I'm storing user roles as integers but I don't have a table yet stating what a role means. For now it's just being kept in the user model. I needed a (non localized) string saying what the user's role was. I thought the case method was too ugly so I went this direction instead.

gistfile1.rb

# u = User.first
# u.role_id # => 1

# Desired output
# u.role    # => "Administrator"

# Obvious implementation
def role
  case self.role_id
  when 1
    "Administrator"
  when 2
    "Registered User"
  when 3
    "Trial"
  when 4
    "Interviewer"
  else
    "Not Valid"
  end
end

# Cleaner implementation
def User.roles
  ["Administrator", "Registered User", "Trial User", "Interviewer"]
end

def role
  User.roles[self.role_id-1]
end