Correct way to reference class\method in another file - php

Question

I have class that I have set up like this:
use MVC\Model;
use \Firebase\JWT\JWT;
class ModelsAuth extends Model {
In my ModelsAuth class, I have this member function:
public function validateToken($token) {
}
I am using this to autoload my classes:
// autoload class
function autoload($class) {
// set file class
$file = SYSTEM . str_replace('\\', '/', $class) . '.php';
if (file_exists($file))
require_once $file;
else
throw new Exception(sprintf('Class { %s } Not Found!', $class));
}
// set autoload function
spl_autoload_register('autoload');
Is it possible to call this class and function from outside the class?
I have tried:
$authorization = new \MVC\Model\ModelsAuth();
$authorization->validateToken($token);
and
$authorization = MVC\Model\ModelsAuth::validateToken($token);
Both return a class not found error.
Any thoughts on what I might be doing wrong with this approach?

Answer 1

You have not declared a namespace for your class, so it's not clear that it will exist as MVC\Model\ModelsAuth and it's probably just going into the root namespace as \ModelsAuth. You probably want something like this:
namespace MVC\Model;
class ModelsAuth extends \MVC\Model {
...
}
Which can also be specified as:
namespace MVC\Model;
use MVC\Model;
class ModelsAuth extends Model {
...
}
I'm not fond of either of these options however, because then you've got a base class named \MVC\Model and a namespace named \MVC\Model, which is somewhat confusing. I'd recommend putting your base class as an abstract into the \MVC\Model namespace, in a file named MVC/Model/AbstractModel.php like this:
namespace MVC\Model;
abstract class AbstractModel {
...
}
And then your model in a file name MVC/Model/MyModel.php like this:
namespace MVC\Model;
class MyModel extends AbstractModel {
...
}
This way, all your models are in the same namespace and the same directory.
Also, if you use a PSR-4 autoloader then most of these sorts of issues will go away.