Zend Dispatch - return variables from controller->action - php

Question

I have a little issue with Zend. I am trying to make some fake HTTP requests and after the module->controller->action is executed, to return random variables that are set in that action. Like in the case of variables set with view->assign(,) - I can access them later from view file (.phtml).
Here is part of my code:
/application/controller/IndexController.php
<?php
class IndexController extends Zend_Controller_Action
{
public function init(){}
public function indexAction()
{
#$this->view seems to be a NULL value from the fake request, so I can't pass variables to it
//$this->view->x = 'y';
echo 'test';
return array(
'x' => 'y'
);
}
}
/public/index2.php
<?php
//--cut--
$application->bootstrap();
$options = array(
'action' => 'index',
'controller' => 'index',
'module' => 'default'
);
if( isset($options['action'], $options['module'], $options['controller']) )
{
$request = new Zend_Controller_Request_Http ();
$request->setModuleName($options['module'])->setActionName($options['action'])->setControllerName($options['controller']);
$frontController = Zend_Controller_Front::getInstance ()->returnResponse ( true );
$response = new Zend_Controller_Response_Http ();
$frontController->getDispatcher ()->dispatch ( $request, $response );
echo '$response:<b>Zend_Controller_Response_Http</b><br>';
//This returns me the body of what I echo in the indexAction but not the variables.
var_dump($response);
}
Thank you so much!

Answer 1

If you want to assign variables to view when the request is dispatched, you can create a Zend_View instance in the indexAction and assign values, as shown below:
public function indexAction()
{
echo "test";
$view = new Zend_View();
$view->setBasePath(APPLICATION_PATH."/views/");
$view->x = 'y';
echo $view->render("index/index.phtml");
}
Try embedding the variable in the index view script, and var_dump of your response will contain both the echoed "test" and the index.phtml output.
If you want to return the array to the response, use json:
public function indexAction()
{
$array = array('x' => 'y');
echo json_encode($array);
}
index2.php:
//.....
var_dump($response);
var_dump(json_decode($response->getBody()));

Answer 2

You need to extend Zend_Controller_Action for this because standard Action didn't receive returned variables.

Answer 3

You will not be able to fetch the view parameters in the way you are trying (outside the view/MVC). This is because the action controller, in your case, IndexController only exists in memory for the duration of the dispatched method (IndexAction).
The parameters that are defined with the view class are only referenced when a call is made to view->render() and then just the HTML is generated.
You can however get the user defined variables (public scope) from within the controller action like so:
class IndexController extends Zend_Controller_Action
{
public function indexAction()
{
/** The view class uses PHP's magic set/get/isset methods to
NULL any access to values that are protected (or more precisely
have a underscore _ prefix for the property name)
hence $this->_view = null;
**/
/** we do however have access to this view (or create a new one if not already
defined within the action controller) with: **/
$view = $this->initView();
/** An array of the public controller parameters **/
$viewParams = $view->getVars();
}
}
Also, the code dispatching theses requests can now be simplified:
$front = Zend_Controller_Front::getInstance();
$front->setRequest(
new Zend_Controller_Request_Http()->setParams($options)
)->dispatch();
Note: I'm using version 1.11