CakePHP Cookbook Documentation

Release 2.x

Cake Software Foundation

July 06, 2013

Contents

Getting Started Blog Tutorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Installation Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Downloading CakePHP . . . . . . . . . . Permissions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Advanced Installation and URL Rewriting Fire It Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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CakePHP Overview 39 What is CakePHP? Why Use it? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Understanding Model-View-Controller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Where to Get Help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Controllers The App Controller . . . . . Request parameters . . . . . Controller actions . . . . . . Request Life-cycle callbacks Controller Methods . . . . . Controller Attributes . . . . More on controllers . . . . . Views 45 45 46 46 47 48 55 56 77 i

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View Templates . . . . . . . . Using view blocks . . . . . . . Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . Creating your own view classes View API . . . . . . . . . . . More about Views . . . . . . . 6

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77 79 81 83 86 87 89

Models 101 Understanding Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 More on models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 Core Libraries General Purpose Behaviors . . . Components . . Helpers . . . . Utilities . . . . 201 201 240 266 316 406 517 517 517 518 519 519 520 521 521 522 523 523 524 525 525 527 528 530 530 531 532 539 542 555 555 568 585

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Plugins Installing a Plugin . . . . . . . . . . Plugin conguration . . . . . . . . . Advanced bootstrapping . . . . . . Using a Plugin . . . . . . . . . . . . Creating Your Own Plugins . . . . . Plugin Controllers . . . . . . . . . . Plugin Models . . . . . . . . . . . . Plugin Views . . . . . . . . . . . . Plugin assets . . . . . . . . . . . . . Components, Helpers and Behaviors Expand Your Plugin . . . . . . . . . Plugin Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Console and Shells The CakePHP console . . . . . . . . . . Creating a shell . . . . . . . . . . . . . Shell tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Invoking other shells from your shell . . Console output levels . . . . . . . . . . Styling output . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Conguring options and generating help Shell API . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . More topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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10 Development Conguration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Routing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

ii

Exceptions . . . . Error Handling . Debugging . . . . Testing . . . . . . REST . . . . . . Dispatcher Filters Vendor packages

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11 Deployment Check your security . . . . . . . . . . . Set document root . . . . . . . . . . . . Update core.php . . . . . . . . . . . . . Improve your applications performance

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12 Tutorials & Examples Blog Tutorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer . . . . . . . . . . . . Simple Authentication and Authorization Application Simple Acl controlled Application . . . . . . . . . . Simple Acl controlled Application - part 2 . . . . . . 13 Appendices 2.4 Migration Guide . . . 2.3 Migration Guide . . . 2.2 Migration Guide . . . 2.1 Migration Guide . . . 2.0 Migration Guide . . . Migration from 1.2 to 1.3 General Information . . . 14 Indices and tables Index

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iii

iv

CHAPTER 1

Getting Started

The CakePHP framework provides a robust base for your application. It can handle every aspect, from the users initial request all the way to the nal rendering of a web page. And since the framework follows the principles of MVC, it allows you to easily customize and extend most aspects of your application. The framework also provides a basic organizational structure, from lenames to database table names, keeping your entire application consistent and logical. This concept is simple but powerful. Follow the conventions and youll always know exactly where things are and how theyre organized. The best way to experience and learn CakePHP is to sit down and build something. To start off well build a simple blog application.

Blog Tutorial
Welcome to CakePHP. Youre probably checking out this tutorial because you want to learn more about how CakePHP works. Its our aim to increase productivity and make coding more enjoyable: we hope youll see this as you dive into the code. This tutorial will walk you through the creation of a simple blog application. Well be getting and installing Cake, creating and conguring a database, and creating enough application logic to list, add, edit, and delete blog posts. Heres what youll need: 1. A running web server. Were going to assume youre using Apache, though the instructions for using other servers should be very similar. We might have to play a little with the server conguration, but most folks can get Cake up and running without any conguration at all. Make sure you have PHP 5.2.8 or greater. 2. A database server. Were going to be using MySQL server in this tutorial. Youll need to know enough about SQL in order to create a database: Cake will be taking the reins from there. Since were using MySQL, also make sure that you have pdo_mysql enabled in PHP. 3. Basic PHP knowledge. The more object-oriented programming youve done, the better: but fear not if youre a procedural fan. 1

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4. Finally, youll need a basic knowledge of the MVC programming pattern. A quick overview can be found in Understanding Model-View-Controller. Dont worry, its only a half a page or so. Lets get started!

Getting Cake
First, lets get a copy of fresh Cake code. To get a fresh download, visit the CakePHP project on GitHub: https://github.com/cakephp/cakephp/tags and download the latest release of 2.0 You can also clone the repository using git://github.com/cakephp/cakephp.git git (http://git-scm.com/). git clone

Regardless of how you downloaded it, place the code inside of your DocumentRoot. Once nished, your directory setup should look something like the following:
/path_to_document_root /app /lib /plugins /vendors .htaccess index.php README

Now might be a good time to learn a bit about how Cakes directory structure works: check out CakePHP Folder Structure section.

Creating the Blog Database

Next, lets set up the underlying database for our blog. If you havent already done so, create an empty database for use in this tutorial, with a name of your choice. Right now, well just create a single table to store our posts. Well also throw in a few posts right now to use for testing purposes. Execute the following SQL statements into your database:
/* First, create our posts table: */ CREATE TABLE posts ( id INT UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, title VARCHAR(50), body TEXT, created DATETIME DEFAULT NULL, modified DATETIME DEFAULT NULL ); /* Then insert some posts for testing: */ INSERT INTO posts (title,body,created) VALUES (The title, This is the post body., NOW()); INSERT INTO posts (title,body,created) VALUES (A title once again, And the post body follows., NOW());

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INSERT INTO posts (title,body,created) VALUES (Title strikes back, This is really exciting! Not., NOW());

The choices on table and column names are not arbitrary. If you follow Cakes database naming conventions, and Cakes class naming conventions (both outlined in CakePHP Conventions), youll be able to take advantage of a lot of free functionality and avoid conguration. Cake is exible enough to accommodate even the worst legacy database schema, but adhering to convention will save you time. Check out CakePHP Conventions for more information, but sufce it to say that naming our table posts automatically hooks it to our Post model, and having elds called modied and created will be automagically managed by Cake.

Cake Database Conguration

Onward and upward: lets tell Cake where our database is and how to connect to it. For many, this is the rst and last time you congure anything. A copy of CakePHPs database conguration le is found in /app/Config/database.php.default. Make a copy of this le in the same directory, but name it database.php. The cong le should be pretty straightforward: just replace the values in the $default array with those that apply to your setup. A sample completed conguration array might look something like the following:
public $default = array( datasource => Database/Mysql, persistent => false, host => localhost, port => , login => cakeBlog, password => c4k3-rUl3Z, database => cake_blog_tutorial, schema => , prefix => , encoding => );

Once youve saved your new database.php le, you should be able to open your browser and see the Cake welcome page. It should also tell you that your database connection le was found, and that Cake can successfully connect to the database. Note: Remember that youll need to have PDO, and pdo_mysql enabled in your php.ini.

Optional Conguration
There are three other items that can be congured. Most developers complete these laundry-list items, but theyre not required for this tutorial. One is dening a custom string (or salt) for use in security hashes. The second is dening a custom number (or seed) for use in encryption. The third item is allowing CakePHP write access to its tmp folder. Blog Tutorial 3

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The security salt is used for generating hashes. Change the default salt value by editing /app/Config/core.php line 187. It doesnt much matter what the new value is, as long as its not easily guessed:
/** * A random string used in security hashing methods. */ Configure::write(Security.salt, pl345e-P45s_7h3*S@l7!);

The cipher seed is used for encrypt/decrypt strings. Change the default seed value by editing /app/Config/core.php line 192. It doesnt much matter what the new value is, as long as its not easily guessed:
/** * A random numeric string (digits only) used to encrypt/decrypt strings. */ Configure::write(Security.cipherSeed, 7485712659625147843639846751);

The nal task is to make the app/tmp directory web-writable. The best way to do this is to nd out what user your webserver runs as (<?php echo whoami; ?>) and change the ownership of the app/tmp directory to that user. The nal command you run (in *nix) might look something like this:
$ chown -R www-data app/tmp

If for some reason CakePHP cant write to that directory, youll be informed by a warning while not in production mode.

A Note on mod_rewrite
Occasionally a new user will run into mod_rewrite issues. For example if the CakePHP welcome page looks a little funny (no images or css styles), it probably means mod_rewrite isnt functioning on your system. Please refer to one of the sections below about url rewriting for your webserver to get you up and running: URL Rewriting
Apache and mod_rewrite (and .htaccess)

While CakePHP is built to work with mod_rewrite out of the boxand usually doesweve noticed that a few users struggle with getting everything to play nicely on their systems. Here are a few things you might try to get it running correctly. First look at your httpd.conf (Make sure you are editing the system httpd.conf rather than a user- or site-specic httpd.conf). 1. Make sure that an .htaccess override is allowed and that AllowOverride is set to All for the correct DocumentRoot. You should see something similar to:
# Each directory to which Apache has access can be configured with respect # to which services and features are allowed and/or disabled in that # directory (and its subdirectories). #

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# First, we configure the "default" to be a very restrictive set of # features. # <Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride All # Order deny,allow # Deny from all </Directory>

2. Make sure you are loading up mod_rewrite correctly. You should see something like:
LoadModule rewrite_module libexec/apache2/mod_rewrite.so

In many systems these will be commented out (by being prepended with a #) by default, so you may just need to remove those leading # symbols. After you make changes, restart Apache to make sure the settings are active. Verify that you your .htaccess les are actually in the right directories. This can happen during copying because some operating systems treat les that start with . as hidden and therefore wont see them to copy. 3. Make sure your copy of CakePHP is from the downloads section of the site or our GIT repository, and has been unpacked correctly by checking for .htaccess les. Cake root directory (needs to be copied to your document, this redirects everything to your Cake app):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^ $ app/webroot/ RewriteRule </IfModule>

[L]

(.*) app/webroot/ $ 1 [L]

Cake app directory (will be copied to the top directory of your application by bake):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^$ webroot/ RewriteRule </IfModule> (.*) webroot/ $ 1

[L] [L]

Cake webroot directory (will be copied to your applications web root by bake):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

If your CakePHP site still has problems with mod_rewrite you might want to try and modify settings for virtualhosts. If on ubuntu, edit the le /etc/apache2/sites-available/default (location is distribu-

Blog Tutorial

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tion dependent). In this le, ensure that AllowOverride None is changed to AllowOverride All, so you have:
<Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride All </Directory> <Directory /var/www> Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews AllowOverride All Order Allow,Deny Allow from all </Directory>

If on Mac OSX, another solution is to use the tool virtualhostx to make a virtual host to point to your folder. For many hosting services (GoDaddy, 1and1), your web server is actually being served from a user directory that already uses mod_rewrite. If you are installing CakePHP into a user directory (http://example.com/~username/cakephp/), or any other URL structure that already utilizes mod_rewrite, youll need to add RewriteBase statements to the .htaccess les CakePHP uses (/.htaccess, /app/.htaccess, /app/webroot/.htaccess). This can be added to the same section with the RewriteEngine directive, so for example your webroot .htaccess le would look like:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase /path/to/cake/app RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

