Magento for PHP MVC Developers

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Magento

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Who am I?
Alan Storm http://alanstorm.com Got involved in the Internet/Web 1995 Work in the Agency/Startup Space 10 years PHP experience The thing you can never say ...
Sunday, October 10, 2010

Not a Computer Scientist

Many developers and programmers arent You don't need to be a computer scientist
to work with Magento

Magento is similar to PHP Frameworks Magento and Kohana, side by side But rst
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(Cake, CodeIgniter, Kohana), just deeper

How We Got Here

A Brief History of Web Development

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HTML Page

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HTML Page
Very radical shift No programming needed, just markup No proprietary le format, just ASCII text

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Scripting vs. Real Programming

HTML included markup for form elements Stealth runtime, with client/server approach Real Programmers could do everything in
C, C++, Java, lisp

Scripters could piggy back on the web

server for HTTP and produce HTML
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Perl/CGI
Perl was once the new hotness Excelled as string processing, and web
applications are strings over HTTP

CPAN meant a shared code library Non-complied meant distributed programs

were shared in the open
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Perl/CGI
CGI was slow, and FastCGI too new Perl didnt scale way before ruby didnt CPANs good, but no standard installation

for the growing shared hosting ecosystem

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PHP 3/PHP 4
Build important features directly into
language, distributed by default

Could import C code as extensions The build-up/tear-down approach of

mod_php ideal for shared hosts

Looks like Perl! Sort of.

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PHP Page

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Rise of PHP Systems

Created to combat PHP applications
becoming too complex/messy

Shopping Cart Applications CMS systems (Drupal, Mambo, Joomla) Programming Frameworks, many inspired
by Ruby on Rails (CakePHP, Code Igniter, Symfony, etc.)

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Magento is the Next Evolutionary Step

Is a shopping cart application Uses a module based approach to load new
code into the system, similar to Drupal

Implements a conguration based MVC Most PHP Frameworks are convention

based, Magento is conguration based
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Controllers and Routing

Setting an Entry Point

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MVC Routing
Determines the main code entry point for
any particular URL request

Replaces PHPs one-page/one-url system All HTTP requests routed through a single
index.php le

Allows centralized library loading, and

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encourages separating business logic and layout code

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Kohana Routing
Routing handled by Router_Core::setup URI: /controllerName/actionName URI: /welcome/index Welcome_Controller::index(); File: /application/controllers/welcome.php
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Magento Routing
URI: /frontName/controllerName/actionName URI: /catalogsearch/result/index No Standard Router Class!

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Magento Routing
Magento Searches Global Cong for
routers

Default system ships with two Routers Congured in Mage_Core

/app/code/core/Mage/Core/etc/cong.xml
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web/routers

Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Router_Admin Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Router_Standard

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Magento Routing
The match method is called on each router The match method is responsible for Creating a Controller class name Instantiating the Controller Creating an Action method Calling the Action method
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Magento Routing
URI: /frontName/controllerName/actionName URI: /catalogsearch/result/index Default routers will any module with a congured Identify <frontName>catalogsearch</frontName>
modules controllers folder for a Check ResultController.php
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Magento Routing
/frontName/controllerName/actionName /catalogsearch/result/index If a Controller is found, Router checks if for
an action method

If action is found, its called, and the module

search/match stops.
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Mage_CatalogSearch_ResultController::indexAction

Front Controller Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Router_Admin Looks at Global Cong and Instantiates Routers Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Router_Standard Goes through each Router and calls match() until a controller is dispatched

match()

Builds a list of Moules with matching frontName Check each module until it nds a valid controller/ action pair

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Magento Routing
Conguration base system, but a de-facto
convention exists

/catalogsearch/result/index translates to Module: Mage_CatalogSearch Controller: ResultController Action: indexAction

Sunday, October 10, 2010

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Custom Routing
Could add directly to your modules
<routers />

cong

Also possible to add additional Routers

through event system

controller_front_init_routers event

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Practical Example

Packaging front-end les within a module directories

app/code/local/Alanstormdotcom/Staticroute/ static-frontend/js/example.js app/code/local/Alanstormdotcom/Staticroute/ static-frontend/css/example.css

