Using ActiveRecord externally

Try to write a ruby executable code using ActiveRecord to interact with mysql db. actually the method has been present in Pragmatic's Rails Recipes #26, but the code seems to be missing something before require 'active_record'. Actually, require 'rubygems' must be added before it, as active_record is resides in the gems' path.

here's the code, its actually a simple schedule-able program for me to retrieve yahoo finance data and insert it to the database, which later may use the same model to retrieve it from Rails.


require 'rubygems'
require 'active_record'
require 'yaml'
require File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__),"../app/models/http_getter")
require File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__),"../app/models/stock")

logger = Logger.new(File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__),"../log/stocks.log"))
ActiveRecord::Base.establish_connection(YAML.load_file(
File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__),"../config/database.yml"))["development"]
)
ActiveRecord::Base.logger = logger

fields = %w{ symbol current_price update_date update_time change open range_to range_from volumn}
symbol = ARGV[0]
url = "http://sg.finance.yahoo.com"
resource = "/d/quotes.csv?s=#{symbol}&f=sl1d1t1c1ohgv&e=.csv"

data = HttpGetter.csv_start(url,resource,fields)

stock = Stock.new(data)
stock.updated_at = Time.now

unless stock.save
logger.error("ERROR: Can't save the record!")
logger.error("ERROR_OBJ_DUMP: "+stock.inspect)
logger.error("ERROR_DATA_DUMP: "+data.inspect)
else
logger.info("SUCCESS "+stock.updated_at.to_s+": Record Saved. Symbol:"+stock.symbol)
end


Some strange thing happen here, u may see the line stock.updated_at = Time.now logically it should not be presented here... it should use the ActiveRecord's brefore_save callback to fill the attribute. But callbacks seems to be not working if I use ActiveRecord external Rails... :-(