The details of those changes will depend on your setup, and can include additional things that are not Cake related. Please refer to Apaches online documentation for more information. 4. (Optional) To improve production setup, you should prevent invalid assets from being parsed by CakePHP. Modify your webroot .htaccess to something like:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase /path/to/cake/app RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/(app/webroot/)?(img|css|js)/(.*) $ RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

The above will simply prevent incorrect assets from being sent to index.php and instead display your webservers 404 page. Additionally you can create a matching HTML 404 page, or use the default built-in CakePHP 404 by adding an ErrorDocument directive: 6 Chapter 1. Getting Started

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ErrorDocument 404 /404-not-found

Pretty URLs on nginx

nginx is a popular server that uses less system resources than Apache. Its drawback is that it does not make use of .htaccess les like Apache, so it is necessary to create those rewritten URLs in the site-available conguration. Depending upon your setup, you will have to modify this, but at the very least, you will need PHP running as a FastCGI instance.
server { listen 80; server_name www.example.com; rewrite ^(.*) http://example.com $ 1 permanent; } server { listen 80; server_name example.com; # root directive should be global root /var/www/example.com/public/app/webroot/; index index.php; access_log /var/www/example.com/log/access.log; error_log /var/www/example.com/log/error.log; location / { try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$uri&$args; } location ~ \.php $ { try_files $uri =404; include /etc/nginx/fastcgi_params; fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000; fastcgi_index index.php; fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name; } }

URL Rewrites on IIS7 (Windows hosts)

IIS7 does not natively support .htaccess les. While there are add-ons that can add this support, you can also import htaccess rules into IIS to use CakePHPs native rewrites. To do this, follow these steps: 1. Use Microsofts Web Platform Installer (http://www.microsoft.com/web/downloads/platform.aspx) to install the URL Rewrite Module 2.0 (http://www.iis.net/downloads/microsoft/url-rewrite) or download it directly (32-bit (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5747) / 64-bit (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=7435)). 2. Create a new le in your CakePHP root folder, called web.cong. Blog Tutorial 7

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3. Using Notepad or any XML-safe editor and copy the following code into your new web.cong le...

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <configuration> <system.webServer> <rewrite> <rules> <rule name="Rewrite requests to test.php" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^test.php(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="app/webroot/test.php{R:1}" /> </rule> <rule name="Exclude direct access to app/webroot/*" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^app/webroot/(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="None" /> </rule> <rule name="Rewrite routed access to assets (img, css, files, js, favicon)" <match url="^(img|css|files|js|favicon.ico)(.*)$" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="app/webroot/{R:1}{R:2}" appendQueryString=" </rule> <rule name="Rewrite requested file/folder to index.php" stopProcessing="tru <match url="^(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="index.php" appendQueryString="true" /> </rule> </rules> </rewrite> </system.webServer> </configuration>

Once the web.cong le is created with the correct IIS-friendly rewrite rules, CakePHPs links, css, js, and rerouting should work correctly.
I dont / cant use URL rewriting

If you dont want to or cant use URL rewriting on your webserver, refer to the core conguration. Now continue to Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer to start building your rst CakePHP application.

Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer

Create a Post Model
The Model class is the bread and butter of CakePHP applications. By creating a CakePHP model that will interact with our database, well have the foundation in place needed to do our view, add, edit, and delete operations later. CakePHPs model class les go in /app/Model, and the le well be creating will be saved to /app/Model/Post.php. The completed le should look like this:
class Post extends AppModel { }

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Naming convention is very important in CakePHP. By naming our model Post, CakePHP can automatically infer that this model will be used in the PostsController, and will be tied to a database table called posts. Note: CakePHP will dynamically create a model object for you if it cannot nd a corresponding le in /app/Model. This also means that if you accidentally name your le wrong (i.e. post.php or posts.php), CakePHP will not recognize any of your settings and will use the defaults instead. For more on models, such as table prexes, callbacks, and validation, check out the Models chapter of the Manual.

Create a Posts Controller

Next, well create a controller for our posts. The controller is where all the business logic for post interaction will happen. In a nutshell, its the place where you play with the models and get post-related work done. Well place this new controller in a le called PostsController.php inside the /app/Controller directory. Heres what the basic controller should look like:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form); }

Now, lets add an action to our controller. Actions often represent a single function or interface in an application. For example, when users request www.example.com/posts/index (which is also the same as www.example.com/posts/), they might expect to see a listing of posts. The code for that action would look something like this:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form); public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->Post->find(all)); } }

Let me explain the action a bit. By dening function index() in our PostsController, users can now access the logic there by requesting www.example.com/posts/index. Similarly, if we were to dene a function called foobar(), users would be able to access that at www.example.com/posts/foobar. Warning: You may be tempted to name your controllers and actions a certain way to obtain a certain URL. Resist that temptation. Follow CakePHP conventions (plural controller names, etc.) and create readable, understandable action names. You can map URLs to your code using routes covered later on. The single instruction in the action uses set() to pass data from the controller to the view (which well create next). The line sets the view variable called posts equal to the return value of the find(all) method of the Post model. Our Post model is automatically available at $this->Post because weve followed Cakes naming conventions. To learn more about Cakes controllers, check out the Controllers chapter.

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Creating Post Views

Now that we have our data owing to our model, and our application logic and ow dened by our controller, lets create a view for the index action we created above. Cake views are just presentation-avored fragments that t inside an applications layout. For most applications theyre HTML mixed with PHP, but they may end up as XML, CSV, or even binary data. Layouts are presentation code that is wrapped around a view, and can be dened and switched between, but for now, lets just use the default. Remember in the last section how we assigned the posts variable to the view using the set() method? That would hand down data to the view that would look something like this:
// print_r($posts) output: Array ( [0] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => The title [body] => This is the post body. [created] => 2008-02-13 18:34:55 [modified] => ) ) [1] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 2 [title] => A title once again [body] => And the post body follows. [created] => 2008-02-13 18:34:56 [modified] => ) ) [2] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 3 [title] => Title strikes back [body] => This is really exciting! Not. [created] => 2008-02-13 18:34:57 [modified] => ) ) )

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(well have to create a folder named Posts in this case). To format this post data in a nice table, our view code might look something like this
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/index.ctp --> <h1>Blog posts</h1> <table> <tr> <th>Id</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Created</th> </tr> <!-- Here is where we loop through our $posts array, printing out post info --> <?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $post[Post][id]; ?></td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link($post[Post][title], array(controller => posts, action => view, $post[Post][id])); ?> </td> <td><?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?></td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> <?php unset($post); ?> </table>

Hopefully this should look somewhat simple. You might have noticed the use of an object called $this->Html. This is an instance of the CakePHP HtmlHelper class. CakePHP comes with a set of view helpers that make things like linking, form output, JavaScript and Ajax a snap. You can learn more about how to use them in Helpers, but whats important to note here is that the link() method will generate an HTML link with the given title (the rst parameter) and URL (the second parameter). When specifying URLs in Cake, it is recommended that you use the array format. This is explained in more detail in the section on Routes. Using the array format for URLs allows you to take advantage of CakePHPs reverse routing capabilities. You can also specify URLs relative to the base of the application in the form of /controller/action/param1/param2. At this point, you should be able to point your browser to http://www.example.com/posts/index. You should see your view, correctly formatted with the title and table listing of the posts. If you happened to have clicked on one of the links we created in this view (that link a posts title to a URL /posts/view/some_id), you were probably informed by CakePHP that the action hasnt yet been dened. If you were not so informed, either something has gone wrong, or you actually did dene it already, in which case you are very sneaky. Otherwise, well create it in the PostsController now:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form); public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->Post->find(all));

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} public function view($id = null) { if (!$id) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $this->set(post, $post); } }

The set() call should look familiar. Notice were using findById() rather than find(all) because we only really want a single posts information. Notice that our view action takes a parameter: the ID of the post wed like to see. This parameter is handed to the action through the requested URL. If a user requests /posts/view/3, then the value 3 is passed as $id. We also do a bit of error checking to ensure a user is actually accessing a record. If a user requests /posts/view, we will throw a NotFoundException and let the CakePHP ErrorHandler take over. We also perform a similar check to make sure the user has accessed a record that exists. Now lets create the view for our new view action and place it in /app/View/Posts/view.ctp
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/view.ctp --> <h1><?php echo h($post[Post][title]); ?></h1> <p><small>Created: <?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?></small></p> <p><?php echo h($post[Post][body]); ?></p>

Verify that this is working by trying the links at /posts/index or manually requesting a post by accessing /posts/view/1.

Adding Posts
Reading from the database and showing us the posts is a great start, but lets allow for the adding of new posts. First, start by creating an add() action in the PostsController:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form, Session); public $components = array(Session); public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->Post->find(all)); }

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public function view($id) { if (!$id) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $this->set(post, $post); } public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { $this->Post->create(); if ($this->Post->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Your post has been saved.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Unable to add your post.); } } } }

Note: You need to include the SessionComponent - and SessionHelper - in any controller where you will use it. If necessary, include it in your AppController. Heres what the add() action does: if the HTTP method of the request was POST, try to save the data using the Post model. If for some reason it doesnt save, just render the view. This gives us a chance to show the user validation errors or other warnings. Every CakePHP request includes a CakeRequest object which is accessible using $this->request. The request object contains useful information regarding the request that was just received, and can be used to control the ow of your application. In this case, we use the CakeRequest::is() method to check that the request is a HTTP POST request. When a user uses a form to POST data to your application, that information is available in $this->request->data. You can use the pr() or debug() functions to print it out if you want to see what it looks like. We use the SessionComponents SessionComponent::setFlash() method to set a message to a session variable to be displayed on the page after redirection. In the layout we have SessionHelper::flash which displays the message and clears the corresponding session variable. The controllers Controller::redirect function redirects to another URL. The param array(action => index) translates to URL /posts i.e the index action of posts controller. You can refer to Router::url() function on the API (http://api20.cakephp.org) to see the formats in which you can specify a URL for various Cake functions. Calling the save() method will check for validation errors and abort the save if any occur. Well discuss how those errors are handled in the following sections. Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer 13

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Data Validation
Cake goes a long way in taking the monotony out of form input validation. Everyone hates coding up endless forms and their validation routines. CakePHP makes it easier and faster. To take advantage of the validation features, youll need to use Cakes FormHelper in your views. The FormHelper is available by default to all views at $this->Form. Heres our add view:
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/add.ctp --> <h1>Add Post</h1> <?php echo $this->Form->create(Post); echo $this->Form->input(title); echo $this->Form->input(body, array(rows => 3)); echo $this->Form->end(Save Post); ?>

Here, we use the FormHelper to generate the opening tag for an HTML form. Heres the HTML that $this->Form->create() generates:
<form id="PostAddForm" method="post" action="/posts/add">

If create() is called with no parameters supplied, it assumes you are building a form that submits to the current controllers add() action (or edit() action when id is included in the form data), via POST. The $this->Form->input() method is used to create form elements of the same name. The rst parameter tells CakePHP which eld they correspond to, and the second parameter allows you to specify a wide array of options - in this case, the number of rows for the textarea. Theres a bit of introspection and automagic here: input() will output different form elements based on the model eld specied. The $this->Form->end() call generates a submit button and ends the form. If a string is supplied as the rst parameter to end(), the FormHelper outputs a submit button named accordingly along with the closing form tag. Again, refer to Helpers for more on helpers. Now lets go back and update our /app/View/Posts/index.ctp view to include a new Add Post link. Before the <table>, add the following line:
<?php echo $this->Html->link( Add Post, array(controller => posts, action => add) ); ?>

You may be wondering: how do I tell CakePHP about my validation requirements? Validation rules are dened in the model. Lets look back at our Post model and make a few adjustments:
class Post extends AppModel { public $validate = array( title => array( rule => notEmpty ), body => array(

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rule => notEmpty ) ); }

The $validate array tells CakePHP how to validate your data when the save() method is called. Here, Ive specied that both the body and title elds must not be empty. CakePHPs validation engine is strong, with a number of pre-built rules (credit card numbers, email addresses, etc.) and exibility for adding your own validation rules. For more information on that setup, check the Data Validation. Now that you have your validation rules in place, use the app to try to add a post with an empty title or body to see how it works. Since weve used the FormHelper::input() method of the FormHelper to create our form elements, our validation error messages will be shown automatically.

