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Rails: dump database to fixtures preserving UTF8

I needed to dump my database to fixtures for testing purposes. None of the commonly referenced scripts could do this while preserving UTF8 characters.

I modified this script to use the Ya2YAML utf8-compliant gem. You will need to install Ya2YAML:

sudo gem install ya2yaml

And save this script into lib/tasks, with the name extract_fixtures.rake:

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desc 'Create YAML test fixtures from data in an existing database.  
Defaults to development database.  Set RAILS_ENV to override.'
 
require 'Ya2YAML'
 
task :extract_fixtures => :environment do
  sql  = "SELECT * FROM %s"
  skip_tables = ["schema_info"]
  ActiveRecord::Base.establish_connection
  (ActiveRecord::Base.connection.tables - skip_tables).each do |table_name|
    i = "000"
    File.open("#{RAILS_ROOT}/test/fixtures/#{table_name}.yml", 'w') do |file|
      data = ActiveRecord::Base.connection.select_all(sql % table_name)
      file.write data.inject({}) { |hash, record|
        hash["#{table_name}_#{i.succ!}"] = record
        hash
      }.ya2yaml
    end
  end
end

You can then run it:

rake extract_fixtures

.. and behold as your fixtures directory is filled with proper unicode YAML files. It will overwrite anything else there, so be careful.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 18th, 2007 at 9:58 pm and is filed under programming, rails. You can follow any responses to this entry through the feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 Responses to “Rails: dump database to fixtures preserving UTF8”

  1. Anders Says:
    December 14th, 2008 at 7:15 am

    Great script, thanks!

  2. Saving UTF-8 characters to YAML problem | keyongtech Says:
    January 19th, 2009 at 1:24 am

    [...] to YAML problem Here’s a patch for "rake extract_fixtures" that also uses ya2yaml: https://fukamachi.org/wp/2007/05/18/r…eserving-utf8/ Saving YAML as UTF-8 should really be default behavior. UnicodeDammit! — Posted via [...]

  3. Steven Hansen Says:
    February 6th, 2009 at 9:12 am

    Sweet, just used this to create my test fixtures.

    Thanks,
    Steven

  4. Chris Strobel Says:
    November 17th, 2009 at 7:06 am

    Thanks the script! It run without hassles.

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