Remove duplicate records based on multiple columns?

class Model

  def self.dedupe
    # find all models and group them on keys which should be common
    grouped = all.group_by{|model| [model.name,model.year,model.trim,model.make_id] }
    grouped.values.each do |duplicates|
      # the first one we want to keep right?
      first_one = duplicates.shift # or pop for last one
      # if there are any more left, they are duplicates
      # so delete all of them
      duplicates.each{|double| double.destroy} # duplicates can now be destroyed
    end
  end

end

Model.dedupe

• Find All
• Group them on keys which you need for uniqueness
• Loop on the grouped model's values of the hash
• remove the first value because you want to retain one copy
• delete the rest

If your User table data like below

User.all =>
[
    #<User id: 15, name: "a", email: "[email protected]", created_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:09", updated_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:09">, 
    #<User id: 16, name: "a1", email: "[email protected]", created_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:20", updated_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:20">, 
    #<User id: 17, name: "b", email: "[email protected]", created_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:28", updated_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:28">, 
    #<User id: 18, name: "b1", email: "[email protected]", created_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:35", updated_at: "2013-08-06 08:57:35">, 
    #<User id: 19, name: "b11", email: "[email protected]", created_at: "2013-08-06 09:01:30", updated_at: "2013-08-06 09:01:30">, 
    #<User id: 20, name: "b11", email: "[email protected]", created_at: "2013-08-06 09:07:58", updated_at: "2013-08-06 09:07:58">] 
1.9.2p290 :099 > 

Email id's are duplicate, so our aim is to remove all duplicate email ids from user table.

Step 1:

To get all distinct email records id.

ids = User.select("MIN(id) as id").group(:email,:name).collect(&:id)
=> [15, 16, 18, 19, 17]

Step 2:

To remove duplicate id's from user table with distinct email records id.

Now the ids array holds the following ids.

[15, 16, 18, 19, 17]
User.where("id NOT IN (?)",ids)  # To get all duplicate records
User.where("id NOT IN (?)",ids).destroy_all

** RAILS 4 **

ActiveRecord 4 introduces the .not method which allows you to write the following in Step 2:

User.where.not(id: ids).destroy_all