JWC - Rapid application development with FOF

Rapid Application Development
with Framework on Framework (FOF)

November 18th, 2012 – Joomla! World Conference

So, what is FOF anyway?

I know what you’re thinking
“Oh, no, not yet another framework!”


FOF extends the Joomla! framework
It does not replace or undermine it


DRY - Don’t Repeat Yourself
I detest copying and pasting the same code, over and over and over and over and over and over and over...


Less is more
Convention over conﬁguration – less dev time, less code, less bugs, less maintenance


Doesn’t impose its way of thinking
No black-box methods, multiple customizable triggers, plugin events, ...


Plays along nicely
Compatible with Joomla! 1.5, 1.7, 2.5 and 3.0.


Backwards compatible
No sudden, quantum changes from one day to the next


Some history
How it all came to be


July 2009 – Base MVC classes
Custom classes, extending JModel and friends, reducing copy & pasted code


September 2011 – Transformed into a framework
Basically, I was pissed with another framework which kept on screwing me over


Be the change
you want to see!

September 2011 – Transformed into a framework
Basically, I was pissed with another framework which kept on screwing me over


September 2012 – HMVC
while stuck on the ground, inside a plane, for four freakin’ hours!


May 2012 – Public release
at the J and Beyond 2012 conference


June 2012 – Bootstrap & jQuery
In optional Akeeba Strapper package


Being a FOF Component
Inside its mind, without visiting the 71/2 ﬂoor of a Manhattan ofﬁce building


AUDIENCE

ADVISORY
BORING SLIDES

Structure

Dispatcher

“triad”
Controller

Model View

Table

Helpers Toolbar

Structure

Dispatcher

The“triad”
Dispatcher is the entry point (a.k.a. “router”). It will setup,
Controller
run and render the MVC triad.

Model View

Table

Helpers Toolbar

Structure

The Controller is a thin interface to push data to the model state
Dispatcher
and instantiate views
“triad”
Controller

Model View

Table

Helpers Toolbar

Structure

Dispatcher

“triad”
Controller

Model View

Table

The Model is the workhorse. Business logic goes here.
Helpers Toolbar

Structure

Dispatcher

“triad”
Controller

Model View

Table

The Table class is a hybrid data adapter, controller and model
Helpers Toolbar
(following J!'s convention)

Structure

Dispatcher

“triad”
Controller

Model View

Table
The View fetches model state data and renders them in a
meaningful way
Helpers Toolbar

Structure

Dispatcher

“triad”
Controller

Model View

The Toolbar handles Table rendering of titles, buttons and so on
the

Helpers Toolbar

Structure

Dispatcher

“triad”
Controller

Model View

Non-OOP stuff.Table
Basically, a nice way to say “cruft”

Helpers Toolbar

Some general thoughts

✤ Almost RESTful, but not quite

✤ “Services ﬁrst” approach. Built-in JSON and transparent
authentication, opens the door to data provisioning for rich JS,
Android, iOS etc apps

✤ OAuth not supported (yet?). A custom, secure, TOTP-based
transparent authentication scheme and HTTP Basic Authentication
are supported, though.

✤ We offer HMVC today. Actually, since October 2011.

Convention over configuration in
the Dispatcher

✤ The Dispatcher is your component’s router. It routes the request to the
appropriate Controller based on conventions:

✤ A POST request gets routed to the save task

✤ A GET request to a plural view name gets routed to the browse
task

✤ A front-end GET request with an ID gets routed to the read task

✤ A back-end GET request with an ID gets routed to the edit task

Models

✤ Tables are named as #__component_view, e.g. #__todo_items

✤ Auto increment field is named component_view_id, e.g. todo_item_id

✤ Magic fields: enabled, created_by, created_on, modified_by,
modified_on, locked_by, locked_on, hits

✤ You can override defaults without copying & pasting code, ever.
Copy & paste is the devil!

Controllers

✤ Default tasks (not RESTful!): browse, read, edit, add, delete, save,
apply, ...

✤ Customize with onBeforeMethod and onAfterMethod methods, e.g.
onBeforeSave. Don't copy & paste code.

✤ All MVC objects can be passed a $conﬁg array to customize them. It
"ﬂows" from dispatcher to component to model and view.

✤ FOF guesses the task if it's missing based on plural/singular view
name and existence of ID in the query

Views

✤ Views inherit from FOFView and its specialized children, e.g.
FOFViewHtml

✤ Customize using the onTask methods, e.g. onBrowse

✤ The toolbar is handled outside the view, in a FOFToolbar descendant
class. Override it with a toolbar.php ﬁle in the component's root.

✤ Magic toolbar methods, e.g. onItemsBrowse allow you to customize
the toolbar without copying & pasting code.

HMVC – Hierarchical MVC

✤ Include the results of component views anywhere (other views, other
component, modules, ...)

✤ FOFDispatcher::getTmpInstance(‘com_foobar’, ‘items’, array(‘layout’
=> ‘fancy’))->dispatch();

Reuse view templates

✤ Load a view template from another view, component, ...

✤ echo $this->loadAnyTemplate('site:com_foobar/item/form');

Language loading and overrides

✤ Automatically loads component language ﬁles (frontend and
backend)

✤ Hierarchical language overriding

✤ English loads ﬁrst

✤ Current site/user language loads next and overrides English

Media files overrides

✤ Load media ﬁles like this:
FOFTemplateUtils::addCSS('media://com_foobar/css/frontend.css');

✤ Media overrides are inside the template folder, e.g.
templates/tpl_example/media/com_foobar/css/frontend.css

Services first – automatic JSON
and CSV views

✤ Just add format=json or format=csv

✤ JSON: You have an instant JSON-based remote API for your
components

✤ CSV: You can quickly export whatever you see in the backend to
Excel, Numbers, LibreOfﬁce, Google Docs, etc.

✤ Transparent authentication support using URL parameters or HTTP
Basic Authentication

Are you pondering what I’m
pondering?

pondering?

✤ Input as an object, not as an array (yes, static methods suck)

pondering?


✤ Remove dependence on JModelLegacy and friends

pondering?



✤ FOFForm: (almost) no PHP and no HTML Joomla! extensions

pondering?




✤ Platform abstraction, allow use with JApplicationWeb and friends

pondering?





✤ RFC 2324 implementation (client)

pondering?





✤ RFC 2324 implementation (client)

✤ A plan to take over the world!

Resources and community
http://akeeba.info/fof

JWC - Rapid application development with FOF

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