        :conditions =&gt; conditions
   end

That is the line 24 which is calling index. Index.rhtml is

&lt;h2&gt;
	&lt;%= story_list_heading %&gt;&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;%= render :partial =&gt; @stories %&gt;

Delameko · January 7, 2010, 8:43am

Actually, it’s my bad, I was in a hurry (had just finished work) and misinterpreted the error message.

It’s trying to load a method on line 4 of your _story.html.erb partial, that it can’t find.

sammyman · January 7, 2010, 11:02pm

Thanks for the help. The code is in my first post. I checked it and it appears correct to me. Any other ideas?

ReggieB · January 8, 2010, 10:47am

The problem is that story.user is returning a nil object. When Ruby then looks for the method ‘login’ on the object returned by story.user it can’t find that method - the nil object doesn’t have one.

Basically, the error means you don’t have a user associated to the story. This could happen because of one of the following:

No user has been assigned to the story
The user that was assigned to the story has been deleted or altered in a way that broke the association.
The code that associates users with with stories is broken.

You could handle the problem by altering line 4 to:


 Submitted by: <&#37;= story.user ? story.user.login : 'unknown' -%> |

Alternatively add code to ensure that a user is always associated with a story.