CKEditor is a WYSIWYG text editor designed to simplify web content creation. It brings common word processing features directly to your web pages. Enhance your website experience with our community maintained editor. Currently this gem supports ckeditor 4 only.

• CKEditor version 4.x (https://ckeditor.com/ckeditor-4/)
• Rails 5.x, 4.2.x integration
• Files browser
• HTML5 file uploader
• Hooks for formtastic and simple_form forms generators
• Integrated with authorization frameworks CanCanCan and Pundit

For basic usage just include the ckeditor gem:

gem 'ckeditor'

or if you'd like to use the latest version from Github:

gem 'ckeditor', github: 'galetahub/ckeditor'

Include this inside your config/initializers/assets.rb:

Rails.application.config.assets.precompile += %w[ckeditor/config.js]

For file upload support, you must generate the necessary file storage models. The currently supported backends are:

• ActiveRecord (active_storage, paperclip, carrierwave, dragonfly)
• Mongoid (paperclip, carrierwave, dragonfly)

To use the active_record orm with paperclip (i.e. the default settings):

gem 'paperclip'

rails generate ckeditor:install --orm=active_record --backend=paperclip

gem "mini_magick"

rails active_storage:install # if you haven't installed active_storage yet
rails generate ckeditor:install --orm=active_record --backend=active_storage

gem 'carrierwave'
gem 'mini_magick'

rails generate ckeditor:install --orm=active_record --backend=carrierwave

Requires Dragonfly 1.0 or higher.

gem 'dragonfly'

rails generate ckeditor:install --orm=active_record --backend=dragonfly

gem 'mongoid-paperclip', require: 'mongoid_paperclip'

rails generate ckeditor:install --orm=mongoid --backend=paperclip

Active Storage support only Active Record, see for more info

gem 'carrierwave-mongoid', require: 'carrierwave/mongoid'
gem 'mini_magick'

rails generate ckeditor:install --orm=mongoid --backend=carrierwave

All ckeditor models will be generated in the app/models/ckeditor directory. Models are autoloaded in Rails 4. For earlier Rails versions, you need to add them to the autoload path (in application.rb):

config.autoload_paths += %w(#{config.root}/app/models/ckeditor)

Mount the Ckeditor::Engine to your routes (config/routes.rb):

mount Ckeditor::Engine => '/ckeditor'

Setup editor version to load (more info here http://cdn.ckeditor.com/)

# in config/initializers/ckeditor.rb

Ckeditor.setup do |config|
  # //cdn.ckeditor.com/<version.number>/<distribution>/ckeditor.js
  config.cdn_url = "//cdn.ckeditor.com/4.6.1/basic/ckeditor.js"
end

In view template include ckeditor CDN:

= javascript_include_tag Ckeditor.cdn_url

Precompile ckeditor/config.js:

# in config/initializers/assets.rb

Rails.application.config.assets.precompile += %w[ckeditor/config.js]

= form_for @page do |form|
  = form.cktext_area :notes, class: 'someclass', ckeditor: { language: 'uk'}
  = form.cktext_area :content, value: 'Default value', id: 'sometext'
  = cktext_area :page, :info, cols: 40, ckeditor: { uiColor: '#AADC6E', toolbar: 'mini' }

It also works with bootstrap-form

= bootstrap_form_for resource do |form|
  = form.cktext_area :text, ckeditor: { language: 'uk'}

All ckeditor options can be found here

In order to configure the ckeditor default options, create the following files:

app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/config.js

app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/contents.css

Adding a custom toolbar:

# in app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/config.js

CKEDITOR.editorConfig = function (config) {
  // ... other configuration ...

  config.toolbar_mini = [
    ["Bold",  "Italic",  "Underline",  "Strike",  "-",  "Subscript",  "Superscript"],
  ];
  config.toolbar = "mini";

  // ... rest of the original config.js  ...
}

When overriding the default config.js file, you must set all configuration options yourself as the bundled config.js will not be loaded. To see the default configuration, run bundle open ckeditor, copy app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/config.js into your project and customize it to your needs.

You should download necessary plugins with all dependencies and extract them in app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/plugins/. After that you can include your plugins in app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/config.js in this way:

CKEDITOR.editorConfig = function (config) {
  config.extraPlugins = 'eqneditor,autosave,';
}

jQuery sample:

<script type='text/javascript' charset='UTF-8'>
  $(document).ready(function(){
    $('form[data-remote]').bind('ajax:before', function(){
      for (instance in CKEDITOR.instances){
        CKEDITOR.instances[instance].updateElement();
      }
    });
  });
</script>

= form.input :content, as: :ckeditor
= form.input :content, as: :ckeditor, input_html: { ckeditor: { height: 400 } }

Note that the toolbar option should match the case specified in the config. If the config is not found it defaults to all available toolbar items.

i.e. config.toolbar_mini becomes {toolbar: 'mini'} in the form.

= form.input :content, as: :ckeditor, input_html: { ckeditor: { toolbar: 'Full' } }

Create a file app/assets/javascripts/init_ckeditor.coffee

ready = ->
  $('.ckeditor').each ->
    CKEDITOR.replace $(this).attr('id')

$(document).ready(ready)
$(document).on('page:load', ready)

Make sure the file is loaded from your app/assets/javascripts/application.js

To use cancan with Ckeditor, add this to an initializer:

# in config/initializers/ckeditor.rb

Ckeditor.setup do |config|
  config.authorize_with :cancancan
end

At this point, all authorization will fail and no one will be able to access the filebrowser pages. To grant access, add the following abilities (usually ability.rb)

# Always performed
can :access, :ckeditor   # needed to access Ckeditor filebrowser

# Performed checks for actions:
can [:read, :create, :destroy], Ckeditor::Picture
can [:read, :create, :destroy], Ckeditor::AttachmentFile

Setup Pundit and Action Policy similar. Just like CanCanCan, you can write this code in your config/initializers/ckeditor.rb file:

Ckeditor.setup do |config|
  config.authorize_with :pundit # or :action_policy
end

Then, generate the policy files for model Picture and AttachmentFile

rails g ckeditor:pundit_policy # or ckeditor:action_policy

By this command, you will got two files:

app/policies/ckeditor/picture_policy.rb app/policies/ckeditor/attachment_file_policy.rb

By default, only the user that logged in can access the models.

You can customize these two policy files as you like.

• To override the default CKEditor routes create a config.js file within the host application at app/assets/javascripts/ckeditor/config.js

• By default, the engine inherits from ApplicationController. To override the default parent controller:

# in config/initializers/ckeditor.rb

Ckeditor.setup do |config|
  config.parent_controller = 'MyCKEditorBaseController'
end

Based on this, if you want to secure CKEditor controller actions and you can't authenticate in ApplicationController, you could do so with a custom controller after configuring the override above, like so:

class MyCKEditorBaseController < ActionController::Base

  before_action :authenticate_user! # or some other auth/permission logic here, like Pundit

end

en:
  ckeditor:
    page_title: 'CKEditor Files Manager'
    confirm_delete: 'Delete file?'
    buttons:
      cancel: 'Cancel'
      upload: 'Upload'
      delete: 'Delete'
      next: 'Next'

$> rake test CKEDITOR_BACKEND=paperclip
$> rake test CKEDITOR_BACKEND=active_storage
$> rake test CKEDITOR_BACKEND=carrierwave
$> rake test CKEDITOR_BACKEND=dragonfly
$> rake test CKEDITOR_BACKEND=shrine
$> rake test CKEDITOR_ORM=mongoid

$> rake test:controllers
$> rake test:generators
$> rake test:integration
$> rake test:models

This project rocks and uses the MIT-LICENSE.