I've used php enough to be quite comfortable with it, but recently I've been looking through some MVC frameworks to try and understand how they work, and I've come across a syntax and data structure which I haven't encountered before:
function view($id)
{
$this->Note->id = $id;
}
What is the ->id section of this code? Is this a sub-method based off it's parent method? If so, how do I go about writing code to create such a structure? (ie. creating the structure from scratch, not using an existing framework like the above example from cakephp).
The following code demonstrates how one could arrive at the structure you described.
<?php
class Note
{
public $id = 42;
}
class MyClass
{
public function __construct() {
// instance of 'Note' as a property of 'MyClass'
$this->Note = new Note();
}
public function test() {
printf("The \$id property in our instance of 'Note' is: %d\n",
$this->Note->id);
}
}
$mc = new MyClass();
$mc->test();
?>
Note is a property of $this and it's (current) value is an object with a property named id which gets assigned the value of $id.
If id was a method of the Note object, the line would read $this->Note->id($id);.
Another way to think about the construct is considering
$this->Note->id = $id;
similar to
$this["Note"]["id"] = $id;
Which would actually be equivalent if both objects ($this and subobject Note) were based on ArrayAccess.
Related
I'm trying to write a code where I could run a function based on it's previous variables. I don't know how to explain any better but a sample will do. I'm trying to do something like this:
<?php
$agric = new Agriculture;
$newplant = $agric-> setClass('plant');
$newanimal = $agric->setClass('animal');
$agric->getAll(); // returns null
$newplant->setProperties($plant1_data); //uses plant
$newanimal->setProperties($animal1_data); // uses animal
$newplant->setProperties($plant2_data); //uses plant
$newanimal->setProperties($animal2_data); // uses animal
$newplant->getAll(); // returns all plants array
$newanimal->getAll(); // returns all animals array
$agric->getAll(); // returns both plants array and animals
?>
So, In one form, the new variables calls the setClass in order to work and everytime it is is called they use their setClass method to know which type of argument they should use to run their code. I know I could do this differently but I seem to love this approach. Any help will do. Thanks in advance
Thanks #everyone.. I finally got the answer to that. So the reason why I'm giving it to #Dragos is because phone factory seems to be the best approach to it. So, all I did was to create two classes. One is Agriculture which has a method to get the properties of what was called using "getAll()" and the Other is HandleAgric which also has "getAll()". The HandleAgric has its own setClass which is static and every time it is called, it instantiates a new Agriculture with its default parameter. So, Both Classes will have setClass() and getAll() as method. Something like this
<?php
class HandleAgric{
private static $Agriculture;
public function __construct(){
self::setClass();
}
function __call($method,$args){
$self = new self;
if(method_exists($self::$Agriculture, $method)){
$call = call_user_func(array($self::$Agriculture, $method));
return $call;
}
return trigger_error("Error Found!!! Aborting");
}
public static function setClass($class=null){
self::$Agriculture = new Agriculture;
$call = self::$Agriculture->setClass($class);
return $call;
}
}
//Example of usage
$Agric = new HandleAgric();
$Plant = $Agric::setClass("plant");
$Animal = $Agric::setClass("animal");
$Plant->setProperties($arrayList);
$Animal->setProperties($arrayList);
# $Plant->getAll() //return plants properties in array;
# $Animal->getAll() //return Animal properties in array;
# $Agric->getAll() //return Agric (both plant and animal) properties in array;
?>
I believe this to be much better.
For your example to work, the method setClass from Agriculture must work like a factory: it instantiates a class based on the parameter and returns the object.
Agriculture class must also keep all the objects instantiated inside setClass method in its own internal array, so when getAll method is called, it iterates through each object and executes their own getAll methods.
I have the following class with several properties and a method in PHP (This is simplified code).
class Member{
public $Name;
public $Family;
public function Fetch_Name(){
for($i=0;$i<10;$i++){
$this[$i]->$Name = I find the name using RegExp and return the value to be stored here;
$this[$i]->Family = I find the family using RegExp and return the value to be stored here;
}
}//function
}//class
In the function Fetch_Name(), I want to find all the names and families that is in a text file using RegExp and store them as properties of object in the form of an array. But I don't know how should I define an array of the Member. Is it logical or I should define StdClass or 2-dimension array instead of class?
I found slightly similar discussion here, but a 2 dimensional array is used instead of storing data in the object using class properties.
