Can anyone recommend a good PHP paging class?
I have searched google, but have not seen anything that matches my requirements. Rather than "rolling my own" (and almost surely reinventing the wheel), I decided to check in here first.
First some background:
I am developing a website using Symfony 1.3.2 with Propel ORM on Ubuntu 9.10. I am currently using the Propel pager, which is OK, but I recently started using memcache to speed things up a little. At this point, the Propel pager is of little use, as it (AFAIK), only works with Propel objects.
What I need is a class th:t meets the following requirents
Has clean interface, with separation of concerns, so that the logic to retrieve records from the datasource (e.g. database) is encapsulated in a class (or at least a separate file).
Can work with arrays of objects
Provides pagination links, and only fetches the data required for the current page. Also, the pagination should 'split' the available page links if there are too many. For example, if there are potentially 1000 possible page links, the pages displayed should be something like FIRST 2,3 ....999 LAST
Can return the number of all the records in the table being queried, so that the following links are available FIRST, LAST (this requirement is actually already covered in the previous requirement - but I just wanted to re-emphasise it).
Can anyone recommend such a library, if they have used it succesfully in the past?
Alternatively, someobe may have 'hacked' (e.g. derived from) the current Propel pager, to get it to do the things I listed about - please let me know.
Not sure if this will fit the bill, but both sfPropelPager and sfDoctrinePager extend from the sfPager class, which provides forward/back motion and paging etc. You should be able to either use sfPager directly, or extend from it in the same way as Doctrine and Propel do with your array of elements to provide paging.
Typically, as this looks to be a "non-standard" use-case, there's zero docs on the Symfony site about it save for the API documentation, but the API docs look pretty comprehensive, and I'm sure the Doctrine/Propel examples will be able to guide you in the right direction!
I've been using and recommend the PEAR::Pager package which is able to do what you need.
You need to down into the sfPropelPager (or sfPager directly) code, understand how it works internally, where dynamic data is used and how you can get it working with memcache.
I don't know memecached but can't you cache propel records directly ? (I know they're huge :D)
My answer point by point :
1 : sfPager is DB agnostic as it is used by both sfDoctrinePager and sfPropelPager, you can use it for a working and tested base.
2 : sfPager should with work with arrays, the model class property referenced in it is not used anywhere. Cf source
3 : Providing pagination links is against separation of concerns, it paginates on objects and links are generated elsewhere (view file, helper, etc.).
You can display them as you want without modyfing the pager class or its descendents
4 : First and last access are provided by sfPager class
I know I can sound like symfony preacher, but this is the way we usually od things working with such a framework. As you wrote, do not reinvent the wheel !
Related
Earlier I asked this question:
should-i-create-an-object-or-work-with-an-array
I am now trying tho think beyond the concept that I was working with. Please share your thoughts with me. I want to GET this.
If I would setup an MVC in combination with a data mapper, would this be logical, for a forum for instance:
All important things are entities. Post, Thread, User, Forum.
Basically I see a controller as a page. It may choose to show different templates (e.g. list, or form), but it IS the page, more or less.
Via the router I would have the needed controller loaded, to get the data and have it displayed in my template.
Now how would this work, for displaying all posts in a thread:
route is set to thread-> load thread controller -> controller asks entities (post, user) for the info -> entities tell the mapper what they need -> mapper gets it from database and returns it to entities -> entities return info to controller -> controller returns info to view -> view displays.
Is that the right idea?
Now where did the "model" go then, from the MVC? Or am I missing steps?
I do not want to use third party tools, I want to build it from scratch, to understand everything that goes on.
How do I start this off right?
I tend to see the page as the sum of the controller (the logic required prior to rendering) and the view (which determines what the page looks like). In general, I would recommend that you don't write your own first, since you'll be working to a design pattern that you've not yet fully understood. I think it would be better to pick a popular PHP framework and see how it is implemented, and then if you are still minded to, try writing your own. Coding it all of this is a lot of work, in my view, especially if you want to write an ORM too!
Although we shy away from framework recommendations on Stack Overflow, I understand from comments here that Symfony2 is thought to be one of the best implementations of this design pattern, in particular because of its use of dependency injection. Do read some of the questions here with the 'mvc' tag too - there's plenty that can be picked up. For what it's worth, I wouldn't get hung up too much on design patterns (i.e. whether framework X implements pattern Y) - so long as your apps are modular and easily testable, that's a big win.
This might be an obvious thing to you but - even after reading through a lot of manuals and blogs - I'm still not sure what exactly should a bundle in Symfony2 represent in a webpage. And it's hard to guess it from the simple demo applications.
