Difference between render and display in merb
Use render for actions like create and new, where you don’t really want to share the xml or even want xml created. Or json for that matter.
Use display to render actions like index and show, where you do want to share the information via xml.
render means you want to render a template — or a string. display means you want to render a resource. so display will do what it can return something to the client
it checks for a template and if that’s missing calls #to_
on the model # courtesy unagi-san
Here’s the render method on merb-core head and display method on merb-core head