22 Oct 07 Rails gotchas (reserved attribute or method name)

Some time ago I’ve got a really strange error message when trying to access a new method in a controller I have created for a rails application …
In the log the error message was:
“wrong number of arguments (2 for 0)”

the step by step to reproduce this error is:

rails test
cd test
script/generate controller test process
script/server
point your browser to http://localhost:3000/test/process

What really happened?
ActionController has a method named process, and my controller:

class TestController < ApplicationController
 
  def process
  end
end

defined a action with the same name, and it messed up with ActionPack …
Hasan had a very similar problem but with a reserved attribute of ActiveRecord

So, if you are having strange problems like these ones, try looking for a “reserved” attribute or method …
They are not really reserved, but, you have to pay attention when you redefine a “rails core” method
Even if you do not know that you are redefining the method