diff --git a/README.md b/README.md index 95b9d31..fa6cde7 100644 --- a/README.md +++ b/README.md @@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ Requirements ------------ - PHP 5.3 -- [PHP cURL](http://php.net/manual/en/book.curl.php) for making requests with the `Client` class +- [PHP cURL](http://php.net/manual/en/book.curl.php) for making requests with the `Client` class (Optional) Install diff --git a/documentation/routing.md b/documentation/routing.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ade430d --- /dev/null +++ b/documentation/routing.md @@ -0,0 +1,150 @@ +# Routers and Routes + +Let's take a look at how to build a simple Router with WellRESTed. + +The first step is to build a `Router` instance. + +```php +$router = new Router(); +``` + +This router doesn't know how to route anything yet. To tell it how to route, we need to add some `Route` instances. WellRESTed comes with a few `Route` classes you can use. The simplest of these is a `StaticRoute`. + +## StaticRoute + +Use a `StaticRoute` when you know the exact path you want to handle. + +```php +$router = new Router(); +$router->addRoute(new StaticRoute("/", "RootHandler")); +$router->addRoute(new StaticRoute("/cats/", "CatCollectionHandler")); +$myRouter->respond(); +``` + +This `Router` will now use a `RootHandler` for requests for the path `/` and `CatCollectionHandler` for requests to `/cats/`. The router doesn't know about any other paths, so any other requests will result in a 404 Not Found response. + +You can also make a `StaticRoute` that matches multiple exact paths. For example, suppose you have a multi-use `AnimalHandler` that you want to invoke to handle requests to `/cats/`, `/dogs`, and `/birds`. You can make this by passing an array instead of a string as the first parameter. + +```php +$route = new StaticRoute(array("/cats/", "/dogs/", "/birds"), "AnimalHandler"); +``` + +## TemplateRoute + +`StaticRoutes` are the best choice if you know the exact path up front. But, what if you want to handle a path that expects an ID or other variable? That's where the `TemplateRoute` comes in. + +Here's a route that will match a request to a specific cat by ID and send it to a `CatItemHandler`. + +```php +$route = new TemplateRoute("/cats/{id}", "CatItemHandler"); +``` + +TemplateRoutes use URI templates to match requests to handlers. To include a variable in your template, enclose it in `{}`. The variable will be extracted and made available for the handler in the handler's `args` member. + +```php +class CatItemHandlder extends \pjdietz\WellRESTed\Handler +{ + protected function get() + { + // Access the {id} variable from the $this->args member. + $id = $this->args["id"]; + // ...Do something with the {id}. + } +} +``` + +Your template may have multiple variables. Be sure to give each a unique name. + +With this `TemplateRoute`... + +```php +$route = new TemplateRoute("/cats/{catId}/{dogId}", "CatItemHandler"); +``` + +...the handler will have access to `$this->args["catId"]` and `$this->args["dogId"]`. + + +### Default Variable Pattern + +By default, the `TemplateRoute` will accept for a variable any value consisting of numbers, letters, underscores, and hyphens. You can change this behavior by passing a pattern to use as the third parameter of the constructor. Here we'll restrict the template to only match numeric values. + +```php +$route = new TemplateRoute("/cats/{id}", "CatItemHandler", TemplateRoute::RE_NUM); +``` + +The `TemplateRoute` includes constants for some common situations. The value of each constant is a partial regular expression. You can use one of the constants, or provide your own partial regular expression. + +### Pattern Constants + +| Constant | Pattern | Description | +| --------- | ----------------- | ----------- | +| `RE_SLUG` | `[0-9a-zA-Z\-_]+` | "URL-friendly" characters such as numbers, letters, underscores, and hyphens | +| `RE_NUM` | `[0-9]+` | Digits only | +| `RE_ALPHA` | `[a-zA-Z]+` | Letters only | +| `RE_ALPHANUM` | `[0-9a-zA-Z]+` | Letters and digits | + +### Variable Patterns Array + +You can also set a different pattern for each variable. To do this, pass an array to the `TemplateRoute` constructor as the fourth paramter. The array must have variable names as keys and patterns as values. + +```php +$patterns = array( + "id" => TemplateRoute::RE_NUM, + "name" => TemplateRoute::RE_ALPHA, +); +$route = new TemplateRoute( + "/cats/{id}/{name}/{more}", + "CatItemHandler", + TemplateRoute::RE_SLUG, + $patterns); +``` + +Here, `{id}` will need to match digits, `{name}` must be all letters, and since `{more}` is not explicitly provided in the `$patterns` array, it uses the default `TemplateRoute::RE_SLUG` passed as the thrid parameter. + +### RegexRoute + +If `TemplateRoute` doesn't give you enough control, you can make a route that matches a regular expression. + +```php +$route = new RegexRoute("~/cat/[0-9]+~", "CatHandler") +``` + +This will match `/cat/102` or `/cat/999` or what have you. To make this more useful, we can add a capture group. The captures are made available to the `Handler` as the `$this->args` member, as with the URI template variables for the `TemplateRoute` + +Note the entire matched path will always be the `0` item, and captured groups will begin at `1`. + +So this route... + +```php + /cat/99 + [1] => 99 +) +``` + +You can also used named capture groups like this; + + +```php +[0-9]+)~", "CatHandler") +``` + +...with the path `/cat/99` creates this array or matches: + +``` +Array +( + [0] => /cat/99 + [1] => 99 + [id] => 99 +) +```