periodically_call_remote.rb

#This will store the PeriodicalExecuter in a variable. In order to set
  #the name of the variable, you can pass in a :variable option. By
  #default, it will use 'poller'.
  #
  #So you can do:
  #
  #periodically_call_remote(:url => some_url, :update => 'some_div',
  #:variable => 'my_var')
  #
  #And when you want to stop the polling, you can inject the following line
  #of javascript into your page:
  #
  #<script>
  #  my_var.stop();
  #</script>
  def periodically_call_remote(options = {})
    variable = options[:variable] ||= 'poller'
    frequency = options[:frequency] ||= 10
    code = "#{variable} = new PeriodicalExecuter(function()
{#{remote_function(options)}}, #{frequency})"
    javascript_tag(code)
  end