I think my problem is in defining the following lines of code.
$Member = new Member();
$Member->Fetch_name();
The member that I have defined is not an array. If I do define it array, still it does not work. I did this
$Member[]= new Member();
But it gives error
Fatal error: Call to a member function Fetch_name() on a non-object in
if I give $Member[0]= new Member() then I don't know how to make $Member1 or Member[2] or so forth in the Fetch_Name function. I hope my question is not complex and illogical.
Many thanks in advance
A Member object represents one member. You're trying to overload it to represent or handle many members, which doesn't really make sense. In the end you'll want to end up with an array that holds many Member instances, not the other way around:
$members = array();
for (...) {
$members[] = new Member($name, $family);
}
Most likely you don't really need your Member class to do anything really; the extraction logic should reside outside of the Member class, perhaps in an Extractor class or something similar. From the outside, your code should likely look like this:
$parser = new TextFileParser('my_file.txt');
$members = $parser->extractMembers();
I think you should have two classes :
The first one, Fetcher (or call it as you like), with your function.
The second one, Member, with the properties Name and Family.
It is not the job of a Member to fetch in your text, that's why I would make another class.
In your function, do your job, and in the loop, do this :
for($i = 0; $i < 10; ++$i){
$member = new Member();
$member->setName($name);
$member->setFamily($family);
// The following is an example, do what you want with the generated Member
$this->members[$i] = $member;
}
The problem here is that you are not using the object of type Member as array correctly. The correct format of your code would be:
class Member{
public $Name;
public $Family;
public function Fetch_Name(){
for($i=0;$i<10;$i++){
$this->Name[$i] = 'I find the name using RegExp and return the value to be stored here';
$this->Family[$i] = 'I find the family using RegExp and return the value to be stored here';
}
}
}
First, $this->Name not $this->$Name because Name is already declared as a member variable and $this->Name[$i] is the correct syntax because $this reference to the current object, it cannot be converted to array, as itself. The array must be contained in the member variable.
L.E: I might add that You are not writing your code according to PHP naming standards. This does not affect your functionality, but it is good practice to write your code in the standard way. After all, there is a purpose of having a standard.
Here you have a guide on how to do that.
And I would write your code like this:
class Member{
public $name;
public $family;
public function fetchName(){
for($i=0;$i<10;$i++){
$this->name[$i] = 'I find the name using RegExp and return the value to be stored here';
$this->family[$i] = 'I find the family using RegExp and return the value to be stored here';
}
}
}
L.E2: Seeing what you comented above, I will modify my answer like this:
So you are saying that you have an object of which values must be stored into an array, after the call. Well, after is the key word here:
Initialize your object var:
$member = new Memeber();
$memebr->fechNames();
Initialize and array in foreach
$Member = new Member();
foreach ($Member->Name as $member_name){
$array['names'][] = $member_name;
}
foreach ($Member->Family as $member_family) {
$array['family'][] = $member_family;
}
var_dump($array);
Is this more of what you wanted?
Hope it helps!
Keep on coding!
Ares.
How to combine two variables to obtain / create new variable?
public $show_diary = 'my';
private my_diary(){
return 1;
}
public view_diary(){
return ${"this->"}.$this->show_diary.{"_diary()"}; // 1
return $this->.{"$this->show_diary"}._diary() // 2
}
both return nothing.
Your class should be like following:
class Test
{
public $show_diary;
function __construct()
{
$this->show_diary = "my";
}
private function my_diary(){
return 707;
}
public function view_diary(){
echo $this->{$this->show_diary."_diary"}(); // 707
}
}
It almost looks from your question like you are asking about how to turn simple variables into objects and then how to have one object contain another one. I could be way off, but I hope not:
So, first off, what is the differnce between an object and a simple variable? An object is really a collection of (generally) at least one property, which is sort of like a variable within it, and very often functions which do things to the properties of the object. Basically an object is like a complex variable.
In PHP, we need to first declare the strucutre of the object, this is done via a class statement, where we basicaly put the skeleton of what the object will be into place. This is done by the class statement. However, at this point, it hasn't actually been created, it is just like a plan for it when it is created later.
The creation is done via a command like:
$someVariable= new diary();
This executes so create a new variable, and lays it out with the structure, properties and functions defined in the class statement.
