Limiting stack depth association embeds

[bradynpoulsen]

I have been unable to find a way to limit embedding associations when they refer each other.

Example

Lets say I have a Project and a Client where the client has_many :projects.

app/serializers/project_serializer.rb

class ProjectSerializer < ActiveModel::Serializer
  embed :ids, include: true

  attributes :id, :name
  has_one :client
end

app/serializers/client_serializer.rb

class ClientSerializer < ActiveModel::Serializer
  embed :ids, include: true

  attributes :id, :name
  has_many :projects
end

But because it continues to include all of the clients and projects until all of the embeds have been processed.

So if I request /projects/3.json, I might get the result:

{
  "clients": [
    {"id": 1, "name": "HelloWorld, Inc", "project_ids":[1,3]}
  ],
  "projects": [
    {"id": 1, "name": "My First Project", "client_id": 1},
    {"id": 3, "name": "My Cool Idea", "client_id": 1}
  ],
  "project": {"id": 3, "name": "My Cool Idea", "client_id": 1}
}

when all I really wanted was just the clients and project entries because of redundant data transfer.

Possible Solution

Of course there are ways to fix my purpose, but I wish there were some function we could define to define the scope of embeds, ie:

class ProjectSerializer < ActiveModel::Serializer
  def embed_level(level)
    embed :ids, include: true if level < 2
  end
end

[steveklabnik]

I consider this to be a dup of #211