Editing Posts
Post editing: here we go. Youre a CakePHP pro by now, so you should have picked up a pattern. Make the action, then the view. Heres what the edit() action of the PostsController would look like:
public function edit($id = null) { if (!$id) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } if ($this->request->is(post) || $this->request->is(put)) { $this->Post->id = $id; if ($this->Post->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Your post has been updated.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Unable to update your post.); } } if (!$this->request->data) { $this->request->data = $post; } }

This action rst ensures that the user has tried to access an existing record. If they havent passed in a passed in an $id parameter, or the post does not exist, we throw a NotFoundException for the CakePHP ErrorHandler to take care of. Next the action checks that the request is a POST request. If it is, then we use the POST data to update our Post record, or kick back and show the user validation errors. If there is no data set to $this->request->data, we simply set it to the previously retrieved post. Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer 15

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The edit view might look something like this:

<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/edit.ctp --> <h1>Edit <?php echo echo echo echo echo Post</h1> $this->Form->create(Post); $this->Form->input(title); $this->Form->input(body, array(rows => 3)); $this->Form->input(id, array(type => hidden)); $this->Form->end(Save Post);

This view outputs the edit form (with the values populated), along with any necessary validation error messages. One thing to note here: CakePHP will assume that you are editing a model if the id eld is present in the data array. If no id is present (look back at our add view), Cake will assume that you are inserting a new model when save() is called. You can now update your index view with links to edit specic posts:
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/index.ctp (edit links added) -->

<h1>Blog posts</h1> <p><?php echo $this->Html->link("Add Post", array(action => add)); ?></p> <table> <tr> <th>Id</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Action</th> <th>Created</th> </tr> <!-- Heres where we loop through our $posts array, printing out post info -->

<?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $post[Post][id]; ?></td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link($post[Post][title], array(action => view, </td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link(Edit, array(action => edit, $post[Post][i </td> <td> <?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?> </td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> </table>

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Deleting Posts
Next, lets make a way for users to delete posts. Start with a delete() action in the PostsController:
public function delete($id) { if ($this->request->is(get)) { throw new MethodNotAllowedException(); } if ($this->Post->delete($id)) { $this->Session->setFlash(The post with id: . $id . has been deleted.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } }

This logic deletes the post specied by $id, and uses $this->Session->setFlash() to show the user a conrmation message after redirecting them on to /posts. If the user attempts to do a delete using a GET request, we throw an Exception. Uncaught exceptions are captured by CakePHPs exception handler, and a nice error page is displayed. There are many built-in Exceptions that can be used to indicate the various HTTP errors your application might need to generate. Because were just executing some logic and redirecting, this action has no view. You might want to update your index view with links that allow users to delete posts, however:
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/index.ctp --> <h1>Blog posts</h1> <p><?php echo $this->Html->link(Add Post, array(action => add)); ?></p> <table> <tr> <th>Id</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Actions</th> <th>Created</th> </tr> <!-- Heres where we loop through our $posts array, printing out post info -->

<?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $post[Post][id]; ?></td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link($post[Post][title], array(action => view, </td> <td> <?php echo $this->Form->postLink( Delete, array(action => delete, $post[Post][id]), array(confirm => Are you sure?)); ?> <?php echo $this->Html->link(Edit, array(action => edit, $post[Post][i </td> <td>

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<?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?> </td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> </table>

Using postLink() will create a link that uses Javascript to do a POST request deleting our post. Allowing content to be deleted using GET requests is dangerous, as web crawlers could accidentally delete all your content. Note: This view code also uses the FormHelper to prompt the user with a JavaScript conrmation dialog before they attempt to delete a post.

Routes
For some, CakePHPs default routing works well enough. Developers who are sensitive to user-friendliness and general search engine compatibility will appreciate the way that CakePHPs URLs map to specic actions. So well just make a quick change to routes in this tutorial. For more information on advanced routing techniques, see Routes Conguration. By default, CakePHP responds to a request for the root of your site (i.e. http://www.example.com) using its PagesController, rendering a view called home. Instead, well replace this with our PostsController by creating a routing rule. Cakes routing is found in /app/Config/routes.php. Youll want to comment out or remove the line that denes the default root route. It looks like this:
Router::connect(/, array(controller => pages, action => display, home));

This line connects the URL / with the default CakePHP home page. We want it to connect with our own controller, so replace that line with this one:
Router::connect(/, array(controller => posts, action => index));

This should connect users requesting / to the index() action of our PostsController. Note: CakePHP also makes use of reverse routing - if with the above route dened you pass array(controller => posts, action => index) to a function expecting an array, the resultant URL used will be /. Its therefore a good idea to always use arrays for URLs as this means your routes dene where a URL goes, and also ensures that links point to the same place too.

Conclusion
Creating applications this way will win you peace, honor, love, and money beyond even your wildest fantasies. Simple, isnt it? Keep in mind that this tutorial was very basic. CakePHP has many more features to

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offer, and is exible in ways we didnt wish to cover here for simplicitys sake. Use the rest of this manual as a guide for building more feature-rich applications. Now that youve created a basic Cake application youre ready for the real thing. Start your own project, read the rest of the Cookbook and API (http://api20.cakephp.org). If you need help, come see us in #cakephp. Welcome to CakePHP! Suggested Follow-up Reading These are common tasks people learning CakePHP usually want to study next: 1. Layouts: Customizing your website layout 2. Elements Including and reusing view snippets 3. Scaffolding: Prototyping before creating code 4. Code Generation with Bake Generating basic CRUD code 5. Simple Authentication and Authorization Application: User authentication and authorization tutorial

Additional Reading
A Typical CakePHP Request Weve covered the basic ingredients in CakePHP, so lets look at how objects work together to complete a basic request. Continuing with our original request example, lets imagine that our friend Ricardo just clicked on the Buy A Custom Cake Now! link on a CakePHP applications landing page. Figure: 2. Typical Cake Request. Black = required element, Gray = optional element, Blue = callback 1. Ricardo clicks the link pointing to http://www.example.com/cakes/buy, and his browser makes a request to your web server. 2. The Router parses the URL in order to extract the parameters for this request: the controller, action, and any other arguments that will affect the business logic during this request. 3. Using routes, a request URL is mapped to a controller action (a method in a specic controller class). In this case, its the buy() method of the CakesController. The controllers beforeFilter() callback is called before any controller action logic is executed. 4. The controller may use models to gain access to the applications data. In this example, the controller uses a model to fetch Ricardos last purchases from the database. Any applicable model callbacks, behaviors, and DataSources may apply during this operation. While model usage is not required, all CakePHP controllers initially require at least one model. 5. After the model has retrieved the data, it is returned to the controller. Model callbacks may apply. 6. The controller may use components to further rene the data or perform other operations (session manipulation, authentication, or sending emails, for example).

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Figure 1.1: Flow diagram showing a typical CakePHP request

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7. Once the controller has used models and components to prepare the data sufciently, that data is handed to the view using the controllers set() method. Controller callbacks may be applied before the data is sent. The view logic is performed, which may include the use of elements and/or helpers. By default, the view is rendered inside of a layout. 8. Additional controller callbacks (like afterFilter) may be applied. The complete, rendered view code is sent to Ricardos browser. CakePHP Conventions We are big fans of convention over conguration. While it takes a bit of time to learn CakePHPs conventions, you save time in the long run: by following convention, you get free functionality, and you free yourself from the maintenance nightmare of tracking cong les. Convention also makes for a very uniform system development, allowing other developers to jump in and help more easily. CakePHPs conventions have been distilled out of years of web development experience and best practices. While we suggest you use these conventions while developing with CakePHP, we should mention that many of these tenets are easily overridden something that is especially handy when working with legacy systems.
Controller Conventions

Controller classnames are plural, CamelCased, and end in Controller. PeopleController and LatestArticlesController are both examples of conventional controller names. The rst method you write for a controller might be the index() method. When a request species a controller but not an action, the default CakePHP behavior is to execute the index() method of that controller. For example, a request for http://www.example.com/apples/ maps to a call on the index() method of the ApplesController, whereas http://www.example.com/apples/view/ maps to a call on the view() method of the ApplesController. You can also change the visibility of controller methods in CakePHP by prexing controller method names with underscores. If a controller method has been prexed with an underscore, the method will not be accessible directly from the web but is available for internal use. For example:
class NewsController extends AppController { public function latest() { $this->_findNewArticles(); } protected function _findNewArticles() { // Logic to find latest news articles } }

While the page http://www.example.com/news/latest/ would be accessible to the user as usual, someone trying to get to the page http://www.example.com/news/_ndNewArticles/ would get an error, because the method is preceded with an underscore. You can also use PHPs visibility keywords to indicate whether or not a method can be accessed from a url. Non-public methods cannot be accessed.

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URL Considerations for Controller Names As youve just seen, single word controllers map easily to a simple lower case URL path. For example, ApplesController (which would be dened in the le name ApplesController.php) is accessed from http://example.com/apples. Multiple word controllers can be any inected form which equals the controller name so: /redApples /RedApples /Red_apples /red_apples will all resolve to the index of the RedApples controller. However, the convention is that your urls are lowercase and underscored, therefore /red_apples/go_pick is the correct form to access the RedApplesController::go_pick action. For more information on CakePHP URLs and parameter handling, see Routes Conguration.
File and Classname Conventions

In general, lenames match the classnames, which are CamelCased. So if you have a class MyNiftyClass, then in Cake, the le should be named MyNiftyClass.php. Below are examples of how to name the le for each of the different types of classes you would typically use in a CakePHP application: The Controller class KissesAndHugsController would be found in a le named KissesAndHugsController.php The Component class MyHandyComponent would be found in a le named MyHandyComponent.php The Model class OptionValue would be found in a le named OptionValue.php The Behavior class EspeciallyFunkableBehavior would be found in a le named EspeciallyFunkableBehavior.php The View class SuperSimpleView would be found in a le named SuperSimpleView.php The Helper class BestEverHelper would be found in a le named BestEverHelper.php Each le would be located in the appropriate folder in your app folder.
Model and Database Conventions

Model classnames are singular and CamelCased. Person, BigPerson, and ReallyBigPerson are all examples of conventional model names. Table names corresponding to CakePHP models are plural and underscored. The underlying tables for the above mentioned models would be people, big_people, and really_big_people, respectively. You can use the utility library Inflector to check the singular/plural of words. See the Inector for more information.

