The css3buttons gem is a small set of helper methods designed to work in conjunction with the amazing css3 github buttons by Nicolas Gallagher.

The helpers allow rails developers to quickly and easily leverage this fantastic CSS library - without cluttering up your views and calls to link_to, button_to and submit_tag.

And with it brings support for the Rails 3.1 asset pipeline. Please note: as of version 1.0.0, Rails 3.0.x is no longer supported. If you're wanting to use the css3buttons on a Rails 3.0.x project, please install version 0.9.5 (see below for full instructions).

Include the gem in your gemfile and run bundle install

gem 'css3buttons'

Require the stylesheets in app/assets/stylesheets/application.css:

*= require css3buttons
*= require_self
...

By default, css3buttons comes with a reset stylesheet built in. Because of this, you should load it before any other stylesheets. However, if you don't want to use reset, or already have your own, just require this instead:

*= require css3buttons/without-reset
*= require_self
...

Include the gem in your gemfile and run 'bundle install`

gem 'css3buttons', '0.9.5'

Run the generators:

$ rails g css3buttons

Which will copy the stylesheets and icon/button images into your public directory.

In your layout, add the following:

<%= css3buttons_stylesheets %>

Which will add both the reset.css and the css3buttons.css stylesheet link tags.

By default, css3buttons comes with a reset stylesheet built in. Because of this, you should load it before any other stylesheets. However, if you'd like to use your own reset, you can skip it with:

<%= css3buttons_stylesheets :include_reset => false %>

To change your link_to calls to buttons, simply use button_link_to. For example:

<%= button_link_to "Search", search_path %>

The helper methods accept all the same parameters as link_to so upgrading and downgrading to css3buttons should be a snap.

The gem also responds to a huge list of dynamic helper methods, to assist in adding icons, colours and styles to your buttons. Unlike previous versions of the gem, you can now add any of the features in any order.

To add an icon from the current icon list, simply prepend the helper method with the name of the icon you'd like to use. For example:

<%= magnifier_button_link_to "Search", search_path %>
<%= user_button_link_to "Account", edit_current_user_path %>
<%= pin_button_link_to "Mark on map", edit_map_path %>

Just like the icons, you can add options for primary, big and pill.

<%= primary_button_link_to "Home", root_path %>
<%= pill_button_link_to "Archive", archive_path %>
<%= big_primary_pill_button_link_to "Super Important!", super_important_path %>

Again with colors - simply add positive or negative to the front of your method call:

<%= negative_trash_button_link_to "Delete", delete_path %>
<%= positive_pill_reload_button_link_to "Reload", reload_path %>

In order to be compatible with the new css3 github buttons library, you can also use danger and safe - as alternatives.

Button groups are snap, you just need to wrap your buttons with button_group, like so:

<%= button_group do %>
  <%= button_link_to "Show", @post %>
  <%= button_link_to "Edit", edit_post_path(@post) %>
  <%= negative_trash_button_link_to "Delete", @post, :confirm => "Are you sure? %>
<% end %>

And, of course, minor groups:

<%= minor_button_group do %>
  You know the drill by now.
<% end %>

Submit tags were ushered in with version 0.9.2. Everything works as it does above, except instead of button_link_to it's button_submit_tag. Example:

<%= positive_button_submit_tag "Publish" %>

Keep in mind however, that icons do not work on <submit> tags. If you're wanting to include icons in your forms there is also a helper method to insert <button> tags instead. The method suffix in this case is button_tag. Examples:

<%= approve_button_tag "Update profile" %>
<%= negative_trash_button_tag "Deactivate account" %>

If you're using formtastic, you may experience issues with using css3buttons in your forms, due to the way the built-in formtastic styles modify default form buttons. In this instance, you can insert the following into your formtastic_changes.css stylesheet.

form.formtastic input.button, form.formtastic.button.button {
  height: 25px;
  padding: 0.2em 1em 0.2em 2.5em;
  font-family: sans-serif;
  font-size: 11px;
  margin-left: 5px;
}

CSS Snippet courtesy of vitobotta.

The button_group helper needs some proper tests, if anyone can point me as to how to stub out a rails request template in RSpec (or the right way to approach this test at all), that would be much appreciated!

I've noticed that this version of the css3 github buttons does not include any colours for the positive/safe styles - so this will appear as normal buttons, unless you add your own styling.

Forks and pull requests are always welcome.