我们通过迁移(通过在每个列定义上指定:default选项)将默认值放入数据库中，并让Active Record使用这些值为每个属性设置默认值。

恕我直言，这种方法与AR的原则是一致的:约定高于配置，DRY，表定义驱动模型，而不是相反。

注意，默认值仍然在应用程序(Ruby)代码中，尽管不在模型中，但在迁移中。

https://github.com/keithrowell/rails_default_value

class Task < ActiveRecord::Base
  default :status => 'active'
end

Phusion有一些很好的插件。

# db/schema.rb
create_table :store_listings, force: true do |t|
  t.string :my_string, default: "original default"
end

StoreListing.new.my_string # => "original default"

# app/models/store_listing.rb
class StoreListing < ActiveRecord::Base
  attribute :my_string, :string, default: "new default"
end

StoreListing.new.my_string # => "new default"

class Product < ActiveRecord::Base
  attribute :my_default_proc, :datetime, default: -> { Time.now }
end

Product.new.my_default_proc # => 2015-05-30 11:04:48 -0600
sleep 1
Product.new.my_default_proc # => 2015-05-30 11:04:49 -0600

来自api文档http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveRecord/Callbacks.html 在模型中使用before_validation方法，它为创建和更新调用提供了创建特定初始化的选项 例如，在这个例子中(同样摘自API文档的例子)，数字字段被初始化为信用卡。您可以轻松地对其进行调整，以设置您想要的任何值

class CreditCard < ActiveRecord::Base
  # Strip everything but digits, so the user can specify "555 234 34" or
  # "5552-3434" or both will mean "55523434"
  before_validation(:on => :create) do
    self.number = number.gsub(%r[^0-9]/, "") if attribute_present?("number")
  end
end

class Subscription < ActiveRecord::Base
  before_create :record_signup

  private
    def record_signup
      self.signed_up_on = Date.today
    end
end

class Firm < ActiveRecord::Base
  # Destroys the associated clients and people when the firm is destroyed
  before_destroy { |record| Person.destroy_all "firm_id = #{record.id}"   }
  before_destroy { |record| Client.destroy_all "client_of = #{record.id}" }
end

令人惊讶的是，这里没有提到他

class Item < ActiveRecord::Base
  def status
    self[:status] or ACTIVE
  end

  before_save{ self.status ||= ACTIVE }
end