How is attr_accessible used in Rails 4?

Rails 4 now uses strong parameters.

Protecting attributes is now done in the controller. This is an example:

class PeopleController < ApplicationController
  def create
    Person.create(person_params)
  end

  private

  def person_params
    params.require(:person).permit(:name, :age)
  end
end

No need to set attr_accessible in the model anymore.

Dealing with accepts_nested_attributes_for

In order to use accepts_nested_attribute_for with strong parameters, you will need to specify which nested attributes should be whitelisted.

class Person
  has_many :pets
  accepts_nested_attributes_for :pets
end

class PeopleController < ApplicationController
  def create
    Person.create(person_params)
  end

  # ...

  private

  def person_params
    params.require(:person).permit(:name, :age, pets_attributes: [:name, :category])
  end
end

Keywords are self-explanatory, but just in case, you can find more information about strong parameters in the Rails Action Controller guide.

Note: If you still want to use attr_accessible, you need to add protected_attributes to your Gemfile. Otherwise, you will be faced with a RuntimeError.

If you prefer attr_accessible, you could use it in Rails 4 too. You should install it like gem:

gem 'protected_attributes'

after that you could use attr_accessible in you models like in Rails 3

Also, and i think that is the best way- using form objects for dealing with mass assignment, and saving nested objects, and you can also use protected_attributes gem that way

class NestedForm
   include  ActiveModel::MassAssignmentSecurity
   attr_accessible :name,
                   :telephone, as: :create_params
   def create_objects(params)
      SomeModel.new(sanitized_params(params, :create_params))
   end
end