Symfony2: Get your project started

Starting your newproject withSymfony2

Ryan Weaver@weaverryan

Thursday, August 18, 11

Who is this dude?

• Co-author of the Symfony2 Docs

• Core Symfony2 contributor

• Co-owner of KnpLabs US

• Fiancee of the much more talented @leannapelham

http://www.knplabs.com/enhttp://www.github.com/weaverryan


http://www.knplabs.com/en

http://www.knplabs.com/en

http://www.github.com/weaverryan

http://www.github.com/weaverryan

Quality. Innovation. Excitement.

• Training

• Coaching / Consulting

• Fun, high-quality custom dev

KnpLabs


Act 1:

Downloading the Symfony Standard Edition

http://bit.ly/sf2-install


http://symfony.com/download


• Symfony offers “distributions” (think Ubuntu)

• The “Standard Distribution” is a fully-functional skeleton web application

• The Standard Distribution *is* the starting point for your new project: download it and begin developing your new application

The “Standard Distribution”


Step 1: Get it!





Step 2: Unzip it!

$ cd /path/to/webroot

$ tar zxvf /path/to/Symfony_Standard_2.0.0.tgz


php bin/vendors install

• Run the following command:

• ...which should fill up your vendor/ directory

Step 3: Download the vendors


php bin/vendors install

• The “standard edition” project itself is just a few directories and a few files

• But it relies a group of 3rd-party libraries

• The Standard edition packages a script that downloads these libraries into your vendor/ directory by reading the “deps” file

Step 3: Explained


[symfony] git=http://github.com/symfony/symfony.git version=v2.0.0

[twig] git=http://github.com/fabpot/Twig.git version=v1.1.1

[monolog] git=http://github.com/Seldaek/monolog.git version=1.0.0

[doctrine] git=http://github.com/doctrine/doctrine2.git version=2.1.0

[swiftmailer] git=http://github.com/swiftmailer/swiftmailer.git version=v4.1.0

The “deps” file


Step 4: Check your config

http://localhost/Symfony/web/config.php




• Fix any major problems (e.g. missing libraries, permissions issues) that Symfony reports

Tend to your Garden


http://bit.ly/sf2-permsThe Docs

Cache and log permissions • The app/cache and app/logs directories must be writable by your web server

• There are several ways to do this depending on your setup and platform


http://bit.ly/sf2-perms





Head to the homepage!

This *is* your first Symfony2

page!!!

http://localhost/Symfony/web/app_dev.php




• So far we’ve:

‣ Downloaded the Standard Distribution‣ Downloaded the vendor libraries‣ Setup any pre-reqs needed for Symfony

‣ Navigated to the homepage of our project: a sample page packaged with the distribution

End of Act1


Act 2:

Storing the new project in git

http://bit.ly/sf2-git




• The Standard Distribution *is* the starting point for your new project

• We’ll use “git” as our version control tool

• Initialize a new git repository inside your project:

Version Control

git init

git status



• Most of the files are *your* files: you’ll edit them and commit them to git

• Some files, however, shouldn’t be shared:‣ database configuration files

• Others simply don’t need to be committed‣ 3rd party libraries (each developer can download them via “bin/vendors install”)‣ cache files

Ignore Some Files


• To ignore certain files in git, create a .gitignore file at the root of your project and specify file patterns that shouldn’t be stored in git

Ignore Some Files


Recommended “.gitignore” file

/web/bundles//app/bootstrap*/app/cache/*/app/logs/*/vendor//app/config/parameters.ini

{{

“generated”files

db config


• Once you’ve created the .gitignore file, you can create an initial commit

• This commit represents the starting point of your project: a fresh project with Symfony

Initial Commit

git add .

git commit -m “Initial commit of the project”


• By convention, database (and other server-specific) configuration is stored in the app/config/parameters.ini file

• We’ve placed this file in our .gitignore

• Every new developer that downloads the project will need to create this file

Database Configuration


• To make the creation of the parameters.ini file easy, create a parameters.ini.dist sample file that we *will* commit to git

Database Configuration

cp app/config/parameters.ini app/config/parameters.ini.dist

git add app/config/parameters.ini.dist

git commit -m “adding a sample parameters file”


• The Standard Distribution comes with some sample pages inside a demo bundle

• Remove these before developing your own application

Removing demo pages

https://github.com/symfony/symfony-standard




• Where are we now?

