Default version timestamp to "updated_at"

[akxcv]

Hi! A lot of Rails models have an updated_at property which is used for many things. Wouldn't it be more logical and natural to take the value from the updated_at column and use it as version's timestamp? If the record's updated_at is nil or if the table doesn't have this column, version's timestamp will be set to now().

# with updated_at column
post = Post.create! # now()
post.update!        # updated_at

# without updated_at column
post = Post.create! # now()
post.update!        # now()

Also, it's a big benefit when testing. For example, I might want to use Timecop.freeze to freeze time and then update my record (e.x. testing my version decorator). However, Timecop.freeze will not affect SQL. If version's timestamp is the same as record's updated_at, freezing time becomes trivial.

Let me know what you think about my proposal.
Also submitting a small pull request.

[palkan]

Hi!
That make sense. At least while we're Rails-only.

One caveat: we should handle update_all behaviour (update_column, etc). Every update should create a new version (unless we've disabled logidze explicitly).

Thus we have to check that the updated_at value has changed (by comparing OLD and NEW) and if it hasn't – fallback to now() (or statement_timestamp(), see #27).

And it would be great to make this feature configurable (i.e. custom ts column name).

[akxcv]

Thanks for the review. Going to update the PR soon.
Looks like #27 is almost as simple as find&replace. We might close it with this PR as well.

[palkan]

Looks like #27 is almost as simple as find&replace. We might close it with this PR as well.

It would be great)

[houndci-bot]

Lint/UnneededDisable: Unnecessary disabling of Lint/HandleExceptions.

[akxcv]

Weird, Hound and Rubocop do not agree on code style.

[palkan]

Looks good! 👍

Let's squash the last three commits into one and merge it.

[palkan]

Let's convert this method into a shared context with a parameter to be more RSpec way.

[akxcv]

Looks like github doesn't notify about a PR update when you squash your commits. Leaving this comment to force a notification. :)

[palkan]

One more thing I forgot: please, update the changelog.