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Field names with two or more words are underscored like, rst_name. Foreign keys in hasMany, belongsTo or hasOne relationships are recognized by default as the (singular) name of the related table followed by _id. So if a Baker hasMany Cake, the cakes table will refer to the bakers table via a baker_id foreign key. For a multiple worded table like category_types, the foreign key would be category_type_id. Join tables, used in hasAndBelongsToMany (HABTM) relationships between models should be named after the model tables they will join in alphabetical order (apples_zebras rather than zebras_apples). All tables with which CakePHP models interact (with the exception of join tables), require a singular primary key to uniquely identify each row. If you wish to model a table which does not have a single-eld primary key, CakePHPs convention is that a single-eld primary key is added to the table. You have to add a single-eld primary key if you want to use that tables model. CakePHP does not support composite primary keys. If you want to directly manipulate your join table data, use direct query calls or add a primary key to act on it as a normal model. E.g.:
CREATE TABLE posts_tags ( id INT(10) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, post_id INT(10) NOT NULL, tag_id INT(10) NOT NULL, PRIMARY KEY(id));

Rather than using an auto-increment key as the primary key, you may also use char(36). Cake will then use a unique 36 character uuid (String::uuid) whenever you save a new record using the Model::save method.
View Conventions

View template les are named after the controller functions they display, in an underscored form. The getReady() function of the PeopleController class will look for a view template in /app/View/People/get_ready.ctp. The basic pattern is /app/View/Controller/underscored_function_name.ctp. By naming the pieces of your application using CakePHP conventions, you gain functionality without the hassle and maintenance tethers of conguration. Heres a nal example that ties the conventions Database table: people Model class: Person, found at /app/Model/Person.php Controller class: PeopleController, found at /app/Controller/PeopleController.php View template, found at /app/View/People/index.ctp Using these conventions, CakePHP knows that a request to http://example.com/people/ maps to a call on the index() function of the PeopleController, where the Person model is automatically available (and automatically tied to the people table in the database), and renders to a le. None of these relationships have been congured by any means other than by creating classes and les that youd need to create anyway. Now that youve been introduced to CakePHPs fundamentals, you might try a run through the Blog Tutorial to see how things t together.

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CakePHP Folder Structure After youve downloaded and extracted CakePHP, these are the les and folders you should see: app lib vendors plugins .htaccess index.php README Youll notice three main folders: The app folder will be where you work your magic: its where your applications les will be placed. The lib folder is where weve worked our magic. Make a personal commitment not to edit les in this folder. We cant help you if youve modied the core. Finally, the vendors folder is where youll place third-party PHP libraries you need to use with your CakePHP applications.
The App Folder

CakePHPs app folder is where you will do most of your application development. Lets look a little closer at the folders inside of app. Cong Holds the (few) conguration les CakePHP uses. Database connection details, bootstrapping, core conguration les and more should be stored here. Console Contains the console commands and console tasks for your application. This directory can also contain a Templates directory to customize the output of bake. For more information see console-and-shells for more information. Controller Contains your applications controllers and their components. Lib Contains 1st party libraries that do not come from 3rd parties or external vendors. This allows you to separate your organizations internal libraries from vendor libraries. Locale Stores string les for internationalization. Model Contains your applications models, behaviors, and datasources. Plugin Contains plugin packages. Test This directory contains all the test cases, and test xtures for your application. The Test/Case directory should mirror your application and contain one or more test cases per class in your application. For more information on test cases and test xtures refer to the development/testing documentation.

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tmp This is where CakePHP stores temporary data. The actual data it stores depends on how you have CakePHP congured, but this folder is usually used to store model descriptions, logs, and sometimes session information. Make sure that this folder exists and that it is writable, otherwise the performance of your application will be severely impacted. In debug mode, CakePHP will warn you if it is not the case. Vendor Any third-party classes or libraries should be placed here. Doing so makes them easy to access using the App::import(vendor, name) function. Keen observers will note that this seems redundant, as there is also a vendors folder at the top level of our directory structure. Well get into the differences between the two when we discuss managing multiple applications and more complex system setups. View Presentational les are placed here: elements, error pages, helpers, layouts, and view les. webroot In a production setup, this folder should serve as the document root for your application. Folders here also serve as holding places for CSS stylesheets, images, and JavaScript les. CakePHP Structure CakePHP features Controller, Model, and View classes, but it also features some additional classes and objects that make development in MVC a little quicker and more enjoyable. Components, Behaviors, and Helpers are classes that provide extensibility and reusability to quickly add functionality to the base MVC classes in your applications. Right now well stay at a higher level, so look for the details on how to use these tools later on.
Application Extensions

Controllers, helpers and models each have a parent class you can use to dene applicationwide changes. AppController (located at /app/Controller/AppController.php), AppHelper (located at /app/View/Helper/AppHelper.php) and AppModel (located at /app/Model/AppModel.php) are great places to put methods you want to share between all controllers, helpers or models. Although they arent classes or les, routes play a role in requests made to CakePHP. Route denitions tell CakePHP how to map URLs to controller actions. The default behavior assumes that the URL /controller/action/var1/var2 maps to Controller::action($var1, $var2), but you can use routes to customize URLs and how they are interpreted by your application. Some features in an application merit packaging as a whole. A plugin is a package of models, controllers and views that accomplishes a specic purpose that can span multiple applications. A user management system or a simplied blog might be a good t for CakePHP plugins.
Controller Extensions (Components)

A Component is a class that aids in controller logic. If you have some logic you want to share between controllers (or applications), a component is usually a good t. As an example, the core EmailComponent class makes creating and sending emails a snap. Rather than writing a controller method in a single controller that performs this logic, you can package the logic so it can be shared.

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Controllers are also tted with callbacks. These callbacks are available for your use, just in case you need to insert some logic between CakePHPs core operations. Callbacks available include: beforeFilter(), executed before any controller action logic beforeRender(), executed after controller logic, but before the view is rendered afterFilter(), executed after all controller logic, including the view render. There may be no difference between afterRender() and afterFilter() unless youve manually made a call to render() in your controller action and have included some logic after that call.
Model Extensions (Behaviors)

Similarly, Behaviors work as ways to add common functionality between models. For example, if you store user data in a tree structure, you can specify your User model as behaving like a tree, and gain free functionality for removing, adding, and shifting nodes in your underlying tree structure. Models also are supported by another class called a DataSource. DataSources are an abstraction that enable models to manipulate different types of data consistently. While the main source of data in a CakePHP application is often a database, you might write additional DataSources that allow your models to represent RSS feeds, CSV les, LDAP entries, or iCal events. DataSources allow you to associate records from different sources: rather than being limited to SQL joins, DataSources allow you to tell your LDAP model that it is associated to many iCal events. Just like controllers, models are featured with callbacks as well: beforeFind() afterFind() beforeValidate() beforeSave() afterSave() beforeDelete() afterDelete() The names of these methods should be descriptive enough to let you know what they do. You can nd the details in the models chapter.
View Extensions (Helpers)

A Helper is a class that aids in view logic. Much like a component used among controllers, helpers allow presentational logic to be accessed and shared between views. One of the core helpers, JsHelper, makes Ajax requests within views much easier and comes with support for jQuery (default), Prototype and Mootools. Most applications have pieces of view code that are used repeatedly. CakePHP facilitates view code reuse with layouts and elements. By default, every view rendered by a controller is placed inside a layout. Elements are used when small snippets of content need to be reused in multiple views.

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CHAPTER 2

Installation

CakePHP is fast and easy to install. The minimum requirements are a webserver and a copy of Cake, thats it! While this manual focuses primarily on setting up with Apache (because its the most common), you can congure Cake to run on a variety of web servers such as LightHTTPD or Microsoft IIS.

Requirements
HTTP Server. For example: Apache. mod_rewrite is preferred, but by no means required. PHP 5.2.8 or greater. Technically a database engine isnt required, but we imagine that most applications will utilize one. CakePHP supports a variety of database storage engines: MySQL (4 or greater) PostgreSQL Microsoft SQL Server SQLite Note: The built-in drivers all require PDO. You should make sure you have the correct PDO extensions installed.

License
CakePHP is licensed under the MIT license. This means that you are free to modify, distribute and republish the source code on the condition that the copyright notices are left intact. You are also free to incorporate CakePHP into any Commercial or closed source application.

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Downloading CakePHP
There are two main ways to get a fresh copy of CakePHP. You can either download an archive copy (zip/tar.gz/tar.bz2) from the main website, or check out the code from the git repository. To download the latest major release of CakePHP. Visit the main website http://cakephp.org and follow the Download Now link. All current releases of CakePHP are hosted on Github (http://github.com/cakephp/cakephp). Github houses both CakePHP itself as well as many other plugins for CakePHP. The CakePHP releases are available at Github tags (https://github.com/cakephp/cakephp/tags). Alternatively you can get fresh off the press code, with all the bug-xes and up to the minute enhancements. These can be accessed from github by cloning the Github (http://github.com/cakephp/cakephp) repository:
git clone git://github.com/cakephp/cakephp.git

Permissions
CakePHP uses the app/tmp directory for a number of different operations. Model descriptions, cached views, and session information are just a few examples. As such, make sure the directory app/tmp and all its subdirectories in your cake installation are writable by the web server user.

Setup
Setting up CakePHP can be as simple as slapping it in your web servers document root, or as complex and exible as you wish. This section will cover the three main installation types for CakePHP: development, production, and advanced. Development: easy to get going, URLs for the application include the CakePHP installation directory name, and less secure. Production: Requires the ability to congure the web servers document root, clean URLs, very secure. Advanced: With some conguration, allows you to place key CakePHP directories in different parts of the lesystem, possibly sharing a single CakePHP core library folder amongst many CakePHP applications.

Development
A development installation is the fastest method to setup Cake. This example will help you install a CakePHP application and make it available at http://www.example.com/cake_2_0/. We assume for the purposes of this example that your document root is set to /var/www/html.

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Unpack the contents of the Cake archive into /var/www/html. You now have a folder in your document root named after the release youve downloaded (e.g. cake_2.0.0). Rename this folder to cake_2_0. Your development setup will look like this on the le system:
/var/www/html/ cake_2_0/ app/ lib/ plugins/ vendors/ .htaccess index.php README

If your web server is congured correctly, you should now nd your Cake application accessible at http://www.example.com/cake_2_0/.

Using one CakePHP checkout for multiple applications

If you are developing a number of applications, it often makes sense to have them share the same CakePHP core checkout. There are a few ways in which you can accomplish this. Often the easiest is to use PHPs include_path. To start off, clone CakePHP into a directory. For this example, well use ~/projects:
git clone git://github.com/cakephp/cakephp.git ~/projects/cakephp

This will clone CakePHP into your ~/projects directory. If you dont want to use git, you can download a zipball and the remaining steps will be the same. Next youll have to locate and modify your php.ini. On *nix systems this is often in /etc/php.ini, but using php -i and looking for Loaded Conguration File. Once youve found the correct ini le, modify the include_path conguration to include ~/projects/cakephp/lib. An example would look like:
include_path = .:/home/mark/projects/cakephp/lib:/usr/local/php/lib/php

After restarting your webserver, you should see the changes reected in phpinfo(). Note: If you are on windows, separate include paths with ; instead of : Having nished setting up your include_path your applications should be able to nd CakePHP automatically.

