What is the difference between t.belongs_to and t.references in rails?

rails-migrations, ruby-on-rails

Solution

Looking at the source code, they do the same exact thing -- `belongs_to` is an alias of `reference`:

  def references(*args)
    options = args.extract_options!
    polymorphic = options.delete(:polymorphic)
    args.each do |col|
      column("#{col}_id", :integer, options)
      column("#{col}_type", :string, polymorphic.is_a?(Hash) ? polymorphic : options) unless polymorphic.nil?
    end
  end
  alias :belongs_to :references

This is just a way of making your code more readable -- it's nice to be able to put `belongs_to` in your migrations when appropriate, and stick to `references` for other sorts of associations.

Problem

What is the difference between `t.references` and `t.belongs_to`? Why are we having those two different words? It seems to me they do the same thing? Tried some Google search, but find no explanation. ``` class CreateFoos < ActiveRecord::Migration def change create_table :foos do |t| t.references :bar t.belongs_to :baz # The two above seems to give similar results t.belongs_to :fooable, :polymorphic => true # I have not tried polymorphic with t.references t.timestamps end end end ```

Original source