UseTinyMCE is yet another (as if we needed another) hack for including TinyMCE in a Rails 3.0 or 3.1 app.

NOTE: Rails 3.1.0 broke version 0.0.8. The current version has been tested on both Rails 3.1.0 & 3.0.10. All installations work properly.

It differs from the others that I looked at on rubygems in that:

1. It works with Rails 3.0 & 3.1.0, details below
2. It's minimal. It does not provide any juicy Rails style configuration for TinyMCE. You just use the config stuff which comes with TinyMCE - in javascript.

It's almost the same in both cases. See Step By Step below.

Rails 3.0 Note: Rails 3.0 defaults to prototype for javascript, so use_tinymce supports both raw TinyMCE (which works well with Prototype) and the jquery version, which works with 'jquery'. It also supports both simple and advanced editor installations for the raw type.

Rails 3.1 Note: TinyMCE doesn't play well with the asset pipeline, so it is installed in public. This has to do with the way TinyMCE is architected: it is plugin based and scatters javascript, css, and html all through it's plugin directory. It manages it's own loading.

Also, Rails 3.1 defaults to jQuery for javascript, so use_tinymce does not support installing the raw version of TinyMCE.

TinyMCE supports selectively using TinyMCE in or not in different textareas within the same page .

To do this, proceed as above and for textarea elements that you do not want to use TinyMCE in, add the class 'no-tinymce'.

Read the comments in 'use_tinymce-gem-location/lib/tasks/use_tinymce.rake' for details. Or read the TinyMCE code.

1. You will need to install TinyMCE in your /public/javascript directory. Do that by running one of these rake tasks:

Rails 3.0:

• rake use_tinymce:install_jquery - if you are using jQuery (Rails 3.1 default)
• rake use_tinymce:install_simple - if you are using Prototype (Rails 3.0 default)
• rake use_tinymce:install_advanced - if you are using Prototype (Rails 3.0 default)

If you don't need much and aren't familiar with TinyMCE, then rake use_tinymce:install_simple should be fine. The advanced version configures TinyMCE with many more features. Go to the "TinyMCE website for details"

Rails 3.1

• rake use_tinymce:install - installs the jQuery version of TinyMCE

This creates an advanced editor. See the TinyMCE website for configuration information: "TinyMCE website for details"

2. Add use_tinymce args to all the controllers for views containing textarea fields in which you want to run TinyMCE. args should be:

• :all - to enable TinyMCE for all actions
• :foo, :bar - to enable TinyMCE only for views rendered by foo and bar actions [usually this is something like use_tinymce :new, :edit].

Note: you should not have to 'require use_tinymceanyplace. If you do, please let me know. 3. Add<%= use_tinymce_link %>to theHEADsection of you application layout - for *at least* all pages which should use *TinyMCE* 4. (Optional) Edit/public/javascript/use_tinymce_init.js` to customize your TinyMCE feature set.

That's it.

Detailed info on the methods in this Gem.

As usual, read the source for the definitive, up-to-date truth.

Which is added to ApplicationController as a Class Method.

*actions is 0 or more method names or the distinguished symbol :all. You put this someplace in your controller if you want any of your controller actions to render a page which uses TinyMCE

Which renders either an empty string or the links required to pull in TinyMCE and use_tinymce_init.js. It makes it's decision by looking at the value of params[:action]

Which you can use if you want or need finer control, use use_tinymce? and write your own conditional.

use_tinymce(action) is a helper method you add to the cruft which creates the head element of your page. It returns true if the symbol action was set by a previous call to use_tinymce [or if you included use_tinymce :all in your controller] action will usually come from params[:action], so it's easier to use use_tinymce_link which already does that.

NOTE assets here refers to the assets directory in the use_tinymce gem - not the Rails 3.1 asset pipeline directory.

This initialization scripts were copied literally from the TinyMCE website "For Dummies" page

• that is: http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/wiki.php/%22For_Dummies%22

Prototype Versions:

• rake use_tinymce:install_advanced copies use_tinymce/assets/use_tinymce_init_advanced.js and the contents of use_tinymce/tinymce_no_jquery - which provides all the full blown features.

• rake use_tinymce:install_simple copies use_tinymce/assets/use_tinymce_init_simple.js and the contents of use_tinymce/tinymce_no_jquery - copies the bare bones version.

The jQuery version was copied from an example script and then slightly modified [see the code comments].

• rake use_tinymce:install_jquery copies assets/use_tinymce_init_jquery.js and the contents of use_tinymce/tinymce_jquery - which attaches an 'advanced' TinyMCE configuration to textareas.

Maintenance: if you want to get rid of use_tinymce, then:

• rake use_tinymce:uninstall removes use_tinymce_init.js and the TinyMCE directory from your applications public/javascripts

Note: rake use_tinymce::uninstall is called automatically when running any rake use_tinymce::install_* to insure you get a clean installation. This will also clean out any customization you have done.

use_tinymce only supports installing the jQuery version of TinyMCE on Rails 3.1.

There are two Rake tasks:

• rake use_tinymce:install - copies assets/use_tinymce_init_jquery.js and the contents of use_tinymce/tinymce_jquery - which attaches an 'advanced' TinyMCE configuration to textareas.
• rake use_tinymce:uninstall removes use_tinymce_init.js and the TinyMCE directory from your applications public/javascripts

Note: rake use_tinymce::uninstall is called automatically when running rake use_tinymce::install to insure you get a clean installation. This will also clean out any customization you have done.

This gem is pretty simple, so if you want to change the location and/or names of some files, go ahead and hack it.

There was a time when I would have added features to allow this, but not any more. It ususally turned out to be more trouble than it was worth.

So, if you want to do it, have a blast - but please don't send me the patches.

use_tinymce ships with version 3.4.2 of TinyMCE - which I downloaded from the Moxiecode website. You should be able to upgrade your TinyMCE if you want by doing the exact same thing and then unpacking the zip file in /public/javascript

WARNING: Rails 3.1 uses sprockets which has a problem compiling non-Unicoded characters. the advanced TinyMCE contains some directly encoded characters in the spellchecker_word_separator_chars variable in the spellchecking plugin. I've modified the code to convert them to Unicode \U... representations. If you upgrade TinyMCE and run with Rails 3.1 + you will probably have to do the same.

Alternately, you can poke around your system and find the gem and unpack the zip file into the use_tinymce gem's /assets folder, re-run the rake tasks and . . . WARNING if you do this, you'll overwrite your use_tinymce_init.js file and lose all your special customizations.

Alternately (2), you can send me a note and I might upgrade the TinyMCE in the gem. Then you'd need to do a bundle update use_tinymce, run the rake task, re-create your special customizations, etc.

It's probably easier to grab the code from "Moxiecode"