Production
A production installation is a more exible way to setup Cake. Using this method allows an entire domain to act as a single CakePHP application. This example will help you install Cake anywhere on your lesystem and make it available at http://www.example.com. Note that this installation may require the rights to change the DocumentRoot on Apache webservers.

Production

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Unpack the contents of the Cake archive into a directory of your choosing. For the purposes of this example, we assume you choose to install Cake into /cake_install. Your production setup will look like this on the lesystem:
/cake_install/ app/ webroot/ (this directory is set as the DocumentRoot directive) lib/ plugins/ vendors/ .htaccess index.php README

Developers using Apache should set the DocumentRoot directive for the domain to:
DocumentRoot /cake_install/app/webroot

If your web server is congured correctly, you should now nd your Cake application accessible at http://www.example.com.

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Advanced Installation
Installing CakePHP with PEAR installer CakePHP publishes a PEAR package that you can install using the pear installer. Installing with the pear installer can simplify sharing CakePHP libraries across multiple applications. To install CakePHP with pear youll need to do the following:
pear channel-discover pear.cakephp.org pear install cakephp/CakePHP

Note: On some systems installing libraries with pear will require sudo. After installing CakePHP with pear, if pear is congured correctly you should be able to use the cake command to create a new application. Since CakePHP will be located on PHPs include_path you wont need to make any other changes. Installing CakePHP with composer Composer is a dependency management tool for PHP 5.3+. It solves many of the problems the PEAR installer has, and simplies managing multiple versions of libraries. Since CakePHP publishes a PEAR package you can install CakePHP using composer (http://getcomposer.org). Before installing CakePHP youll need to setup a composer.json le. An composer.json le for a CakePHP applications would look like the following: 30 Chapter 2. Installation

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{ "name": "example-app", "repositories": [ { "type": "pear", "url": "http://pear.cakephp.org" } ], "require": { "pear-cakephp/cakephp": ">=2.3.4" }, "config": { "vendor-dir": "Vendor/" } }

Save this JSON into composer.json in the root directory of your project. Next download the composer.phar le into your project. After youve downloaded composer, install CakePHP. In the same directory as your composer.json run the following:
$ php composer.phar install

Once composer has nished running you should have a directory structure that looks like:
example-app/ composer.phar composer.json Vendor/ bin/ autoload.php composer/ pear-pear.cakephp.org/

You are now ready to generate the rest of your application skeleton:
$ Vendor/bin/cake bake project <path to project>

By default bake will hard-code CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH. To make your application more portable you should modify webroot/index.php, changing CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH to be a relative path:
define( CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH, ROOT . DS . APP_DIR . /Vendor/pear-pear.cakephp.org/CakePHP );

If youre installing any other libraries with composer, youll need to setup the autoloader, and work around an issue in composers autoloader. In your Config/bootstrap.php le add the following:
// Load composer autoload. require APP . /Vendor/autoload.php; // Remove and re-prepend CakePHPs autoloader as composer thinks it is the most important.

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// See https://github.com/composer/composer/commit/c80cb76b9b5082ecc3e5b53b1050f76bb27b127b spl_autoload_unregister(array(App, load)); spl_autoload_register(array(App, load), true, true);

You should now have a functioning CakePHP application with CakePHP installed via composer. Be sure to keep the composer.json and composer.lock le with the rest of your source code. Sharing CakePHP libraries with multiple applications There may be some situations where you wish to place CakePHPs directories on different places on the lesystem. This may be due to a shared host restriction, or maybe you just want a few of your apps to share the same Cake libraries. This section describes how to spread your CakePHP directories across a lesystem. First, realize that there are three main parts to a Cake application: 1. The core CakePHP libraries, in /lib/Cake. 2. Your application code, in /app. 3. The applications webroot, usually in /app/webroot. Each of these directories can be located anywhere on your le system, with the exception of the webroot, which needs to be accessible by your web server. You can even move the webroot folder out of the app folder as long as you tell Cake where youve put it. To congure your Cake installation, youll need to make some changes to the following les. /app/webroot/index.php /app/webroot/test.php (if you use the Testing feature.) There are three constants that youll need to edit: ROOT, APP_DIR, and CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH. ROOT should be set to the path of the directory that contains your app folder. APP_DIR should be set to the (base)name of your app folder. CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH should be set to the path of your CakePHP libraries folder. Lets run through an example so you can see what an advanced installation might look like in practice. Imagine that I wanted to set up CakePHP to work as follows: The CakePHP core libraries will be placed in /usr/lib/cake. My applications webroot directory will be /var/www/mysite/. My applications app directory will be /home/me/myapp. Given this type of setup, I would need to edit my webroot/index.php le (which will end up at /var/www/mysite/index.php, in this example) to look like the following:
// /app/webroot/index.php (partial, comments removed) if (!defined(ROOT)) { define(ROOT, DS . home . DS . me); }

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if (!defined(APP_DIR)) { define (APP_DIR, myapp); } if (!defined(CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH)) { define(CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH, DS . usr . DS . lib); }

It is recommended to use the DS constant rather than slashes to delimit le paths. This prevents any missing le errors you might get as a result of using the wrong delimiter, and it makes your code more portable. Apache and mod_rewrite (and .htaccess) This section was moved to URL rewriting.

URL Rewriting
Apache and mod_rewrite (and .htaccess) While CakePHP is built to work with mod_rewrite out of the boxand usually doesweve noticed that a few users struggle with getting everything to play nicely on their systems. Here are a few things you might try to get it running correctly. First look at your httpd.conf (Make sure you are editing the system httpd.conf rather than a user- or site-specic httpd.conf). 1. Make sure that an .htaccess override is allowed and that AllowOverride is set to All for the correct DocumentRoot. You should see something similar to:
# Each directory to which Apache has access can be configured with respect # to which services and features are allowed and/or disabled in that # directory (and its subdirectories). # # First, we configure the "default" to be a very restrictive set of # features. # <Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride All # Order deny,allow # Deny from all </Directory>

2. Make sure you are loading up mod_rewrite correctly. You should see something like:
LoadModule rewrite_module libexec/apache2/mod_rewrite.so

In many systems these will be commented out (by being prepended with a #) by default, so you may just need to remove those leading # symbols. After you make changes, restart Apache to make sure the settings are active.

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Verify that you your .htaccess les are actually in the right directories. This can happen during copying because some operating systems treat les that start with . as hidden and therefore wont see them to copy. 3. Make sure your copy of CakePHP is from the downloads section of the site or our GIT repository, and has been unpacked correctly by checking for .htaccess les. Cake root directory (needs to be copied to your document, this redirects everything to your Cake app):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^ $ app/webroot/ RewriteRule </IfModule>

[L]

(.*) app/webroot/ $ 1 [L]

Cake app directory (will be copied to the top directory of your application by bake):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^$ webroot/ RewriteRule </IfModule> (.*) webroot/ $ 1

[L] [L]

Cake webroot directory (will be copied to your applications web root by bake):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

If your CakePHP site still has problems with mod_rewrite you might want to try and modify settings for virtualhosts. If on ubuntu, edit the le /etc/apache2/sites-available/default (location is distribution dependent). In this le, ensure that AllowOverride None is changed to AllowOverride All, so you have:
<Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride All </Directory> <Directory /var/www> Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews AllowOverride All Order Allow,Deny Allow from all </Directory>

If on Mac OSX, another solution is to use the tool virtualhostx to make a virtual host to point to your folder. For many hosting services (GoDaddy, 1and1), your web server is actually being served from a user directory that already uses mod_rewrite. If you are installing CakePHP into a user directory (http://example.com/~username/cakephp/), or any other URL structure that already utilizes 34 Chapter 2. Installation

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mod_rewrite, youll need to add RewriteBase statements to the .htaccess les CakePHP uses (/.htaccess, /app/.htaccess, /app/webroot/.htaccess). This can be added to the same section with the RewriteEngine directive, so for example your webroot .htaccess le would look like:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase /path/to/cake/app RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

The details of those changes will depend on your setup, and can include additional things that are not Cake related. Please refer to Apaches online documentation for more information. 4. (Optional) To improve production setup, you should prevent invalid assets from being parsed by CakePHP. Modify your webroot .htaccess to something like:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase /path/to/cake/app RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/(app/webroot/)?(img|css|js)/(.*) $ RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

The above will simply prevent incorrect assets from being sent to index.php and instead display your webservers 404 page. Additionally you can create a matching HTML 404 page, or use the default built-in CakePHP 404 by adding an ErrorDocument directive:
ErrorDocument 404 /404-not-found

Pretty URLs on nginx nginx is a popular server that uses less system resources than Apache. Its drawback is that it does not make use of .htaccess les like Apache, so it is necessary to create those rewritten URLs in the site-available conguration. Depending upon your setup, you will have to modify this, but at the very least, you will need PHP running as a FastCGI instance.
server { listen 80; server_name www.example.com; rewrite ^(.*) http://example.com $ 1 permanent; } server { listen 80; server_name example.com;

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# root directive should be global root /var/www/example.com/public/app/webroot/; index index.php; access_log /var/www/example.com/log/access.log; error_log /var/www/example.com/log/error.log; location / { try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$uri&$args; } location ~ \.php $ { try_files $uri =404; include /etc/nginx/fastcgi_params; fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000; fastcgi_index index.php; fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name; } }

URL Rewrites on IIS7 (Windows hosts) IIS7 does not natively support .htaccess les. While there are add-ons that can add this support, you can also import htaccess rules into IIS to use CakePHPs native rewrites. To do this, follow these steps: 1. Use Microsofts Web Platform Installer (http://www.microsoft.com/web/downloads/platform.aspx) to install the URL Rewrite Module 2.0 (http://www.iis.net/downloads/microsoft/url-rewrite) or download it directly (32-bit (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5747) / 64-bit (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=7435)). 2. Create a new le in your CakePHP root folder, called web.cong. 3. Using Notepad or any XML-safe editor and copy the following code into your new web.cong le...

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <configuration> <system.webServer> <rewrite> <rules> <rule name="Rewrite requests to test.php" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^test.php(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="app/webroot/test.php{R:1}" /> </rule> <rule name="Exclude direct access to app/webroot/*" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^app/webroot/(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="None" /> </rule> <rule name="Rewrite routed access to assets (img, css, files, js, favicon)" <match url="^(img|css|files|js|favicon.ico)(.*)$" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="app/webroot/{R:1}{R:2}" appendQueryString=" </rule> <rule name="Rewrite requested file/folder to index.php" stopProcessing="tru

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<match url="^(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="index.php" appendQueryString="true" /> </rule> </rules> </rewrite> </system.webServer> </configuration>

Once the web.cong le is created with the correct IIS-friendly rewrite rules, CakePHPs links, css, js, and rerouting should work correctly. I dont / cant use URL rewriting If you dont want to or cant use URL rewriting on your webserver, refer to the core conguration.

