In Symfony 2+, when you describe the method that is executed for a specific route, you can use either:
MyBundle:MyController:hello
Or, given that you setup MyController to be managed by the dependency injection container as service my_controller:
my_controller:helloAction
Why does Symfony expect the Action suffix in one case but not the other?
Why does the second variant NEED helloAction instead of hello,
like in the first variant?
Nope!
Don't be misled.
When defining controller as service, the controller method names can be whatever name you want.
Thus, if in your controller you have method called hello, so you must define it in the routing config as hello only, instead helloAction (which is wrong). That is why symfony expects for a valid callable name.
On the other hand, when extending from default framework controller, Symfony expects all methods name have a Action suffix (That's just a convention rather than technical requirement, see Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\KernelInterface#ControllerNameParser, line 78).
Here is a practical exemple:
namespace AppBundle\Controller;
/** My controller as service */
class DefaultController
{
public function hello()
{
return new Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response('Hello!');
}
}
My route settings:
# app/config/touting.yml
hello:
path: /hello
# NOTE: Method name is hello, not helloAction
defaults: {_controller: app.controller.default:hello}
Related
I want to pass the EntityManager instance into the constructor of my controller, using this code:
namespace AppBundle\Controller;
use Symfony\Bundle\FrameworkBundle\Controller\Controller;
use Doctrine\ORM\EntityManager;
class UserController extends Controller
{
public function __construct( EntityManager $entityManager )
{
// do some stuff with the entityManager
}
}
I do the constructor injection by putting the parameters into the service.yml file:
parameters:
# parameter_name: value
services:
# service_name:
# class: AppBundle\Directory\ClassName
# arguments: ["#another_service_name", "plain_value", "%parameter_name%"]
app.user_controller:
class: AppBundle\Controller\UserController
arguments: ['#doctrine.orm.entity_manager']
the service.yml is included in the config.yml and when I run
php bin/console debug:container app.user_controller
I get:
Information for Service "app.user_controller"
=============================================
------------------ -------------------------------------
Option Value
------------------ -------------------------------------
Service ID app.user_controller
Class AppBundle\Controller\UserController
Tags -
Public yes
Synthetic no
Lazy no
Shared yes
Abstract no
Autowired no
Autowiring Types -
------------------ -------------------------------------
However, calling a route which is mapped to my controller, I get:
FatalThrowableError in UserController.php line 17: Type error:
Argument 1 passed to
AppBundle\Controller\UserController::__construct() must be an instance
of Doctrine\ORM\EntityManager, none given, called in
/home/michel/Documents/Terminfinder/vendor/symfony/symfony/src/Symfony/Component/HttpKernel/Controller/ControllerResolver.php
on line 202
I cant figure out, why the EntityManager is not getting injected?
When using the base classController.php the Container is usually auto-wired by the framework in theControllerResolver.
Basically you are trying to mix up how things actually work.
To solve your problem you basically have two solutions:
Do no try to inject the dependency but fetch it directly from the Container from within your action/method.
public function listUsers(Request $request)
{
$em = $this->container->get('doctrine.orm.entity_manager');
}
Create a controller manually but not extend the Controller base class; and set ip up as a service
To go a bit further on this point, some people will advise to do not use the default Controller provided by Symfony.
While I totally understand their point of view, I'm slightly more moderated on the subject.
The idea behind injecting only the required dependencies is to avoid and force people to have thin controller, which is a good thing.
However, with a little of auto-determination, using the existing shortcut is much simpler.
A Controller / Action is nothing more but the glue between your Views and your Domain/Models.
Prevent yourself from doing too much in your Controller using the ContainerAware facility.
A Controller can thrown away without generate business changes in your system.
Since 2017 and Symfony 3.3+, there is native support for controllers as services.
You can keep your controller the way it is, since you're using constructor injection correctly.
Just modify your services.yml:
# app/config/services.yml
services:
_defaults:
autowire: true
AppBundle\:
resouces: ../../src/AppBundle
It will:
load all controllers and repositories as services
autowire contructor dependencies (in your case EntityManager)
Step further: repositories as services
Ther were many question on SO regarding Doctrine + repository + service + controller, so I've put down one general answer to a post. Definitelly check if you prefer constructor injection and services over static and service locators.
Did you use following pattern to call the controller AppBundle:Default:index? if yes that should be the problem. If you want to use controller as a service you have to use the pattern: app.controller_id:indexAction which uses the id of the service to load the controller.