‣ The new project is stored in git

‣ Certain files are set to be ignored by git

‣ A database configuration “template” file was created to help when the project is cloned by new developers

Finishing up Act 2


Act 3:

What Symfony does...in exactly 3 slides

http://bit.ly/sf2-http




Your job: turn a request into a response

Client(e.g. browser) Your App

/foo

the request

<h1>Foo!</h1>

the response

But as your app grows, staying organized is tough, wheels are reinvented and code tends

towards spaghettiThursday, August 18, 11

Request to Response Structure• Symfony gives you structure for reading each request and creating the appropriate response

e.g. app.php

1) a request executes the front controller

2) matches a route 3) executes a PHP function that you write


Tools for Development• In addition to basic structure, Symfony is full of optional tools that you can choose to use when developing your application:

‣ security‣ render templates‣ send emails‣ work with the database‣ handle HTML forms‣ validation‣ caching


Act 4:

Creating your app

http://bit.ly/sf2-page-creation




• A standard Symfony project looks like this:

Bundles!

app/src/vendor/web/

app config - nothing too heavy

your bundles!

third-party libraries

front controllers, CSS, JS, etc


• A bundle is a directory that holds *everything* for a single “feature” - from routing files to PHP classes to JS files

• A bundle is like a plugin, except that everything (including the core Symfony2 files) exists in a bundle

(this means you could replace the core framework libraries with your own...)

Bundles: first-class plugins


• Symfony can generate a nice bundle skeleton on your behalf:

Creating the MainBundle

php app/console generate:bundle

• Acme/MainBundle• MainBundle• ... enter the defaults for the rest

Answer the prompts:


Initialize the bundle

• The following was added by the task to your app/AppKernel.php file:

public function registerBundles(){ $bundles = array( // ... new Acme\MainBundle\MainBundle(), );}


Where now?• Now that you have a bundle, you can start creating your app page-by-page:

‣ create a route‣ create a controller‣ create and return a Response object (usually via a template)

• As you develop more features, you may create more bundles, but it’s up to you


Open Source Bundles• Lots of 3rd-party bundles are also available to help you:

‣ FOSUserBundle - user management

‣ KnpMenuBundle - really smart menus

‣ DoctrineFixturesBundle‣ StofDoctrineExtensionsBundle - easy doctrine behaviors

‣ AvalancheImagineBundle - image manipulation

‣ KnpPaginatorBundle

... and many more...Thursday, August 18, 11

http://symfony2bundles.org/


http://symfony2bundles.org

http://symfony2bundles.org

Act 5:

Playing with Behat

http://behat.org




• Behat is a tool that lets you focus on developing to the intended behavior of your application

• You write scenarios that describe the behavior of the features needed, which are then executed as tests against your application

What is Behat


Example Behat Feature

Feature: Registration In order to have an account with the system As an unauthenticated user I can register for a new account

Scenario: Navigate to the registration page Given I am on "/" When I follow "Register" Then the response status code should be 200 And the "h1" element should contain "Register"


• To use behat to test the functionality of your application, you’ll need to install both Behat and Mink

• Behat is a command-line executable that you install via pear

• Details: behat.org

Installing Behat


• To use behat to test the functionality of your application, you’ll need to install both Behat and Mink

• Behat is a command-line executable that you install via pear

Installing Behat

pear channel-discover pear.behat.orgpear channel-discover pear.symfony.compear install behat/behatpear install behat/mink


• To use Behat and Mink in your project, install BehatBundle and MinkBundle

1. Add the deps file2. Configure the autoloader3. Enable the bundles4. Configure the bundles5. Start describing your features!

