CakePHP: Pagination in an Element on home.ctp - php

Question

I'm using CakePHP to create a frontend UI for PowerDNS, using a MySQL backend. On the front page of the app I want to have a handful of widgets ('Quickly add a record', 'Quickly add a domain' etc.). One of the widgets I want is a paginated list of existing domains.
The index function in DomainsController.php looks like this:
public $paginate = array(
'fields' => array('id', 'name'),
'limit' => 25,
'order' => array( 'name' => 'asc' ),
'conditions' => array( "NOT" => array( "name LIKE" => "%.arpa" ) )
);
public function index() {
$domains = $this->paginate();
if ( $this->request->is('requested')) {
return $domains;
} else {
$this->set('domains', $domains);
}
}
I've created an element that looks like this:
<?php $domains = $this->requestAction('Domains/index'); ?>
<ol>
<?php foreach( $domains as $domain) :?>
<li>echo $domains['domain']['name']</li>
<?php endforeach; ?>
</ol>
<?php echo $paginator->numbers(); ?>
When I visit the front page, I get an 'Undefinied variable: paginator' error. I've tried using $this->Paginator->numbers() instead but that just gives me 'Undefined property: View::$Paginator'. Adding the 'Paginator' helper to PagesController.php doesn't help either - $this->Paginator becomes available but I get 'Undefined index: pageCount'.
Is it possible to do this kind of pagination from an element on home.ctp or am I going to have to do some custom JavaScript stuff?
EDIT
Now I'm getting somewhere: I changed my DomainsController index function to this:
public function index() {
$domains = $this->paginate();
$paginator = $this->params;
if ( $this->request->is('requested')) {
return compact( 'domains', 'paginator' );
} else {
$this->set('domains', $domains);
}
}
And added the following to the domainList.ctp element:
<?php
$result = $this->requestAction('Domains/index');
$domains = $result['domains'];
$this->Paginator->request = $result['paginator'];
?>
<ol>
<?php foreach( $domains as $domain) :?>
<li>echo $domains['domain']['name']</li>
<?php endforeach; ?>
</ol>
<?php echo $paginator->numbers(); ?>
$this->Paginator is now working properly and I can access all of its methods and properties and so on as normal. My problem now is that if I click on, say, '2', the browser navigates to /pages/home/page:2 but the domain list still shows page 1. Just need to figure out how to pass 'page:2' to the element. And AJAX-ify the whole thing so that I don't need to refresh the whole page.

Answer 1

Firstly, don't do this:
$domains = $this->requestAction('Domains/index');
It's expensive and not good practice and I'm not sure why you need to be doing it from your example.
Secondly, call your paginate like this:
$domains = $this->Paginate('Domain');

Answer 2

OK, I solved this problem, although my solution probably isn't very elegant.
DomainsController.php has a listDomains() function that looks like this:
public function listDomains() {
$domains = $this->paginate();
$paginator = $this->params;
if ( $this->request->is('ajax') ) {
$this->set( 'domains', $domains );
}
if ( $this->request->is('requested')) {
return array( 'domains' => $domains, 'paginator' => $paginator, 'paging' => $this->params['paging'] );
} else {
$this->set( 'domains', $domains );
}
}
home.ctp references an element called domainList.ctp. domainList.ctp, below, in turn uses requestAction() - I know, I know - to call the domainList() function above. Bequest the request is requested, an array containing the values of $domains and $paginator is sent back to the element.
domainList.ctp contains this code:
<?php
$result = $this->requestAction('Domains/listDomains', array('updateId' => 'domainList') );
$domains = $result['domains'];
$paginator = $result['paginator'];
$this->Paginator->request = $paginator;
$this->Paginator->options(array(
'update' => '#domainList',
'evalScripts' => true,
'url' => array('controller' => 'Domains', 'action' => 'listDomains', 'updateId' => 'domainList' ),
));
?>
Essentially what I'm doing here is manually re-populating $this->Paginator->request with the params that were originally sent to the DomainController's domainList() function. This lets me access the various paginator functions, like numbers(), prev() and next(), properly. It's a bit messy but guess what? It gets a little messier.
When you click on the links created by those paginator functions, the 'if ( $this->request->is('ajax') )' segment is executed and the div object on the page is updated with the contents of View/Domains/domainList.ctp instead of View/Elements/domainList.ctp. The contents of View/Domains/domainList.ctp is more or less the same as the corresponding element and the two have to be kep more or less syncronised. The difference is that we don't need to manually populate $this->Paginator:
<?php
$this->Paginator->options(array(
'update' => '#domainList',
'evalScripts' => true,
'url' => array('controller' => 'Domains', 'action' => 'listDomains', 'updateId' => 'domainList' ),
));
?>
Like I said, it's messy and inelegant but it worked for me. I'd be happy to know if anyone has a less kludgy way to do this.