Otherwise it will try to create an instance of the class without using the service container.
For more information see the symfony documentation about this topic https://symfony.com/doc/current/controller/service.html
The entity manager is available in a controller without needing to inject it. All it takes is:
$em = $this->getDoctrine()->getManager();
I've just started working my way through the symfony2 book.
I wonder why do we named our controller's functions Action:
public function [something]Action() { // ...
In everyone example in the book thus far and all code I see online Action is the function name. There's any reason for it?
This works perfectly:
<?php
// src/AppBundle/Controller/LuckyController.php
namespace AppBundle\Controller;
use Symfony\Bundle\FrameworkBundle\Controller\Controller;
use Sensio\Bundle\FrameworkExtraBundle\Configuration\Route;
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response;
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\JsonResponse;
class LuckyController extends Controller{
/**
* #Route("/lucky/number/{count}")
*/
public function countTESTING($count){
return new Response(
'<html><body>I DONT HAVE TO CALL THIS somethingACTION</body></html>
');
}
}
?>
I've tried googline this but I see no mention or reasoning as to why. Could someone explain why we use that suffix?
It's just a conventions. You can use those suffixes, but you can also do without it.
If you have
public function somethingAction()
in your controller, you can refer it in the routing configuration in this way:
index:
path: /path_for_something
defaults: { _controller: AppBundle:Index:something }
The _controller parameter uses a simple string pattern called the logical controller name. So, AppBundle:Index:something means:
Bundle: AppBundle
Controller class: IndexController
Method name: somethingAction
But, you can also do this without this feature. Symfony is very flexible, and it does not force you to do almost anything. It is just one of many ways you have to do the same thing.
If you adopt this convention, it's easier for you to understand which action do you have in your controller, it's easy for other developer to understand your code, and it's easier for symfony2 to locate your actions/controllers inside your bundle, so that you can also overriding controllers. This is the best practice.
But if you don't want these benefits, you can using its fully-qualified class name and method as well:
index:
path: /something
defaults: { _controller: AppBundle\Controller\IndexController::indexAction }
But, as the documentation say:
if you follow some simple conventions, the logical name is more
concise and allows more flexibility.
No it wasn't just a naming convention. It was used to execute some code before or after every controller 'action' method. Like checking is user has logged in.
It is based on magic __call function which is executed for a non-existent or non-public method call.
$controller = new Posts();
$controller->index();
class Posts
{
public function __call($name, $args)
{
//run code before
call_user_func_array()[$this, "$nameAction"], $args);
//run code after
}
public function indexAction()
{
}
}
You HAVE TO name your actions
public function somethingAction(){}
because your routes point to a controller, and the action you want to call.
you can also have private functions in your controller, that you will only name
private function something(){}
I say that using yml to configure controllers, i dont believe its different when using annotations, but my advise is to use yml for configuring controllers... really !
I can't understand why Silex\Application object is injected in some classes but in others not. Here is an example
Example 1
/
Controllers
Admin
LoginController.php
namespace SD\Controllers\Admin;
use Silex\Application;
class LoginController
{
public function loginAction(\Silex\Application $app)
{
//in this method Application object is injected automatically
}
}
Example 2
/
Lib
RoutesFactory.php
namespace SD\Lib;
use Silex\Application;
class RoutesFactory
{
public static function make(\Silex\Application $app)
{
// in this method Application object is not injected automatically and I get an error saying the object passed to method make is none instead of \Silex\Apllication
}
}
So why the Application object in the first example is injected automatically but in the second not?
Silex does parameter conversion in controllers (and in controllers only), so in the controllers methods you can type hint and expect to "automatically" have the instance, but not anywhere else. From the official docs:
You can (in the controller method) use Request and Silex\Application type hints to get $request and $app injected.
NOTE: Emphasis mine, its extracted from the context so I though better to make it clear.
For more details, check the Silex controller resolver code and also the Symfony's HttpKernel one.
I have started to create a project using Symfony 2. I need to share data between all controllers.
I have added a base controller which extends symfony\controller and each of my controllers extends this base controller
class BaseController extends Controller
class HomeController extends BaseController
This base controller will be used for things like assigning global twig variables ( I know I can do this in the config but some of the variables will be gotten from other config files and database ).