Fire It Up
Alright, lets see CakePHP in action. Depending on which setup you used, you should point your browser to http://example.com/ or http://example.com/cake_install/. At this point, youll be presented with CakePHPs default home, and a message that tells you the status of your current database connection. Congratulations! You are ready to create your rst CakePHP application. Not working? If youre getting timezone related error from PHP uncomment one line in app/Config/core.php:
/** * Uncomment this line and correct your server timezone to fix * any date & time related errors. */ date_default_timezone_set(UTC);

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CHAPTER 3

CakePHP Overview

Welcome to the Cookbook, the manual for the CakePHP web application framework that makes developing a piece of cake! This manual assumes that you have a general understanding of PHP and a basic understanding of objectoriented programming (OOP). Different functionality within the framework makes use of different technologies such as SQL, JavaScript, and XML and this manual does not attempt to explain those technologies, only how they are used in context.

What is CakePHP? Why Use it?

CakePHP (http://www.cakephp.org/) is a free (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License), open-source (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source), rapid development (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_application_development) framework (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application_framework) for PHP (http://www.php.net/). Its a foundational structure for programmers to create web applications. Our primary goal is to enable you to work in a structured and rapid mannerwithout loss of exibility. CakePHP takes the monotony out of web development. We provide you with all the tools you need to get started coding what you really need to get done: the logic specic to your application. Instead of reinventing the wheel every time you sit down to a new project, check out a copy of CakePHP and get started with the real guts of your application. CakePHP has an active developer team (https://github.com/cakephp?tab=members) and community, bringing great value to the project. In addition to keeping you from wheel-reinventing, using CakePHP means your applications core is well tested and is being constantly improved. Heres a quick list of features youll enjoy when using CakePHP: Active, friendly community (http://cakephp.org/feeds) Flexible licensing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License) Compatible with versions PHP 5.2.8 and greater.

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Integrated CRUD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Create,_read,_update_and_delete) for database interaction. Application scaffolding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaffold_(programming)). Code generation. MVC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-view-controller) architecture. Request dispatcher with clean, custom URLs and routes. Built-in validation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_validation). Fast and exible templating (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_template_system) (PHP syntax, with helpers). View Helpers for AJAX, JavaScript, HTML Forms and more. Email, Cookie, Security, Session, and Request Handling Components. Flexible ACL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Access_control_list). Data Sanitization. Flexible Caching (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_cache). Localization. Works from any web site directory, with little to no Apache (http://httpd.apache.org/) conguration involved.

Understanding Model-View-Controller
CakePHP follows the MVC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-view-controller) software design pattern. Programming using MVC separates your application into three main parts:

The Model layer

The Model layer represents the part of your application that implements the business logic. It is responsible for retrieving data and converting it into meaningful concepts for your application. This includes processing, validating, associating or other tasks related to handling data. At a rst glance, Model objects can be looked at as the rst layer of interaction with any database you might be using for your application. But in general they stand for the major concepts around which you implement your application. In the case of a social network, the Model layer would take care of tasks such as Saving the user data, saving friends associations, storing and retrieving user photos, nding new friends for suggestions, etc. While the model objects can be thought as Friend, User, Comment, or Photo.

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The View layer

The View renders a presentation of modeled data. Being separated from the Model objects, it is responsible for using the information it has available to produce any presentational interface your application might need. For example, as the Model layer returns a set of data, the view would use it to render a HTML page containing it. Or a XML formatted result for others to consume. The View layer is not only limited to HTML or text representation of the data, it can be used to deliver a wide variety of formats depending on your needs, such as videos, music, documents and any other format you can think of.

The Controller layer

The Controller layer handles requests from users. Its responsible for rendering back a response with the aid of both the Model and the View Layer. Controllers can be seen as managers taking care that all needed resources for completing a task are delegated to the correct workers. It waits for petitions from clients, checks their validity according to authentication or authorization rules, delegates data fetching or processing to the model, and selects the correct type of presentational data that the client is accepting, to nally delegate this rendering process to the View layer.

CakePHP request cycle

Figure: 1: A typical MVC Request in CakePHP The typical CakePHP request cycle starts with a user requesting a page or resource in your application. This request is rst processed by a dispatcher which will select the correct controller object to handle it. Once the request arrives at the controller, it will communicate with the Model layer to process any data fetching or saving operation that might be needed. After this communication is over, the controller will

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proceed at delegating to the correct view object the task of generating an output resulting from the data provided by the model. Finally, when this output is generated, it is immediately rendered to the user Almost every request to your application will follow this basic pattern. Well add some details later on which are specic to CakePHP, so keep this in mind as we proceed.

Benets
Why use MVC? Because it is a tried and true software design pattern that turns an application into a maintainable, modular, rapidly developed package. Crafting application tasks into separate models, views, and controllers makes your application very light on its feet. New features are easily added, and new faces on old features are a snap. The modular and separate design also allows developers and designers to work simultaneously, including the ability to rapidly prototype (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_prototyping). Separation also allows developers to make changes in one part of the application without affecting the others. If youve never built an application this way, it takes some time getting used to, but were condent that once youve built your rst application using CakePHP, you wont want to do it any other way. To get started on your rst CakePHP application, try the blog tutorial now

Where to Get Help

The Ofcial CakePHP website
http://www.cakephp.org The Ofcial CakePHP website is always a great place to visit. It features links to oft-used developer tools, screencasts, donation opportunities, and downloads.

The Cookbook
http://book.cakephp.org This manual should probably be the rst place you go to get answers. As with many other open source projects, we get new folks regularly. Try your best to answer your questions on your own rst. Answers may come slower, but will remain longer and youll also be lightening our support load. Both the manual and the API have an online component.

The Bakery
http://bakery.cakephp.org The CakePHP Bakery is a clearing house for all things CakePHP. Check it out for tutorials, case studies, and code examples. Once youre acquainted with CakePHP, log on and share your knowledge with the community and gain instant fame and fortune. 42 Chapter 3. CakePHP Overview

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The API
http://api20.cakephp.org/ Straight to the point and straight from the core developers, the CakePHP API (Application Programming Interface) is the most comprehensive documentation around for all the nitty gritty details of the internal workings of the framework. Its a straight forward code reference, so bring your propeller hat.

The Test Cases

If you ever feel the information provided in the API is not sufcient, check out the code of the test cases provided with CakePHP. They can serve as practical examples for function and data member usage for a class.:
lib/Cake/Test/Case

The IRC channel

IRC Channels on irc.freenode.net: #cakephp General Discussion #cakephp-docs Documentation #cakephp-bakery Bakery If youre stumped, give us a holler in the CakePHP IRC channel. Someone from the development team (https://github.com/cakephp?tab=members) is usually there, especially during the daylight hours for North and South America users. Wed love to hear from you, whether you need some help, want to nd users in your area, or would like to donate your brand new sports car.

The Google Group

http://groups.google.com/group/cake-php CakePHP also has a very active Google Group. It can be a great resource for nding archived answers, frequently asked questions, and getting answers to immediate problems.

CakePHP Questions
http://ask.cakephp.org/ Simply register/login and ask a question. Wait until youve got some answers and pick the correct answer. You can view, comment and vote on previously asked and solved questions as well.

Where to Get Help

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CHAPTER 4

Controllers

Controllers are the C in MVC. After routing has been applied and the correct controller has been found, your controllers action is called. Your controller should handle interpreting the request data, making sure the correct models are called, and the right response or view is rendered. Controllers can be thought of as middle man between the Model and View. You want to keep your controllers thin, and your models fat. This will help you more easily reuse your code and makes your code easier to test. Commonly, controllers are used to manage the logic around a single model. For example, if you were building a site for an on-line bakery, you might have a RecipesController and an IngredientsController managing your recipes and their ingredients. In CakePHP, controllers are named after the primary model they handle. Its totally possible to have controllers work with more than one model as well. Your applications controllers extend AppController class, which in turn extends the core Controller class. The AppController class can be dened in /app/Controller/AppController.php and it should contain methods that are shared between all of your applications controllers. Controllers provide a number of methods which are called actions. Actions are methods on a controller that handle requests. By default all public methods on a controller are an action, and accessible from a url. Actions are responsible for interpreting the request and creating the response. Usually responses are in the form of a rendered view, but there are other ways to create responses as well.

The App Controller

As stated in the introduction, the AppController class is the parent class to all of your applications controllers. AppController itself extends the Controller class included in the CakePHP core library. As such, AppController is dened in /app/Controller/AppController.php like so:
class AppController extends Controller { }

Controller attributes and methods created in your AppController will be available to all of your applications controllers. It is the ideal place to create code that is common to all of your controllers. Components (which youll learn about later) are best used for code that is used in many (but not necessarily all) controllers. 45

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While normal object-oriented inheritance rules apply, CakePHP does a bit of extra work when it comes to special controller attributes. The list of components and helpers used by a controller are treated specially. In these cases, AppController value arrays are merged with child controller class arrays. The values in the child class will always override those in AppController. Note: CakePHP merges the following variables from the AppController to your applications controllers: $components $helpers $uses Remember to add the default Html and Form helpers, if you dene var $helpers in your AppController Please also remember to call AppControllers callbacks within child controller callbacks for best results:
public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); }

Request parameters
When a request is made to a CakePHP application, CakePHPs Router and Dispatcher classes use Routes Conguration to nd and create the correct controller. The request data is encapsulated into a request object. CakePHP puts all of the important request information into the $this->request property. See the section on CakeRequest for more information on the CakePHP request object.

Controller actions
Controller actions are responsible for converting the request parameters into a response for the browser/user making the request. CakePHP uses conventions to automate this process and remove some boiler-plate code you would otherwise need to write. By convention CakePHP renders a view with an inected version of the action name. Returning to our online bakery example, our RecipesController might contain the view(), share(), and search() actions. The controller would be found in /app/Controller/RecipesController.php and contain:
# /app/Controller/RecipesController.php class RecipesController extends AppController { public function view($id) { //action logic goes here.. } public function share($customerId, $recipeId) { //action logic goes here.. }

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public function search($query) { //action logic goes here.. } }

The view les for these actions would be app/View/Recipes/view.ctp, app/View/Recipes/share.ctp, and app/View/Recipes/search.ctp. The conventional view le name is the lower cased and underscored version of the action name. Controller actions generally use set() to create a context that View uses to render the view. Because of the conventions that CakePHP uses, you dont need to create and render the view manually. Instead once a controller action has completed, CakePHP will handle rendering and delivering the View. If for some reason youd like to skip the default behavior. Both of the following techniques will by-pass the default view rendering behavior. If you return a string, or an object that can be converted to a string from your controller action, it will be used as the response body. You can return a CakeResponse object with the completely created response. When controller methods are used with requestAction() you will often want to return data that isnt a string. If you have controller methods that are used for normal web requests + requestAction you should check the request type before returning:
class RecipesController extends AppController { public function popular() { $popular = $this->Recipe->popular(); if (!empty($this->request->params[requested])) { return $popular; } $this->set(popular, $popular); } }

The above controller action is an example of how a method can be used with requestAction() and normal requests. Returning an array data to a non-requestAction request will cause errors and should be avoided. See the section on Controller::requestAction() for more tips on using requestAction() In order for you to use a controller effectively in your own application, well cover some of the core attributes and methods provided by CakePHPs controllers.

