Learning Kohana

To try some things out last night I used the _remap() method in my controller. It might be the beginning of an admin or scaffold panel but I’m not sure yet whether it’s gonna be developed entirely so that’s why I show you what I’ve got right now.

Anyway, it demonstrates quite nicely how you can use the _remap() method.

It also demonstrates usage of ORM and the Model to Form class (Model_Formation).

class Scaffold_Controller extends Controller{
 
	protected $model;
 
	public function _remap($model,$arguments) //first argument is the normally the method, the second an array of arguments
	{
		$this->model=$model;
 
		if(!isset($arguments[0]))
		{
			$arguments[0]='overview';
		}
		$method=array_shift($arguments);
 
 
		call_user_func_array(array($this,$method),$arguments);
 
	}
	public function overview()
	{
		$list=ORM::factory($this->model)->find_all();
		foreach($list as $row)
		{
			$row=array_slice($row->as_array(),0,3); //only show first three fields
 
			foreach($row as $field)
			{
				echo $field .' - ';
			}
			echo '<br>';
		}
	}
	public function edit($id)
	{
		$id=(int) $id;
 
		$form=new Model_Formation(ORM::factory($this->model)->find($id)); //give a model with id=$id,
 
		if($form->save())
		{
			echo 'saved';
		}
		else
		{
			echo 'not saved';
		}
		echo $form;
	}
	public function insert()
	{
		$form=new Model_Formation(ORM::factory($this->model)); //give an empty ORM model
 
		if($form->save())
		{
			echo 'saved';
		}
		else
		{
			echo 'not saved';
		}
		echo $form;		
	}
}

So, how does this work. The _remap() method is present which means that normal dispatching to the controller methods is cancelled and it’s up to _remap() to handle it. The _remap() changes the normal behaviour so what’s normally the controller method now becomes the model scaffolding works for. The first argument now is the method which will be used. The index() method is not present but if no method is given ‘overview’ is used.

Let’s try out a few urls:

• http://localhost/scaffold/article - will call the overview method and show the first three fields of the article model
• http://localhost/scaffold/article/overview - like the above
• http://localhost/scaffold/article/edit/5 - Will show a filled form from the database for the article model
• http://localhost/scaffold/article/insert - Will show an empty form for the article model
• http://localhost/scaffold/comment/insert - Will show an empty form for the comment model

That’s how you could use the _remap() method to override the default dispatching.

You can also see how the Model_Formation accepts an ORM model and converts it into a form, filled or not. The overview() method could of course also use a grid class to show a proper table.

I hope I’ve demonstrated well how you can use the _remap() method to alter behaviour of the dispatcher. If you have any questions, let me know.