For example: I have a site which is divided into two parts (one is just a 2nd level domain like example.com and another is dom2.example.com). Each of these two parts has some sections of it's own - sometimes the same (like news) sometimes different.
What would the correct representation of this in symfony2? Should I have
a MySite\site1 and MySite\site2 bundle and do the different sections via different controllers, or
bundles Site1\News and Site2\News, or
bundles MySite\Site1News and MySite\Site2News etc.
...or am I getting all wrong at this?
I am also new to Symfony and will follow the results of this question with interest, but for what it's worth, my take on it is:
A bundle is just that: a group of files, assets, PHP classes and methods, tests, etc. The logic of the grouping can be anything you like. In some cases, it's really obvious what the grouping is and why it's been done -- for instance, if I wrote a blog system for Symfony2 and wanted to release it, I'd make it into a bundle. That's the sort of example used most in the documentation.
But you'd also use bundles for anything you wanted to release as one little feature. Say for instance, this bundle which creates default routes for all your controllers. It's not a fully developed plugin/feature like a blog or forum, but it's a bit of code that I can easily import into my project, it stays totally separate from everything else, it's a bundle.
Finally, you'd also use bundles internally to your project, in absolutely any way which makes sense to you.
My take on your specific situation:
Quick and easy:
MySite\MyCode -- gets the job done, and maybe you don't have any logical way to break up the code you're going to write.
If there's some more unique features between the two sites and you want to separate them out for clarity:
MySite\SharedFeatures
MySite\Site1Features
MySite\Site2Features
If you really like everything in its place, or if you have a complex project, maybe:
MySite\MySiteMain (shared features and catch-all miscellany that doesn't deserve its own bundle)
MySite\News
MySite\Site1FeatureSomethingOrOther
MySite\Site2FeatureSomethingOrOther
I definitely think you want to stick to logical groups of code -- so I think your example "bundles Site1\News and Site2\News" and "MySite\Site1News and MySite\Site2News" wouldn't be the best way to go. Site1 and Site2 are implementations, so making a separate bundle for each site's news page would seem to be counterproductive to me; you'd want to make one news component and build it to be used in two different ways.
As for your two-domains question, you can either point both domains at the same code, and test within your code for what domain is being requested, or you can check out two copies of the same code and change the configuration files slightly (this doesn't necessarily violate the idea of DRY because you'd still edit the code in one place, then update both copies.)
The way I understand a bundle is that it is similar to what CMS like e.g. Typo3 or Drupal call a "plugin". So it should be ideally self-contained and written in a way that it can be used on other projects too.
E.g. in your case I'd create a "staticHtmlBundle" that contains all the static pages of your website, divided within by site.com and dom2.site.com.
Then I would create a "newsBundle" that contains all the news-articles, maybe even database-driven with a little admin-section where you can edit them and assign them to different channels (in your case that is site.com, dom2.site.com). A static page from within staticHtmlBundle would call newsBundle and display its data (like e.g. a listView of the news or a detailView and so on).
If you keep everything as abstract and reusable as possible then you could even publish the newsBunde in the Symfony 2 Bundle repository and share it with the community!
The way I perceive Symfony2 bundles is that they are provide a modular system which allows you to not only extend and override the php code, but also any resources they may or may not include.
Having said that, consider you have an API and you would like to transfer an object.
How would you do that?
Of course, you can do that manually, but wouldn't it be nice if Symfony can do it for you?
My way of doing this would include 3 bundles, JMSSerializerBundle and FosRestBundle.
One bundle for the client side - MyCompany/ClientBundle
One bundle for the server side - MyCompany/ServerBundle
One bundle housing all the data transfer objects I would like to be able to transfer - MyCompany/CommonBundle.
Inside my MyCompany/CommonBundle I would have the classes I would use for my data transfer objects along with the serialization rules I would have to provide the JMSSerializerBundle with. They may be in the form of xml, yml or php annotations.
Once you have an object filled up with the data, you can just use return and FosRestBundle would serialize it for you. Serialization would depend on the routing, so you can have the object serialized in XML for one system and in JSON for another. Key point is you have different serialization formats and versioning you can utilise at later point.
On the client side, you can use simple param converter to convert the received JSON or XML to an object right in the controller with no additional hassle. You can also type in some validation rules, so you can verify if the object is populated as you expect it to be.
In my example, the MyCompany/CommonBundle has objects that would be used by multiple applications and would be identical. Having that as a separate bundle helps you avoid code duplication and makes long term maintenance a lot easier.
I hope I managed to explain this. Any questions?
Ask in the comments. Will update the answer accordingly.
We are evaluating some PHP Frameworks for a productive website. CakePHP looks pretty interesting but we have no clue if it fits our needs.
