Administrate Field PaperTrail Ruby Gem
Developed and maintain an open-source Ruby gem that integrates PaperTrail audit logging with the Administrate admin framework. The gem provides a custom field type that displays comprehensive change histories and version tracking within admin interfaces, enabling administrators to view detailed audit trails of record modifications with customizable attribute filtering.
Hire Me3
Major gems supported (Rails, Administrate, PaperTrail)
5+
Rails versions supported (5.0+)
90%
upReduction in custom code needed for audit trail display
100%
Complete setup and usage documentation provided
Project Overview
Administrate Field PaperTrail is a specialized Ruby gem that bridges the gap between PaperTrail's powerful audit logging capabilities and Administrate's admin interface framework. The gem provides administrators with visual access to comprehensive change histories directly within their admin panels, making it easy to track who changed what and when. This integration addresses a common need in enterprise applications where audit trails are crucial for compliance, debugging, and data governance.
Project Requirements
- Integrate PaperTrail audit logging with Administrate admin framework
- Create a custom field type for displaying change histories
- Provide configurable attribute filtering for audit displays
- Ensure compatibility with multiple gem versions (Rails 5.0+, Administrate 0.2.2+, PaperTrail 2.7.2+)
- Deliver comprehensive documentation and easy integration
The Challenge
The main challenge was creating a seamless integration between two distinct gems (PaperTrail for audit logging and Administrate for admin interfaces) that weren't designed to work together. I needed to develop a custom field type that could parse and display complex change history data in a user-friendly format, handle various data types and transformations, provide configurable filtering to exclude irrelevant attributes, and ensure the solution worked across different versions of both dependencies without conflicts.
The Approach & Solution
I developed a custom Administrate field type that leverages PaperTrail's version tracking system to display formatted change histories. The solution includes a specialized Field::PaperTrail class that integrates with Administrate's field system, configurable excluded_attributes option for filtering displayed changes, proper formatting and presentation of before/after values, compatibility layer ensuring support across multiple gem versions, and comprehensive documentation with clear integration examples. The gem follows Administrate's field patterns for consistency and maintainability.