Integrating into your project

http://bit.ly/mink-bundleThursday, August 18, 11



• Remember that the goal of Behat is to let you describe the behavior of your application as human-readable sentences

• This allows you to describe the behavior of each feature in a common language, which is executed as tests against your application

• Develop a feature until the test passes,then move on

Behavior-Driven Development


registration.feature


Scenario: Navigate to the registration page Given I am on "/" When I follow "Register" Then the response status code should be 200 And the "h1" element should contain "Register"

{Describes your feature, but

not executed by Behat

http://bit.ly/gherkin-docs

{Each Scenario is actually executed as a test against

your application

This “format” is called “Gherkin”


http://bit.ly/gherkin

http://bit.ly/gherkin


• Behind the scenes, each line of the scenario is executed against a collection of “definitions”

• A definition is a regular expression pattern and a function

• When a line in your scenario matches a definition’s regular expression, that definition is executed

• Mink comes with a great list ofbuilt-in definitions

Behind-the-scenes



• By default, tests are run in a “headless” or command-line-only browser

• This means that your testing your application as if Javascript were off

• You can also do in-browser testing by leveraging another library called Sahi

Testing Javascript


In-browser testing


@javascript Scenario: Navigate to the registration page Given I am on "/" When I follow "Register" Then the response status code should be 200 And the "h1" element should contain "Register"

Activates Sahi


• By adding “@javascript”, the test will be run through Sahi

• Sahi will physically open up a browser and execute the test

• You can use headless browsers for some tests and Sahi for others that require Javascript functionality

Testing Javascript


After dinner mint:

The HTTP Lifecycle


HTTP is Simple

• HTTP is a text language that allows two machines to communicate with each other

• Communication on the web is always a two-step process:

1) The client sends an HTTP request2) The server send back an HTTP response


HTTP Communication - from space

Client(e.g. browser) Your App

/foo

the request

<h1>Foo!</h1>

the response


The Request

• The actual request looks something like this:

GET /foo HTTP/1.1Host: knplabs.comAccept: text/htmlUser-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh)


This simple message communicates everything

necessary about exactly which resource the client is requesting


The Request

GET /foo HTTP/1.1Host: knplabs.comAccept: text/htmlUser-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh)

• The first line contains the two most important pieces of information:

HTTP method URI


The Request

HTTP method

URI The unique address or location thatidentifies the resource the client wants

The “verb” of the request: what actionyou would like to perform with theresource


Request Methods

GET Retrieve the resource from the server

POST Create a resource on the server

PUT Update the resource on the server

DELETE Delete the resource from the server


The Response

• And the response looks like this:

HTTP/1.1 200 OKDate: Tue, 04 Jun 2011 21:05:05 GMTServer: lighttpd/1.4.19Content-Type: text/html

<html> <h1>Foo!</h1></html>


The Response

HTTP/1.1 200 OKDate: Tue, 04 Jun 2011 21:05:05 GMTServer: lighttpd/1.4.19Content-Type: text/html

<html> <h1>Foo!</h1></html>

HTTP Status code

{Requestbody


HTTP Request-Response

• In every application, and every language, you always have the same goal:

To read the HTTP request and create the appropriate HTTP response


Request Response in PHP

• So how do you interact with HTTP requests and responses in PHP?

<?php

$uri = $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];$foo = $_GET['foo'];

header('Content-type: text/html');echo 'The URI requested is: '.$uri;echo 'The "foo" parameter is: '.$foo;


Request Response in PHP

• PHP gives you access to the HTTP request via several “superglobal” arrays

• To create the HTTP response, use the the header() method to set the header lines and print content to populate the request body


The user sends the HTTP request...

<?php// this is testing.php

$uri = $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];$foo = $_GET['foo'];

header('Content-type: text/html');echo 'The URI requested is: '.$uri;echo 'The "foo" parameter is: '.$foo;

• http://knplabs.com/testing.php?foo=symfony


http://knplabs.com/testing.php?foo=symfony


... and PHP sends back the HTTP response

HTTP/1.1 200 OKDate: Sat, 03 Apr 2011 02:14:33 GMTServer: Apache/2.2.17 (Unix)Content-Type: text/html

The URI requested is: /testing?foo=symfonyThe "foo" parameter is: symfony

• http://knplabs.com/testing.php?foo=symfony




Request and Responses in Symfony

• Symfony offers a Request and Response objects that abstract the HTTP text messages into an object-oriented format


use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Request;use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response;

$request = Request::createFromGlobals();$c = 'URI: '.$request->getPathInfo();$c .= '”foo”: '.$request->query->get('foo');

$response = new Response();$response->setContent($c);$response->setStatusCode(200);$response->headers->set('Content-Type', 'text/html')

//sets the headers and then prints the content$response->send();


Thanks!Questions?

Ryan Weaver@weaverryan


Technology

Symfony2: Get your project started