Basically when you check the documentation and the tutorials for CakePHP it looks really promising. Nevertheless there were always some things that bugged me with frameworks so far, maybe someone who already used CakePHP in a productive project could answer this questions for me?
Writing/Reading data for single records looks pretty neat in CakePHP. What happens if you want to read data from multiple tables with complex conditions, group by, where clauses? How does CakePHP handle it?
Scaffolding looks pretty nice for basic administration interfaces. How easy is it to customize this stuff. Let's say I have a foreign key on one of my tables. When I create a scaffolding page, does CakePHP automatically create a dropdown list for me with all the possible items? What if I want to filter the possible items? Let's say I want to combine two fields into one field in the view part, but when I edit it, I should be able to edit both of those fields individually. Does this work?
Do you think you were faster in development with CakePHP than with let's say plain PHP?
I've used CakePHP, Zend Framework and I've also written applications "from the ground up" with nothing more than homegrown classes and such. To that I'd like to mention that I use CakePHP regularly so, take that as you will.
(Writing/reading data, complex conditions) You can certainly do everything you mentioned. Others are correct in that it attempts to abstract away SQL operations for you. I've yet to have a query that I couldn't translate into Cake's "parlance"; complex geospatial queries, joins, etc.
(Scaffolding, complex conditions) The scaffolding is really only meant to serve as a "jump start" of sorts to help make sure your model associations and such are setup correctly and should not be used as a permanent solution. To that end, yes it will do a fairly good job at introspecting your relationships and providing relevant markup.
(Faster development) Of course. There is a large community with a vast number of plugins or examples out there to help get you started. Regardless of what you pick, choosing a framework will almost certainly make you "faster" if only for handling the minutiae that comes with setting up an application.
It really depends on your definition of "large". Are you referring to big datasets? A very complex domain model? Or just lots and lots of different controllers/actions?
Writing/Reading data.
Anything you can do with plain SQL you can do in CakePHP. It may not always be very nice to do, but at it's worst it's no worse than straight SQL.
But you really shouldn't be thinking about queries. You should be thinking about your domain model. CakePHP implements the active record pattern. It works very well if your domain model maps nicely to an active record pattern. But if it does not, then I would not recommend CakePHP. If your domain model doesn't map to Active Record then you will spend a lot of time fighting the Cake way of doing things. And that's no fun. You would be much better off with a framework that implements a Data Mapper pattern (e.g. Zend).
Scaffolding
Scaffolding is temporary. It does handle foreign keys (if you define them in the model as well as in the database) but that's it. You can't modify the scaffolding. But, you can bake them!
When you bake a controller or view then you're basically writing the scaffold to a file as a jump-off point for your own implementation. After baking, you can do anything that you want. The downside of baking is that it doesn't update anymore when the models or database changes. So, if you bake a controller and views and you add fields to your model, then you need to add those fields manually to your controller and view code.
speed of development
In my case, I'm a lot faster developing a website in CakePHP then in plain code. But only if Active Record suits the application! See my first point. Even then, Cake is probably still faster, but I would be faster still with a better suiting framework.
Some other thoughts
large datasets
If you have very large datasets and big query results then Cake can be a problem. A find() operation wants to return an associative array, so all the rows are read, parsed and converted to arrays. If your result set is too large you will run out of memory. CakePHP does not implement ResultSet objects like many other Active Record implementations and that is a definite downside. You end up manually paging through your own data with subqueries. Yuck. Wich brings me to my next point:
arrays
Learn to love them because CakePHP does. Everything is an array and often they are large, complex and deep. It gets really annoying after a while. You can't add functions to arrays so your code is more messy than if CakePHP would have used nested object instances. The functions you can add to those objects can help keep your code clean.
oddities and inconsistencies
CakePHP has some real nasty stinkers hidden deep within. If Active Record suits your application then you will probably never run into them, but if you try to mold CakePHP into something more complex, then you will have to fight these. Some examples:
HABTM through a custom model uses the definition from the other side of the relationship that you're working on.
Some really odd places where your before/after triggers aren't called (e.g. not from an updateAll)
odd Model->field() behavior. It always queries from the database. So, be careful about updating model data without immediately saving it to the database. Some CakePHP functions fetch data from Model->$_data and some use Model->field(). The result may be entirely different resulting in some very hard to track down bugs.
In short
I would highly recommend CakePHP even for "large" sites, as long as your domain model fits nicely on top of Active Record. If not, pick a different framework.
Since you are asking for opinions, then I have to say that I advise AGAINST CakePHP.
My biggest gripe with it, is that it's still using PHP4 (written in and code generated). So, why go backwards? It is compatible for PHP5, but the framework itself revolves around PHP4.