Request Life-cycle callbacks

class Controller CakePHP controllers come tted with callbacks you can use to insert logic around the request life-cycle: Controller::beforeFilter() This function is executed before every action in the controller. Its a handy place to check for an active session or inspect user permissions. Request Life-cycle callbacks 47

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Note: The beforeFilter() method will be called for missing actions, and scaffolded actions. Controller::beforeRender() Called after controller action logic, but before the view is rendered. This callback is not used often, but may be needed if you are calling render() manually before the end of a given action. Controller::afterFilter() Called after every controller action, and after rendering is complete. This is the last controller method to run. In addition to controller life-cycle callbacks, Components also provide a similar set of callbacks.

Controller Methods
For a complete list of controller methods and their descriptions visit the CakePHP API. Check out http://api20.cakephp.org/class/controller.

Interacting with Views

Controllers interact with the view in a number of ways. First they are able to pass data to the views, using set(). You can also decide which view class to use, and which view le should be rendered from the controller. Controller::set(string $var, mixed $value) The set() method is the main way to send data from your controller to your view. Once youve used set(), the variable can be accessed in your view:
// First you pass data from the controller: $this->set(color, pink); // Then, in the view, you can utilize the data: ?> You have selected <?php echo $color; ?> icing for the cake.

The set() method also takes an associative array as its rst parameter. This can often be a quick way to assign a set of information to the view. Changed in version 1.3: Array keys will no longer be inected before they are assigned to the view (underscored_key does not become underscoredKey anymore, etc.):
$data = array( color => pink, type => sugar, base_price => 23.95 ); // make $color, $type, and $base_price

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// available to the view: $this->set($data);

The attribute $pageTitle no longer exists, use set() to set the title:
$this->set(title_for_layout, This is the page title);

Controller::render(string $view, string $layout) The render() method is automatically called at the end of each requested controller action. This method performs all the view logic (using the data youve given in using the set() method), places the view inside its layout and serves it back to the end user. The default view le used by render is determined by convention. If the search() action of the RecipesController is requested, the view le in /app/View/Recipes/search.ctp will be rendered:
class RecipesController extends AppController { // ... public function search() { // Render the view in /View/Recipes/search.ctp $this->render(); } // ... }

Although CakePHP will automatically call it (unless youve set $this->autoRender to false) after every actions logic, you can use it to specify an alternate view le by specifying an action name in the controller using $action. If $view starts with / it is assumed to be a view or element le relative to the /app/View folder. This allows direct rendering of elements, very useful in ajax calls.
// Render the element in /View/Elements/ajaxreturn.ctp $this->render(/Elements/ajaxreturn);

The $layout parameter allows you to specify the layout the view is rendered in. Rendering a specic view In your controller you may want to render a different view than what would conventionally be done. You can do this by calling render() directly. Once you have called render() CakePHP will not try to re-render the view:
class PostsController extends AppController { public function my_action() { $this->render(custom_file); } }

This would render app/View/Posts/custom_file.ctp app/View/Posts/my_action.ctp

instead

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You can also render views inside plugins using the following syntax: $this->render(PluginName.PluginController/custom_file). For example:
class PostsController extends AppController { public function my_action() { $this->render(Users.UserDetails/custom_file); } }

This would render app/Plugin/Users/View/UserDetails/custom_file.ctp

Flow Control
Controller::redirect(mixed $url, integer $status, boolean $exit) The ow control method youll use most often is redirect(). This method takes its rst parameter in the form of a CakePHP-relative URL. When a user has successfully placed an order, you might wish to redirect them to a receipt screen.:
public function place_order() { // Logic for finalizing order goes here if ($success) { $this->redirect(array(controller => orders, action => thanks)); } else { $this->redirect(array(controller => orders, action => confirm)); } }

You can also use a relative or absolute URL as the $url argument:
$this->redirect(/orders/thanks)); $this->redirect(http://www.example.com);

You can also pass data to the action:

$this->redirect(array(action => edit, $id));

The second parameter of redirect() allows you to dene an HTTP status code to accompany the redirect. You may want to use 301 (moved permanently) or 303 (see other), depending on the nature of the redirect. The method will issue an exit() after the redirect unless you set the third parameter to false. If you need to redirect to the referer page you can use:
$this->redirect($this->referer());

The method also supports name based parameters. If you want to redirect to a URL like: http://www.example.com/orders/confirm/product:pizza/quantity:5 you can use:

$this->redirect(array(controller => orders, action => confirm, product => p

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Controller::flash(string $message, string|array $url, integer $pause, string $layout) Like redirect(), the flash() method is used to direct a user to a new page after an operation. The flash() method is different in that it shows a message before passing the user on to another URL. The rst parameter should hold the message to be displayed, and the second parameter is a CakePHPrelative URL. CakePHP will display the $message for $pause seconds before forwarding the user on. If theres a particular template youd like your ashed message to use, you may specify the name of that layout in the $layout parameter. For in-page ash messages, be sure to check out SessionComponents setFlash() method.

Callbacks
In addition to the Request Life-cycle callbacks. CakePHP also supports callbacks related to scaffolding. Controller::beforeScaffold($method) $method name of method called example index, edit, etc. Controller::afterScaffoldSave($method) $method name of method called either edit or update. Controller::afterScaffoldSaveError($method) $method name of method called either edit or update. Controller::scaffoldError($method) $method name of method called example index, edit, etc.

Other Useful Methods

Controller::constructClasses() This method loads the models required by the controller. This loading process is done by CakePHP normally, but this method is handy to have when accessing controllers from a different perspective. If you need CakePHP in a command-line script or some other outside use, constructClasses() may come in handy. Controller::referer(mixed $default = null, boolean $local = false) Returns the referring URL for the current request. Parameter $default can be used to supply a default URL to use if HTTP_REFERER cannot be read from headers. So, instead of doing this:
class UserController extends AppController { public function delete($id) { // delete code goes here, and then... if ($this->referer() != /) { $this->redirect($this->referer()); } else { $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } } }

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you can do this:

class UserController extends AppController { public function delete($id) { // delete code goes here, and then... $this->redirect($this->referer(array(action => index))); } }

If $default is not set, the function defaults to the root of your domain - /. Parameter $local if set to true, restricts referring URLs to local server. Controller::disableCache() Used to tell the users browser not to cache the results of the current request. This is different than view caching, covered in a later chapter. The headers sent to this effect are:
Expires: Mon, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT Last-Modified: [current datetime] GMT Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate Cache-Control: post-check=0, pre-check=0 Pragma: no-cache

Controller::postConditions(array $data, mixed $op, string $bool, boolean $exclusive) Use this method to turn a set of POSTed model data (from HtmlHelper-compatible inputs) into a set of nd conditions for a model. This function offers a quick shortcut on building search logic. For example, an administrative user may want to be able to search orders in order to know which items need to be shipped. You can use CakePHPs FormHelper and HtmlHelper to create a quick form based on the Order model. Then a controller action can use the data posted from that form to craft nd conditions:
public function index() { $conditions = $this->postConditions($this->request->data); $orders = $this->Order->find(all, compact(conditions)); $this->set(orders, $orders); }

If $this->request->data[Order][destination] equals Old Towne Bakery, postConditions converts that condition to an array compatible for use in a Model->nd() method. In this case, array(Order.destination => Old Towne Bakery). If you want to use a different SQL operator between terms, supply them using the second parameter:
/* Contents of $this->request->data array( Order => array( num_items => 4, referrer => Ye Olde ) ) */

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// Lets get orders that have at least 4 items and contain Ye Olde $conditions = $this->postConditions( $this->request->data, array( num_items => >=, referrer => LIKE ) ); $orders = $this->Order->find(all, compact(conditions));

The third parameter allows you to tell CakePHP what SQL boolean operator to use between the nd conditions. Strings like AND, OR and XOR are all valid values. Finally, if the last parameter is set to true, and the $op parameter is an array, elds not included in $op will not be included in the returned conditions. Controller::paginate() This method is used for paginating results fetched by your models. You can specify page sizes, model nd conditions and more. See the pagination section for more details on how to use paginate. Controller::requestAction(string $url, array $options) This function calls a controllers action from any location and returns data from the action. The $url passed is a CakePHP-relative URL (/controllername/actionname/params). To pass extra data to the receiving controller action add to the $options array. Note: You can use requestAction() to retrieve a fully rendered view by passing return in the options: requestAction($url, array(return));. It is important to note that making a requestAction using return from a controller method can cause script and css tags to not work correctly. Warning: If used without caching requestAction can lead to poor performance. It is rarely appropriate to use in a controller or model. requestAction is best used in conjunction with (cached) elements as a way to fetch data for an element before rendering. Lets use the example of putting a latest comments element in the layout. First we need to create a controller function that will return the data:

// Controller/CommentsController.php class CommentsController extends AppController { public function latest() { if (empty($this->request->params[requested])) { throw new ForbiddenException(); } return $this->Comment->find(all, array(order => Comment.created DESC, l } }

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If we now create a simple element to call that function:

// View/Elements/latest_comments.ctp $comments = $this->requestAction(/comments/latest); foreach ($comments as $comment) { echo $comment[Comment][title]; }

We can then place that element anywhere to get the output using:
echo $this->element(latest_comments);

Written in this way, whenever the element is rendered, a request will be made to the controller to get the data, the data will be processed, and returned. However in accordance with the warning above its best to make use of element caching to prevent needless processing. By modifying the call to element to look like this:
echo $this->element(latest_comments, array(), array(cache => true));

The requestAction call will not be made while the cached element view le exists and is valid. In addition, requestAction now takes array based cake style urls:
echo $this->requestAction( array(controller => articles, action => featured), array(return) );

This allows the requestAction call to bypass the usage of Router::url which can increase performance. The url based arrays are the same as the ones that HtmlHelper::link() uses with one difference - if you are using named or passed parameters, you must put them in a second array and wrap them with the correct key. This is because requestAction merges the named args array (requestActions 2nd parameter) with the Controller::params member array and does not explicitly place the named args array into the key named; Additional members in the $option array will also be made available in the requested actions Controller::params array:
echo $this->requestAction(/articles/featured/limit:3); echo $this->requestAction(/articles/view/5);

As an array in the requestAction would then be:

echo $this->requestAction( array(controller => articles, action => featured), array(named => array(limit => 3)) ); echo $this->requestAction( array(controller => articles, action => view), array(pass => array(5)) );

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Note: Unlike other places where array urls are analogous to string urls, requestAction treats them differently. When using an array url in conjunction with requestAction() you must specify all parameters that you will need in the requested action. This includes parameters like $this->request->data. In addition to passing all required parameters, named and pass parameters must be done in the second array as seen above. Controller::loadModel(string $modelClass, mixed $id) The loadModel function comes handy when you need to use a model which is not the controllers default model or its associated model:

$this->loadModel(Article); $recentArticles = $this->Article->find(all, array(limit => 5, order => Article. $this->loadModel(User, 2); $user = $this->User->read();

