Zend Framework Tutorial

by Chris Shiflett — Page 2 of 6

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Zend_Controller

Using the controller is pretty intuitive. In fact, I'm writing this tutorial without the luxury of documentation!

Documentation is now available from the ZF website.

I begin with Zend_Controller_Front, a front controller. In order to begin understanding how it works, place the following code in your index.php file:

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<?php
include 'Zend.php';
Zend::loadClass('Zend_Controller_Front');
$controller = Zend_Controller_Front::getInstance();
$controller->setControllerDirectory('/path/to/controllers');
$controller->dispatch();
?>

If you prefer object chaining, this can instead be written as:

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<?php
include 'Zend.php';
Zend::loadClass('Zend_Controller_Front');
$controller = Zend_Controller_Front::getInstance()
->setControllerDirectory('/path/to/controllers')
->dispatch();
?>

Now, when you make a request for /foo/bar, you get an error. That's good! It lets you know something is happening. The major complaint is that IndexController.php is not found.

Before you create this file, it's helpful to understand how the framework expects you to organize things. The framework breaks a request down into parts and, in the case of a request for /foo/bar, foo is the controller, and bar is the action. The default value for each is index.

When foo is the controller, the framework looks for a file called FooController.php in the controllers directory. Because this does not exist, the framework falls back to IndexController.php. Not finding either, it reports the error.

To continue, create IndexController.php in the controllers directory (which you set with setControllerDirectory()):

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<?php
Zend::loadClass('Zend_Controller_Action');
class IndexController extends Zend_Controller_Action
{
public function indexAction()
{
echo 'IndexController::indexAction()';
}
}
?>

The IndexController class handles requests for which the controller is index or for which the indicated controller does not exist, as just explained. The indexAction() method handles requests for which the action is index. Remember that index is the default value for both the controller and the action. If you try a request for /, /index, or /index/index, the indexAction() method is executed (trailing slashes do not alter this behavior). A request for any other resource is going to result in an error.

There is another useful method to add to IndexController before continuing. The noRouteAction() method is called whenever a request is made for a controller that doesn't exist. For example, a request for /foo/bar executes noRouteAction() if FooController.php does not exist. However, a request for /index/foo still results in an error, because foo is the action, not the controller.

Add noRouteAction() to IndexController.php:

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<?php
Zend::loadClass('Zend_Controller_Action');
class IndexController extends Zend_Controller_Action
{
public function indexAction()
{
echo 'IndexController::indexAction()';
}
public function noRouteAction()
{
$this->_redirect('/');
}
}
?>

This example uses $this->_redirect('/') to illustrate a possible action to take in noRouteAction(). This causes requests for nonexistent controllers to be redirected to the root document (front page).

Now create FooController.php:

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<?php
Zend::loadClass('Zend_Controller_Action');
class FooController extends Zend_Controller_Action
{
public function indexAction()
{
echo 'FooController::indexAction()';
}
public function barAction()
{
echo 'FooController::barAction()';
}
}
?>

If you again request /foo/bar, you should see that barAction() is being executed, because bar is the action. Not only can you already support friendly URLs, but you can also do so in a very organized way with just a few lines of code. Cool!

You can also create a __call() method to handle requests for undefined actions such as /foo/baz:

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<?php
Zend::loadClass('Zend_Controller_Action');
class FooController extends Zend_Controller_Action
{
public function indexAction()
{
echo 'FooController::indexAction()';
}
public function barAction()
{
echo 'FooController::barAction()';
}
public function __call($action, $arguments)
{
echo 'FooController:__call()';
}
}
?>

Now that you can elegantly handle incoming requests with just a few lines of code, you are ready to continue.

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Re: Zend Framework Tutorial (#70)

By bavana on 2006-05-25 01:24:14

hi ,

i am trying to learn the Zend framework using the above example.i am stuck up with the foocontroller.php page
..actually this page is not invoking.if i calls the url using foo/bar, it takes the noaction() of the indexcontroller.php ..any idea where i am missing..?

thanks Bavana