Extras

Here are some ideas for extension exercises:

  • Add a site-wide sidebar that holds navigation links
  • Create date-based navigation links. For instance, there would be a list of links with the names of the months and when you click on the month it shows you all the articles published in that month.
  • Track the number of times an article has been viewed. Add a view_count column to the article, then in the show method of articles_controller.rb just increment that counter. Or, better yet, add a method in the article.rb model that increments the counter and call that method from the controller.
  • Once you are tracking views, create a list of the three “most popular” articles
  • Create a simple RSS feed for articles using the respond_to method and XML view templates