From then on, you can access various properties or call functions within it.
class show_diary
{
public $owner;
public function __construct()
{
$this->owner='My';
}
}
class view_diary
{
public $owner;
public $foo;
public function __construct()
{
$this->foo='bar';
$this->owner=new show_diary();
}
}
$diary= new view_diary();
print_r($diary);
The code gives us two classes. One of the classes has an instance of the other class within it.
I have used constructors, which are a special type of function that is executed each time we create a new instance of a class - basically each time we declare a variable of that type, the __construct function is called.
When the $diary= new view_diary(); code is called, it creates an instance of the view_diary class, and in doing so, the first thing it does is assigns it's own foo property to have the value 'bar' in it. Then, it sets it's owner property to be an instance of show_diary which in turn then kicks off the __construct function within the new instance. That in turn assigns the owner property of the child item to have the value 'My'.
If you want to access single properties of the object, you can do so by the following syntax:
echo $diary->foo;
To access a property of an object inside the object, you simply add more arrows:
echo $diary->owner->owner;
Like this?
$diary = $this->show_diary . '_diary';
return $this->$diary();
So basically I'm making a leap from procedural coding to OOP.
I'm trying to implement the principles of OOP but I have a nagging feeling I'm actually just writing procedural style with Objects.
So say I have a list of pipes/chairs/printers/whatever, they are all all listed as products in my single table database. I need to build a webapp that displays the whole list and items depending on their type, emphasis is on 'correct' use of OOP and its paradigm.
Is there anything wrong about just doing it like:
CLass Show
{
public function showALL(){
$prep = "SELECT * FROM myProducts";
$q = $this->db-> prepare($prep);
$q->execute();
while ($row = $q->fetch())
{
echo "bla bla bla some arranged display".$row['something']
}
}
and then simply
$sth = new show();
$sth->showAll();
I would also implement more specific display methods like:
showSpecificProduct($id)->($id would be passed trough $_GET when user say clicks on one of the links and we would have seperate product.php file that would basically just contain
include('show.class.php');
$sth = new show();
$sth->showSpecificProduct($id);
showSpecificProduct() would be doing both select query and outputing html for display.
So to cut it short, am I going about it allright or I'm just doing procedural coding with classes and objects. Also any ideas/hints etc. on resolving it if I'm doing it wrong?
As well as the model practices described by #Phil and #Drew, I would urge you to separate your business, data and view layers.
I've included a very simple version which will need to be expanded upon in your implementation, but the idea is to keep your Db selects separate from your output and almost "joining" the two together in the controller.
class ProductController
{
public $view;
public function __construct() {
$this->view = new View;
}
public function indexAction() {
$model = new DbProductRepository;
$products = $model->fetchAll();
$this->view->products = $products;
$this->view->render('index', 'product');
}
}
class View
{
protected $_variables = array();
public function __get($name) {
return isset($this->_variables['get']) ? $this->_variables['get'] : null;
}
public function __set($name, $value) {
$this->_variables[$name] = $value;
}
public function render($action, $controller) {
require_once '/path/to/views/' . $controller . '/' . $action . '.php';
}
}
// in /path/to/views/product/index.php
foreach ($this->products as $product) {
echo "Product ID {$product['id']} - {$product['name']} - {$product['cost']}<br />\n";
}
A better fit would be to implement a repository pattern. An example interface might be
interface ProductRepository
{
public function find($id);
public function fetchAll();
}
You would then create a concrete implementation of this interface
class DbProductRepository implements ProductRepsoitory
{
private $db;
public function __construct(PDO $db)
{
$this->db = $db;
}
public function find($id)
{
// prepare execute SQL statement
// Fetch result
// return result
}
public function fetchAll()
{
// etc
}
}
It's generally a bad idea to echo directly from a method or function. Have your methods return the appropriate objects / arrays / whatever and consume those results.
The scenario you are describing above seems like a good candidate for MVC.
In your case, I would create a class strictly for accessing the data (doing selects of product categories or specific products) and then have a different file (your view) take the output and display it.