I would recommend taking a look at Symfony or Zend. Symfony being the best if you want more structure in place - it forces you to adhere to the MVC structure that it has established.
The alternative is Zend, but it's more of a 'do-it-yourself' framework, or rather more of a set of libraries. You need to put it all together yourself, and it doesn't have any strict structure like Symfony.
There are obviously other frameworks, but I recommend the fore-said. Another one that you may want to look at is Codeigniter.
CakePHP tries to abstract away the database, so you write very little SQL (however, you write a lot of SQL snippets).
The basic process is to define your models, then define the relationship between models (hasOne, belongsTo, hasMany, hasAndBelongsToMany). You can put any conditions or default ordering on these associations you like. Then, whenever you fetch a row from the database, any associated rows are automatically fetched with it. It's very easy and powerful.
Everything comes with a bunch of configuration options, giving further flexibility. For example, when fetching data there is a recursion option which takes an integer. This value is how many associations deep Cake should fetch data. So if you wanted to fetch a user with all their associated data, and all the joined data to THAT, it's trivial.
Pretty much anything can be overridden on defined on the fly, and you can always fall back to writing your own SQL, so there's nothing Cake prevents you from doing...
I've not found much use for scaffolding. The answer to your question is yes, it'll auto populate joined dropdowns, etc. But I've never used it as a basis to build an interface. I tend to use a database tool to populate data early on rather than scaffolding.
I've built and also maintain several web-apps on CakePHP, and it is without question faster than 'rolling your own'. But I think that's true of any decent framework!
Unfortunately one of the weaker points is the documentation. Often you need to Google for answers as the official documentation is a bit hit-and-miss at times.
Just go with Yii framework, it's the best in this category.
(Note: This is a subjective question. You are asking for opinions. So I hope you don't mind if I give mine.)
(Edit: Ops. I mixed Cake with CI)
I used Code Igniter a while back. It did everything it should and was fairly easy to understand. However, for big projects, it lacked features. Many CI proponents say that this is it's strength as it keeps it fast and can make little RAM. This is true.
However, after developing one application with it, I found myself looking elsewhere so I would not have to write code that must have been written before. I looked at CakePHP and found it too restrictive and automagical. In particular, I needed some kind of ACL functionality. This lead me to Zend Framework. I learned that it is loosely coupled. I can include only the files I need. I can also make use of Zend_Application for large projects. It's object oriented design is a must when developing and maintaining large projects.
Yes, CI and CakePHP helped me to develop faster than with plain PHP. However, there are much more powerful frameworks. I hear and see good things about Symphony. There are quite a few more. I'm sure others will point them out.
last week I have spend on creating a dynamic DB-to-OOP mapping engine in PHP.
It works pretty well. You define your DB, make PHP classes with same names, call one method, it generates the SQL, fetches the result, and creates the appropriate objects from it.
You can apply different query filters, it automatically joins parent tables, translation tables (for multi-language db), value tables (which don't have classes on PHP side), it has a build-in filter validator (so only valid sql are passed to the db) etc. etc. etc.
It is nothing revolutionary, but with some careful table/class naming it gets the job done pretty well.
Later on, I opened my cPanel and had a look at PEAR modules, and I can see there are many modules that deal with databases. I'm new to PEAR, haven't used it before.
Can anyone tell me if there is a module that does something similar, like I described above?
Just to make things clear, I'm not looking for a proxy generator, which will generate the code for the classes, but a dynamic mapper, which does everything pretty much on-fly.
http://www.doctrine-project.org/ Is this what you're looking for? An ORM?
Pear::DB?
I am fond of dbstructure definition of msaccess which lets defining at once and creating the data entry forms, datatables and reports at once easily.
I have been searching for some framework which would generate the data entry forms, data tables and reports easily. I guess the only thing I need to define is complete datatable structure.
Is there any like that or better one than that?
EDIT:
well i am afraid that PHP frameworks have been limited to programmers only. I would like to extend it with some automated functions like autoform in msaccess which would generate data entry form, auto report for data listing. So that my development time would be again some less. I found doctrine nearly matching my specification but not sure as i haven't fully explored doctrine
Cake offers both "hard" (bake) and "soft" scaffolding, which should be very close to what you want. It's still only meant as a quick proof-of-concept tool and to get you up and running faster so you can concentrate on programming the business logic. It's not meant as a hands-off solution nor to be used in production.
What you seem to be looking for is a database frontend like phpMyAdmin or SQL Buddy, not a PHP framework.
Symfony provides an admin generator that builds all the forms on the fly and it will also update itself when you change your db schema. It is based on doctrine which you say you looked at so that would make things a bit easier for you.