So I thought I could reference container since Controller is container aware, however it isn't at the point I am using the functions (from constructor).
public function __construct ()
I have seen people mention passing the container in as a parameter and mention services but I have had a look and cannot figure it out. All I want to achieve is this:
public function __construct (Container $container) {
$container->get('twig').addGlobal('foo');
}
This is a common stumbling block to Symfony 2 newbies. The controller/container question has been asked hundreds of time before so you are not alone(hint).
Why doesn't your controller constructor code work?
Start by looking under vendor/symfony...FrameworkBundle/Controller/Controller.php. Hmm. No constructor there so where the heck is the container coming from? We see that Controller extends ContainerAware. That seems promising. We look at ContainerAware (the namespace helps to find where the file is) and once again, no constructor. There is however a setContainer method so we can assume that the container is injected into the controller after the constructor is called. Quite common in a dependency injection based framework.
So now we know why the constructor code fails. The container has not yet been injected. Stupid design right? Time for a different framework? Not really. Let's face it, having to have all your controllers extend a base controller just to get some twig variables set is not really the best design.
The Symfony way to execute code before the controller action is executed is to make a controller event listener. It will look something like this:
namespace Cerad\Bundle\CoreBundle\EventListener;
use Symfony\Component\DependencyInjection\ContainerAware;
use Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\HttpKernel;
use Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\KernelEvents;
use Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\Event\FilterControllerEvent;
use Symfony\Component\EventDispatcher\EventSubscriberInterface;
class ModelEventListener extends ContainerAware implements EventSubscriberInterface
{
public static function getSubscribedEvents()
{
return array(KernelEvents::CONTROLLER => array(
array('doTwig', 0), // 0 is just the priority
));
}
public function doTwig(FilterControllerEvent $event)
{
// Ignore sub requests
if (HttpKernel::MASTER_REQUEST != $event->getRequestType()) return;
$this->container->get('twig')->addGlobal('foo');
}
}
// This goes in services.yml
parameters:
cerad_core__model_event_listener__class:
Cerad\Bundle\CoreBundle\EventListener\ModelEventListener
services:
cerad_core__model_event_listener:
class: '%cerad_core__model_event_listener__class%'
calls:
- [setContainer, ['#service_container']]
tags:
- { name: kernel.event_subscriber }
So now we have the desired functionality without the need for a base controller class.
Notice also that the controller can be accessed through the event. Since the controller has been created but the action method not yet called, you could call controller methods or inject data directly into the controller. This is seldom needed. In most cases, you would add additional information to the request object which then gets injected into the controller's action method.
It's really a nice design once you get comfortable with listeners and services.
Please read carefully that question - Symfony2 passing data between bundles & controllers, try to use code included in it.
You can use service to solve your problem, for example.
If you look at the Controller class you'll se the following:
class Controller extends ContainerAware
This means you can retrieve twig from the container as simple as this:
$twig = $this->get('twig');
But I would recommend you to use custom twig extension in your case.
In a Symfony2 project, when you use a Controller, you can access Doctrine by calling getDoctrine() on this, i.e.:
$this->getDoctrine();
In this way, I can access the repository of such a Doctrine Entity.
Suppose to have a generic PHP class in a Symfony2 project. How can I retrieve Doctrine ?
I suppose that there is such a service to get it, but I don't know which one.
You can register this class as a service and inject whatever other services into it. Suppose you have GenericClass.php as follows:
class GenericClass
{
public function __construct()
{
// some cool stuff
}
}
You can register it as service (in your bundle's Resources/config/service.yml|xml usually) and inject Doctrine's entity manager into it:
services:
my_mailer:
class: Path/To/GenericClass
arguments: [doctrine.orm.entity_manager]
And it'll try to inject entity manager to (by default) constructor of GenericClass. So you just have to add argument for it:
public function __construct($entityManager)
{
// do something awesome with entity manager
}
If you are not sure what services are available in your application's DI container, you can find out by using command line tool: php app/console container:debug and it'll list all available services along with their aliases and classes.
After checking the symfony2 docs i figured out how to pass your service
in a custom method to break the default behavior.
Rewrite your configs like this:
services:
my_mailer:
class: Path/To/GenericClass
calls:
- [anotherMethodName, [doctrine.orm.entity_manager]]
So, the Service is now available in your other method.
public function anotherMethodName($entityManager)
{
// your magic
}
The Answer from Ondrej is absolutely correct, I just wanted to add this piece of the puzzle to this thread.