Create a custom Router class Add match rules to intercept URLs in the form

http://example.com/static-frontend/css/example.css

Connect URL for full code

http://www.magentocommerce.com/magento-connect/developer/alanstorm

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Adding A Router
Setting up an event listener Event handling class is also your Router

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Implement Router
Extend base Router Class Implement Event Handling Method
class }
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Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Router_Abstract

Alanstormdotcom_Staticroute_Controller_Router extends Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Router_Abstract { public function initControllerRouters($observer) { //get reference to front controller /* @var $front Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Front */ $front = $observer->getEvent()->getFront(); //add router $front->addRouter('arbitrary-name', $this); }

Implement match

Use $identier to check for le in match method

$identier = '/static-frontend/css/example.css'

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Models
Getting out of the SQL Writing Business

Sunday, October 10, 2010

MVC Models
MVC Model are classes that represent the
applications data

Use to organize and/or automate data

queries (SQL) for cleaner code optimizations

Also provide centralized location for query Encapsulate business login in methods
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Kohana Models
Extend from Base ORM class Mostly follows Active Record Pattern Create, Read, Update, Delete Simple Class Instantiation
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Magento Models
Many Models implement an Entity Attribute
Value store

Simpler basic models offers one table/one

class Active Record like functionality independent of data store these details to use.

Implement a Mapper pattern, making Model Client Programmer doesnt need to know
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Magento Models
Magento Replaces direction instantiation
with a indirect static method call
$user = new User(); $customer = Mage::getModel(cusotmer/customer);

Every model has a Collection object which is

used when fetching for multiple models. Kohana and other frameworks, return PHP arrays()

Sunday, October 10, 2010

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Magento Collections
Collections are objects that act like arrays Ancestors implement Standard PHP Library Inherit from class Varien_Data_Collection Allows you to encapsulate business logic
with custom methods on collections Interfaces: IteratorAggregate and Countable

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Views
It all comes back to HTML

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MVC Views
Views create the response output Typically HTML Could be JSON, XML, etc. Separates template logic from application
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Kohana View
Controller
Contrller Interacts with Model based on request Controller Picks specic variables to send to view

Model

View

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Kohana View
Traditional PHP MVC View Pattern Views are PHP mixed with HTML Often called Dumb View, since the View

doesnt know anything about the Application

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Magento View
Controller
Contrller Interacts with Model based on request Controller Tells View to Kick Off

Model
View Reads Data Directly from Model Objects

View

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Controller

Contrller Interacts with Model based on request

Controller Tells View to Kick Off

Model
View Reads Data Directly from Model Objects

View

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Controller

Contrller Interacts with Model based on request

Controller Tells View to Kick Off Layout is a nested collection of recursively rendering blocks

Model

Layout
Root Block Block Block

Blocks Read Data Directly from Model Objects

Block Block Block

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Magento Blocks
The simplest block is just a PHP class with
a toHtml() method, which returns a string

Many Blocks render via a phtml template From within a phtml template, is a
$this

reference to the containing Block PHP code for rendering logic

The phtml templates contain HTML and Block methods communicate with Models
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Template for Block

Block Class

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Magento Layout
A single Layout object contains all the
Block objects for a particular request

Layout XML les allows users to control

control page structure without editing Controllers or Models

which Blocks are available for any request Layout XML system allows designers and interactive developers to fully Layout XML system using PHP

However, Blocks can be added outside the

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Child Blocks

Sunday, October 10, 2010

The catalog/product_list Block has been added to the catalog/category_view Block, with the name product_list Allows us to use the following in catalog/category/view.phtml

$this->getChildHtml('product_list');

Action Nodes
Allow us to call methods on blocks from
XML Layout System

URI page/html_pager translates to Mage_Page_Block_Html_Pager Calls Mage_Page_Block_Html_Pager::addPagerLimit($mode, $value, $label='')

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Magento for PHP MVC Developers

Alan Storm http://www.magentocommerce.com/knowledge-base http://alanstorm.com http://twitter.com/alanstorm http://commercebugdemo.alanstorm.com/

Sunday, October 10, 2010