How to make urls to view userprofiles like in facebook using laravel - php

Question

I am creating a project in Laravel . I want to create a url
like http://www.mywebsite.com/username
so i can show the user profile based on username
so far i have this code
Route::group(array('prefix' => 'user', 'before' => 'admin'), function() {
# USer / Individual
Route::get('/', array('as' => 'user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#getindex'));
Route::get('create-user', array('as' => 'create-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#create'));
Route::get('edit-user/{id}', array('as' => 'edit-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#edit'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::get('delete-user/{id}', array('as' => 'del_user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#destroy'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::get('deactivate/{id}', array('as' => 'user_deactive', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#deactive_user'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::get('active/{id}', array('as' => 'user_active', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#active_user'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::post('create-user', array('as' => 'post-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#store'));
Route::post('update-user/{id}', array('as' => 'update-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#update'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
# USer [Individual] Skills
Route::get('create-skill', array('as' => 'create-user-skill', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#create_skill'));
Route::get('delete-skill/{id}', array('as' => 'del_skill', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#destroy_skill'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::post('create-skill', array('as' => 'create-user-skill', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#store_skill'));
#send email to user
Route::get('send-email/{id}', array('as' => 'create-email-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#create_email'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::post('send-email', array('as' => 'send-email-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#send_email'));
});
I couldnt find any way to create routing for that if i create just a simple route it disturbs all my other urls like /logout
After Brainstorming here is what i concluded i have to implement it in order to check if this works or not
Route::filter('user.item', function($route, $request)
{
if ($route->parameter('item')->user_id !== Auth::user()->id)
{
App::abort(404);
}
});
What ill be doing is applying filter to routes to check from database if that username exists or not if it does exist ill fetch the view for profile and show the profile otherwise run the url as it is .Is it possible that way >?

Answer 1

A route that has a dynamic segment in the first place should be put after all the other routes so it only runs when the other routes don't match...
Route::get('foo', ...);
Route::get('bar', ...);
Route::get('{user}', ...);
Note that there is still a problem because a user can't have the name create-user because otherwise he won't see his profile but rather the actual create-user route.
That means if you really want to have the profile URL like that you should validate the username and check for reserved words (which are actually your other routes)
Of course the alternative is to just use something like user/{username}

Answer 2

You are right that such routing will overload all other routes and nothing works.
It is much easier to create url like http://www.mywebsite.com/u/username
If you want to have route /{username} then you can either make all other urls to be made of 2 or more url segments or make ineffective manual magic in the routing.
In manual routing you can see if the username matches any user and if not then perform the logout for example. You also need to keep in mind that someones username can be logout.

Answer 3

Bind your username "key" (in your route) and create a Route Bind.
Route::bind('username',function($value){
return User::where('username',$value)->first();
});
Route::group(array('prefix' => '{username}', 'before' => 'admin'), function() {
# USer / Individual
Route::get('/', array('as' => 'user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#getindex'));
Route::get('create-user', array('as' => 'create-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#create'));
Route::get('edit-user/{id}', array('as' => 'edit-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#edit'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::get('delete-user/{id}', array('as' => 'del_user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#destroy'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::get('deactivate/{id}', array('as' => 'user_deactive', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#deactive_user'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::get('active/{id}', array('as' => 'user_active', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#active_user'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::post('create-user', array('as' => 'post-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#store'));
Route::post('update-user/{id}', array('as' => 'update-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#update'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
# USer [Individual] Skills
Route::get('create-skill', array('as' => 'create-user-skill', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#create_skill'));
Route::get('delete-skill/{id}', array('as' => 'del_skill', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#destroy_skill'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::post('create-skill', array('as' => 'create-user-skill', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#store_skill'));
#send email to user
Route::get('send-email/{id}', array('as' => 'create-email-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#create_email'))->where(array('id' => '[0-9]+'));
Route::post('send-email', array('as' => 'send-email-user', 'uses' => 'Admin\AdminIndividualController#send_email'));
});

Answer 4

If its ok for you to display URL of the user's profile page like this: http://website.com/#username then you can show the user's profile based on his username like this:
in routes.php file
Route::get("#{username}", array(
"as" => "users.show",
"uses" => "UsersController#show",
));
in UsersController.php file
public function show($username)
{
$user = User::where("username", "=", $username)->first();
if (is_null($user))
{
return App::abort(404);
}
return View::make("path/to/view/file")->with("user", $user);
}
and you can create links with that URL http://website.com/#username like this:
{{ $user->username }}
this way you don't need to check for reserved words (which are your other routes) unless you already have a route begins with the symbol #.