Router Refactor For Controller Classes

At the moment, we are using single files as our controllers. That's fine for a small project like this, but it can get messy. We're going to be using controller classes instead.

I want to make it so that it loads a specific controller class method when we do something like this in our router:

$router->get('/listings', 'ListingsController@index');

I also want to be able to pass parameters to the method like this:

$router->get('/listings/{id}', 'ListingsController@show');

This is a better way to get the id than using the $_GET superglobal and query strings.

Create HomeController Class

Let's start by just creating the HomeController class with the index method in it. This will be our homepage. Create a new file in App/controllers called HomeController.php. Add the following:

namespace App\Controllers;

class HomeController
{
  public function index()
  {
    echo 'Home Page';
  }
}

That's it for now. I just want to be able to load this class and method from the router.

Open the routes.php file and comment out all routes and add this at the top:

$router->get('/', 'HomeController@index');

Of course, this will break the application.

Router Refactor

Open your Router class and add change your registerRoute method to look like this:

 /**
   * Add a route to the router
   *
   * @param string $method
   * @param string $uri
   * @param string $action
   * @return void
   */
  public function registerRoute($method, $uri, $action)
  {
    // Extract the controller and method from the action
    list($controller, $controllerMethod) = explode('@', $action);

    $this->routes[] = [
      'method' => $method,
      'uri' => $uri,
      'controller' => $controller,
      'controllerMethod' => $controllerMethod
    ];
  }

Instead of passing a controller as an argument, we pass an action which looks like this - ListingsController@index. You can check this with inspect($action).

We then use explode to split it into an array where the first item is the controller and the second is the method. The list function allows us to assign the array items to variables.

You can check this with inspect($controller) and inspect($controllerMethod).

Then we add the controller and method to the route array.

Update route Method

Now we need to use the controller and method in the route method. Change it to look like this:

/**
   * Route the request
   *
   * @param string $uri
   * @param string $method
   * @return void
   */
  public function route($uri, $method)
  {

    foreach ($this->routes as $route) {
      if ($route['uri'] === $uri && $route['method'] === $method) {
        // Extract controller and method from route
        $controller = 'App\\Controllers\\' . $route['controller'];
        $controllerMethod = $route['controllerMethod'];

        // Instantiate the controller and call the method
        $controllerInstance = new $controller();
        $controllerInstance->$controllerMethod();

        return;
      }
    }

    $this->error();
  }

We are now instantiating the controller class and calling the method. Which controller and method depends on the current route.

So if it is the home page, it will load the HomeController class and call the index method.

Now, let's create a new file at controllers/HomeController.php and add the following:

namespace App\Controllers;

class HomeController
{
  public function __construct()
  {
  }

  public function index()
  {
    die('HomeController@index');
  }
}

Now if you go to the homepage, you should just see HoomeController@index.

In the next lesson, we will add the rest of the code for the controller classes.