What to use instead of `render :text` (and `render nothing: true`) in rails 5.1 and later?

Question

Rails 5.1 removes a whole load of previously deprecated methods. Among them is the old friend render :text.

It was very useful when you need to render some text, but don't want the overhead of a view template. Examples:

render text: "ok"
render text: t('business_rules.project_access_denied'), status: 401

What to use instead?

score 185 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

185

The non-deprecated way is to use render :plain

Rails Guide on Layouts and Rendering:

2.2.6 Rendering Text

You can send plain text - with no markup at all - back to the browser by using the :plain option to render:
render plain: "OK"

Bonus

Instead of render nothing: true (also removed), one should now use head :ok. Does the same thing: sends http 200 response code, just the headers, no content.

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

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answered Apr 15 '17 at 17:18

Sergio Tulentsev

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This particular deprecation caused me 10 minutes of head scratching. Hence the self-answer. – Sergio Tulentsev Apr 15 '17 at 17:18
This has got to be the number one cause for JSON parsing errors... :D – max Apr 15 '17 at 17:21
@max: no doubt. This, and controller rendering an html page with beautified stacktrace on exceptions :) – Sergio Tulentsev Apr 15 '17 at 17:22
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When was this deprecated? The 5.1.0.rc1 CHANGELOG just says "Remove deprecated support to `:text` in `render`" (and `:nothing`, sigh) but you'd think the "we're deprecating this" note in some CHANGELOG would tell you what to use instead. – mu is too short Apr 15 '17 at 18:08
What a PITA. Any idea what to use instead of `:nothing`? I've been putting off upgrading out of 4.2 because of this sort of nonsense. At least the `skip_action_callback` deprecation notice tells you to use the "individual skip_callback methods" instead. – mu is too short Apr 15 '17 at 18:16
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@muistooshort: instead of `render nothing: true` you should use `head :ok` – Sergio Tulentsev Apr 15 '17 at 18:16
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Awesome, thanks. Gotta' bookmark this for the inevitable liquor and anger fuelled upgrade process :) – mu is too short Apr 15 '17 at 18:19
@muistooshort: how's that upgrade process? Did you get to do it yet? :) – Sergio Tulentsev Nov 30 '17 at 11:06
Not yet, I have stockpiled enough "supplies" ;) – mu is too short Nov 30 '17 at 18:55
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I love Rails, but cmon, was this deprecated just to make our upgrade path miserably? The amount of braking changes is incredible. – sandre89 May 21 '18 at 19:09
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a lot of the recent changes were pretty arbitrary, and made upgrading painful :( – Tilo Jun 10 '18 at 18:01
You look like you're citing something - can you include the link? – Andrew Grimm Jul 05 '18 at 22:23
@AndrewGrimm: why, it's the relevant rails guide, of course. Added the link. – Sergio Tulentsev Jul 06 '18 at 06:59
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upgrading to 5.0 was relatively okay. 5.1 turned out to be a bigger minefield than expected o.o – prusswan Aug 07 '18 at 07:34
@muistooshort: did you upgrade yet? Rails 6 is coming out, the longer you postpone, the more painful it'll be :) – Sergio Tulentsev Mar 17 '19 at 22:20
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Switched projects before I could get clearance for an upgrade so the 4.2->5.2 upgrade became not my problem (my favorite type of problem :), got to start a new app instead of dealing with an app with a legacy from Rails2/MongoDB. Now I get to whinge about Active Storage instead. – mu is too short Mar 17 '19 at 22:53
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tripped me up that you don't `render head: :no_content`, it's just `head :no_content` if it saves anyone else a few minutes... – Vijay Apr 20 '19 at 22:50
Thanks pal, it did the job – vidur punj May 07 '19 at 12:09

What to use instead of `render :text` (and `render nothing: true`) in rails 5.1 and later?

1 Answers1

2.2.6 Rendering Text

Bonus

Linked