It could look something like this:
class Product_Model {
public function find($prodId) { ... }
public function fetchAll($category = '') { ... }
public function search($string) { ... }
}
Then somewhere else you can do:
$products = new Product_Model();
$list = $products->fetchAll(37); // get all from category 37
// in true MVC, you would have a view that you would assign the list to
// $view->list = $list;
foreach($ilst as $product) {
echo "Product ID {$product['id']} - {$product['name']} - {$product['cost']}<br />\n";
}
The basic principle of MVC is that you have model classes that are simply objects representing data from some data source (e.g. database). You might have a mapper that maps data from the database to and from your data objects. The controller would then fetch the data from your model classes, and send the information to the view, where the actual presentation is handled. Having view logic (html/javascript) in controllers is not desirable, and interacting directly with your data from the controller is the same.
first, you will want to look into class autoloading. This way you do not have to include each class you use, you just use it and the autoloader will find the right file to include for you.
http://php.net/manual/en/language.oop5.autoload.php
each class should have a single responsibility. you wouldn't have a single class that connects to the database, and changes some user data. instead you would have a database class that you would pass into the user class, and the user class would use the database class to access the database. each function should also have a single responsibility. you should never have an urge to put an "and" in a function name.
You wouldn't want one object to be aware of the properties of another object. this would cause making changes in one class to force you to make changes in another and it eventually gets difficult to make changes. properties should be for internal use by the object.
before you start writing a class, you should first think about how you would want to be able to use it (see test driven development). How would you want the code to look while using it?
$user = new User($db_object);
$user->load($id);
$user->setName($new_name);
$user->save();
Now that you know how you want to be able to use it, it's much easier to code it the right way.
research agile principles when you get a chance.
One rule of thumb is that class names should usually be nouns, because OOP is about having software objects that correspond to real conceptual objects. Class member functions are usually the verbs, that is, the actions you can do with an object.
In your example, show is a strange class name. A more typical way to do it would be to have a class called something like ProductViewer with a member function called show() or list(). Also, you could use subclasses as a way to get specialized capabilities such as custom views for particular product types.
I have a custom class object in PHP named product:
final class product
{
public $id;
public $Name;
public $ProductType;
public $Category;
public $Description;
public $ProductCode;
}
When passing an object of this class to my Data Access Layer I need to cast the object passed into a type of the product class so I can speak to the properties within that function. Since type casting in PHP works only with basic types what is the best solution to cast that passed object?
final class productDAL
{
public function GetItem($id)
{
$mySqlConnection = mysql_connect('localhost', 'username', 'password');
if (!$mySqlConnection) { trigger_error('Cannot connect to MySql Server!'); return; }
mysql_select_db('databaseName');
$rs = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM tblproduct WHERE ID='$id';");
$returnObject = mysql_fetch_object($rs, 'product');
return $returnObject;
}
public function SaveItem($objectToSave, $newProduct = false)
{
$productObject = new product();
$productObject = $objectToSave;
echo($objectToSave->Name);
$objectToSave->ID;
}
}
Right now I am creating a new object cast as a type of product and then setting it equal to the object passed to the function. Is there a better way of accomplishing this task? Am I going about the wrong way?
EDITED FOR CLARITY - ADD FULL PRODCUTDAL CLASS
You don't need to cast the object, you can just use it as if it was a product.
$name = $objectToSave->Name;
I´m not sure what you are trying to achieve, but if $objectToSave is already of class product:
You can simply call $objectToSave->SaveItem() (assuming SaveItem() is part of the product class) and access it´s properties in the function like $this->Name, etc.;
In your code $productObject and $objectToSave will hold a reference to the same object.
Type casts in PHP are done like this:
$converted = (type) $from;
Note, that this won't work if the object types are not compatible (if for example $form happens to be a string or object of mismatching type).
But usual solution (called Active Record pattern, present for example in Zend Framework) is to have a base class for a database item called Row. Individual items (for example the class product from your sample) then inherit from this class.
Typical ZF scenario:
$table = new Product_Table();
$product = $table->find($productId); // load the product with $productId from DB
$product->someProperty = $newPropertyValue;
$product->Save(); // UPDATE the database
Which is IMO much better than your solution.
EDIT:
You can't cast between two unrelated objects, it is not possible.
If you want to use the DAL like this, skip the "product" object and go for simple associative array. You can enumerate over its members with foreach, unlike object's properties (you could use reflection, but that's overkill).
My recommendation: Go for the Active Record pattern (it is easy to implement with magic methods). It will save you a lot of trouble.
Currently, you are creating a new Product, then discarding it immediately (as its reference is replaced by $objectToSave.) You will need to copy its properties one by one, I regret.
foreach (get_object_vars($objectToSave) as $key => $value)
{
$product->$key = $value;
}
(If the properties of $objectToSave are private, you will need to a expose a method to_array() that calls get_object_vars($this).)