[PHP] Classes and config outside public_html

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

I'm just experimenting with building a site, and want to follow a patten I have used elsewhere...

Say my folder is called "WebSite1". Within that I have public_html which will contain all client-facing code and assets...

But outside it I want a folder called "Classes" that will contain my business objects. Also I'd like to have a config.whatever that contains things such as database connections.

I know this can be leveraged through Zend for example, but am looking at my own way to do this. Can someone tell me how?

Ta

[Bazenga]

Where's the problem exactly? just tell apache that public_html is the root folder for your web application. That's all there is to it. Inside the php files in the public_html do include statements that you require from the Classes folder for example.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

I don't think you have fully understood.

I am looking to create a situation sort of like where I have a "Application Root" and a "Web Root". Public_html being the web root, and the folder that is above that being the app root.

I do not want to be declaring my includes and so on on each HTML page.

[Bazenga]

I'll let someone more experienced in PHP to help you. However, I think there is a directive called include_path that might help you.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Thanks for your input - but I am aware of that. You aren't really following the question. Cheers though :)

[AnthonySterling]

Hi Nik,

Would __autoload suffice? This, in conjunction with a Front Controller can do what you ask, although it depends entirely on how you structure your application.

Anthony.

[Bazenga]

any updates?

[Brian M. Veteran]

It may be better to do something like that with mod_rewrite. Here is a snippet of old code which does a similar thing (I apologise for the poor quality of it in advance - it was written in about 5 minutes to accommodate something someone wanted hacked into their existing script and I wasn't being paid :p):

Note: classes belonging to the system begin mm_, are stored in inc/class_lib, and cannot be publicly called using the URL. Methods beginning _ can also not be called publicly, and there's some other things which help this such as is_public. mm_error and mm_system are the main system/error classes here:

// Class Loader
function __autoload($class_name) {

	// We give mm_ classes priority here:
	if(file_exists($_GLOBALS['root_path'] . "inc/class_lib/$class_name.class.php")) {
		require_once($_GLOBALS['root_path'] . "inc/class_lib/$class_name.class.php");
	} else {
		require_once($_GLOBALS['root_path'] . "application/controller/$class_name.php");
	}
}

// Create & Init System - **you can probably ignore this bit**
$GLOBALS['system'] = new mm_system();
$GLOBALS['system']->init();

// Load Required Class and Function
$class = $_GET['class'];
$func = $_GET['func'];
if(empty($class)) $class = $GLOBALS['default_class'];
if(empty($func)) $func = 'index';

if(substr($class, 0, 3) !== 'mm_' && file_exists($_GLOBALS['root_path'] . "application/controller/$class.php") && eval("return $class::is_public;")) {
	$page = new $class();
	if(method_exists($page, $func) && substr($func, 0, 1) !== '_') {
		$page->$func();
	} else {
		$page->unknown_method();
	}
} else {
	$page = new mm_error(102);
}

This is called by the url index.php?class=ClassName&func=FunctionName, which can be simply modified with mod_rewrite to be something like http://url/classname/function/variables

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Sorru for lack of updates. I went with Anthony's autoloader idea. However am looking at Zend or CodeIgnitor to use as a framework to work within with such things.

[Trobink09]

It seems magnificent idea to me is

[Cole]

Sorru for lack of updates. I went with Anthony's autoloader idea. However am looking at Zend or CodeIgnitor to use as a framework to work within with such things.

I would recommend CodeIgniter, although I wish that it would end support for PHP4 and bring on some new PHP5 features.

You could also use a pseudo-singleton controller to autoload all of the classes and achieve what you want in a fairly clean and efficient manner.

[iamhiddensomewhere]

If you're using Apache as your web server, you can put this in your application root's .htaccess file and it'll forward all outside requests to that folder.

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>

RewriteEngine On

RewriteRule ^$ public/ [L]

RewriteRule ^(.*)$ public/$1 [L]

</IfModule>

Replace 'public' (without the quotes) with the folder of your choice.

The first line (the first rule): send all requests for the root directory (without any files or directories, for example: http://example.com/) to the public directory (http://example.com/public/). Also, if there's a direct request for http://example.com/public/, it'll look for a folder called 'public' (without the quotes) inside the public directory (effectively http://example.com/public/public/). And the [L] option indicates that if the rule is successful, that rule will be the last one checked.

The second line: send all requests for anything to find anything inside the public directory (a request for http://example.com/index.php will be directed to http://example.com/public/index.php). And, like the above rule, stop checking all following rules.

[Kudos Veteran]

I would recommend CodeIgniter, although I wish that it would end support for PHP4 and bring on some new PHP5 features.

You could also use a pseudo-singleton controller to autoload all of the classes and achieve what you want in a fairly clean and efficient manner.

Kohana, originally a fork of Codeigniter, it shares less and less in common with it. It is easily my favourite framework and is written to a standard that I admire.