[Rails] (no subject)

[Peter T Bosse II]

I am trying to populate a select() popup menu with all of the  
currently entered options from the database.  My thinking is that I  
would search the database for all records, then call my "get_options"  
with the name of the field as an argument.

   def list
     @assets = Asset.find(:all)
     get_options(@assets,"asset_type")
   end

   private
   def get_options(items,field)
     @options = []
     items.each do |@item|
       @options << @item.field
     end
     @options = @options.sort.uniq
   end

This doesn't work.  However, if I replace:

       @options << @item.field

with:

       @options << @item.asset_type

(...where "asset_type" is the name of a field in the database) it  
does work.  Now, I'm trying to follow the DRY principles, but I can't  
figure out how to pass the field name to "get_options".  I could  
write a dozen or so "get_options_asset_type",  
"get_options_serial_number" and the like and it would work, but this  
is an opportunity for me to learn.  How am I supposed to do this?

- Peter