Controller Attributes
For a complete list of controller attributes and their descriptions visit the CakePHP API. Check out http://api20.cakephp.org/class/controller. property Controller::$name The $name attribute should be set to the name of the controller. Usually this is just the plural form of the primary model the controller uses. This property can be omitted, but saves CakePHP from inecting it:
// $name controller attribute usage example class RecipesController extends AppController { public $name = Recipes; }

$components, $helpers and $uses

The next most often used controller attributes tell CakePHP what helpers, components, and models youll be using in conjunction with the current controller. Using these attributes make MVC classes given by $components and $uses available to the controller as class variables ($this->ModelName, for example) and those given by $helpers to the view as an object reference variable ($this->{$helpername}). Note: Each controller has some of these classes available by default, so you may not need to congure your controller at all. property Controller::$uses Controllers have access to their primary model available by default. Our RecipesController will have the Recipe model class available at $this->Recipe, and our ProductsController also features the Controller Attributes 55

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Product model at $this->Product. However, when allowing a controller to access additional models through the $uses variable, the name of the current controllers model must also be included. This is illustrated in the example below. If you do not wish to use a Model in your controller, set public $uses = array(). This will allow you to use a controller without a need for a corresponding Model le. However, the models dened in the AppController will still be loaded. You can also use false to not load any models at all. Even those dened in the AppController. Changed in version 2.1: Uses now has a new default value, it also handles false differently. property Controller::$helpers The Html, Form, and Session Helpers are available by default, as is the SessionComponent. But if you choose to dene your own $helpers array in AppController, make sure to include Html and Form if you want them still available by default in your Controllers. To learn more about these classes, be sure to check out their respective sections later in this manual. Lets look at how to tell a CakePHP controller that you plan to use additional MVC classes:
class RecipesController extends AppController { public $uses = array(Recipe, User); public $helpers = array(Js); public $components = array(RequestHandler); }

Each of these variables are merged with their inherited values, therefore it is not necessary (for example) to redeclare the Form helper, or anything that is declared in your App controller. property Controller::$components The components array allows you to set which Components a controller will use. Like $helpers and $uses components in your controllers are merged with those in AppController. As with $helpers you can pass settings into components. See Conguring Components for more information.

Other Attributes
While you can check out the details for all controller attributes in the API, there are other controller attributes that merit their own sections in the manual.

More on controllers
Request and Response objects
New in CakePHP 2.0 are request and response objects. In previous versions these objects were represented through arrays, and the related methods were spread across RequestHandlerComponent, Router, Dispatcher and Controller. There was no authoritative object on what information the request contained. For 2.0, CakeRequest and CakeResponse are used for this purpose.

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CakeRequest
CakeRequest is the default request object used in CakePHP. It centralizes a number of features for interrogating and interacting with request data. On each request one CakeRequest is created and then passed by reference to the various layers of an application that use request data. By default CakeRequest is assigned to $this->request, and is available in Controller, Views and Helpers. You can also access it in Components by using the controller reference. Some of the duties CakeRequest performs include: Process the GET, POST, and FILES arrays into the data structures you are familiar with. Provide environment introspection pertaining to the request. Things like the headers sent, the clients IP address, and the subdomain/domain information about the application the server is running on. Provide access to request parameters both as array indices and object properties. Accessing request parameters CakeRequest exposes several interfaces for accessing request parameters. The rst is as object properties, the second is array indexes, and the third is through $this->request->params:
$this->request->controller; $this->request[controller]; $this->request->params[controller];

All of the above will both access the same value. Multiple ways of accessing the parameters was done to ease migration for existing applications. All Route elements are accessed through this interface. In addition to Route elements you also often need access to Passed arguments and Named parameters. These are both available on the request object as well:
// Passed arguments $this->request->pass; $this->request[pass]; $this->request->params[pass]; // named parameters $this->request->named; $this->request[named]; $this->request->params[named];

Will all provide you access to the passed arguments and named parameters. There are several important/useful parameters that CakePHP uses internally, these are also all found in the request parameters: plugin The plugin handling the request, will be null for no plugin. controller The controller handling the current request. action The action handling the current request. prefix The prex for the current action. See Prex Routing for more information. bare Present when the request came from requestAction() and included the bare option. Bare requests do not have layouts rendered.

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requested Present and set to true when the action came from requestAction. Accessing Querystring parameters Querystring parameters can be read from using CakeRequest::$query:
// url is /posts/index?page=1&sort=title $this->request->query[page]; // You can also access it via array access $this->request[url][page]; // BC accessor, will be deprecated in future versions

You can either directly access the query property, or you can use CakeRequest::query() to read the url query array in an error free manner. Any keys that do not exist will return null:
$foo = $this->request->query(value_that_does_not_exist); // $foo === null

Accessing POST data All POST data can be accessed using CakeRequest::$data. Any form data that contains a data prex, will have that data prex removed. For example:
// An input with a name attribute equal to data[MyModel][title] is accessible at $this->request->data[MyModel][title];

You can either directly access the data property, or you can use CakeRequest::data() to read the data array in an error free manner. Any keys that do not exist will return null:
$foo = $this->request->data(Value.that.does.not.exist); // $foo == null

Accessing PUT or POST data New in version 2.2. When building REST services you often accept request data on PUT and DELETE requests. As of 2.2 any application/x-www-form-urlencoded request body data will automatically be parsed and set to $this->data for PUT and DELETE requests. If you are accepting JSON or XML data, see below for how you can access those request bodies. Accessing XML or JSON data Applications employing REST often exchange data in non URL encoded post bodies. You can read input data in any format using CakeRequest::input(). By providing a decoding function you can receive the content in a deserialized format:
// Get JSON encoded data submitted to a PUT/POST action $data = $this->request->input(json_decode);

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Since some deserializing methods require additional parameters when being called, such as the as array parameter on json_decode or if you want XML converted into a DOMDocument object, CakeRequest::input() supports passing in additional parameters as well:
// Get Xml encoded data submitted to a PUT/POST action $data = $this->request->input(Xml::build, array(return => domdocument));

Accessing path information CakeRequest also provides useful information about the paths in your application. CakeRequest::$base and CakeRequest::$webroot are useful for generating urls, and determining whether or not your application is in a subdirectory. Inspecting the request Detecting various request conditions used to require using RequestHandlerComponent. These methods have been moved to CakeRequest, and offer a new interface alongside a more backwards compatible usage:
$this->request->is(post); $this->request->isPost();

Both method calls will return the same value. For the time being the methods are still available on RequestHandler, but are deprecated and still might be removed before the nal release. You can also easily extend the request detectors that are available, by using CakeRequest::addDetector() to create new kinds of detectors. There are four different types of detectors that you can create: Environment value comparison - An environment value comparison, compares a value fetched from env() to a known value the environment value is equality checked against the provided value. Pattern value comparison - Pattern value comparison allows you to compare a value fetched from env() to a regular expression. Option based comparison - Option based comparisons use a list of options to create a regular expression. Subsequent calls to add an already dened options detector will merge the options. Callback detectors - Callback detectors allow you to provide a callback type to handle the check. The callback will receive the request object as its only parameter. Some examples would be:
// Add an environment detector. $this->request->addDetector(post, array(env => REQUEST_METHOD, value => POST));

// Add a pattern value detector. $this->request->addDetector(iphone, array(env => HTTP_USER_AGENT, pattern => /iPho // Add an option detector $this->request->addDetector(internalIp, array( env => CLIENT_IP, options => array(192.168.0.101, 192.168.0.100)

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)); // Add a callback detector. Can either be an anonymous function or a regular callable. $this->request->addDetector(awesome, array(callback => function ($request) { return isset($request->awesome); }));

CakeRequest also includes methods like CakeRequest::domain(), CakeRequest::subdomains() and CakeRequest::host() to help applications with subdomains, have a slightly easier life. There are several built-in detectors that you can use: is(get) Check to see if the current request is a GET. is(put) Check to see if the current request is a PUT. is(post) Check to see if the current request is a POST. is(delete) Check to see if the current request is a DELETE. is(head) Check to see if the current request is HEAD. is(options) Check to see if the current request is OPTIONS. is(ajax) Check to see of the current request came with X-Requested-with = XmlHttpRequest. is(ssl) Check to see if the request is via SSL is(flash) Check to see if the request has a User-Agent of Flash is(mobile) Check to see if the request came from a common list of mobile agents. CakeRequest and RequestHandlerComponent Since many of the features CakeRequest offers used to be the realm of RequestHandlerComponent some rethinking was required to gure out how it still ts into the picture. For 2.0, RequestHandlerComponent acts as a sugar daddy. Providing a layer of sugar on top of the utility CakeRequest affords. Sugar like switching layout and views based on content types or ajax is the domain of RequestHandlerComponent. This separation of utility and sugar between the two classes lets you more easily pick and choose what you want and what you need. Interacting with other aspects of the request You can use CakeRequest to introspect a variety of things about the request. Beyond the detectors, you can also nd out other information from various properties and methods. $this->request->webroot contains the webroot directory. $this->request->base contains the base path. $this->request->here contains the full address to the current request $this->request->query contains the query string parameters.

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CakeRequest API class CakeRequest CakeRequest encapsulates request parameter handling, and introspection. CakeRequest::domain($tldLength = 1) Returns the domain name your application is running on. CakeRequest::subdomains($tldLength = 1) Returns the subdomains your application is running on as an array. CakeRequest::host() Returns the host your application is on. CakeRequest::method() Returns the HTTP method the request was made with. CakeRequest::onlyAllow($methods) Set allowed HTTP methods, if not matched will throw MethodNotAllowedException The 405 response will include the required Allow header with the passed methods New in version 2.3. CakeRequest::referer($local = false) Returns the referring address for the request. CakeRequest::clientIp($safe = true) Returns the current visitors IP address. CakeRequest::header($name) Allows you to access any of the HTTP_* headers that were used for the request:
$this->request->header(User-Agent);

Would return the user agent used for the request. CakeRequest::input($callback[, $options ]) Retrieve the input data for a request, and optionally pass it through a decoding function. Additional parameters for the decoding function can be passed as arguments to input(). CakeRequest::data($name) Provides dot notation access to request data. Allows for reading and modication of request data, calls can be chained together as well:
// Modify some request data, so you can prepopulate some form fields. $this->request->data(Post.title, New post) ->data(Comment.1.author, Mark); // You can also read out data. $value = $this->request->data(Post.title);

CakeRequest::query($name) Provides dot notation access to url query data:

// url is /posts/index?page=1&sort=title $value = $this->request->query(page);

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New in version 2.3. CakeRequest::is($type) Check whether or not a Request matches a certain criteria. Uses the built-in detection rules as well as any additional rules dened with CakeRequest::addDetector(). CakeRequest::addDetector($name, $options) Add a detector to be used with is(). See Inspecting the request for more information. CakeRequest::accepts($type = null) Find out which content types the client accepts or check if they accept a particular type of content. Get all types:
$this->request->accepts();

Check for a single type:

$this->request->accepts(application/json);

static CakeRequest::acceptLanguage($language = null) Get either all the languages accepted by the client, or check if a specic language is accepted. Get the list of accepted languages:
CakeRequest::acceptLanguage();

Check if a specic language is accepted:

CakeRequest::acceptLanguage(es-es);

property CakeRequest::$data An array of POST data. You can use CakeRequest::data() to read this property in a way that suppresses notice errors. property CakeRequest::$query An array of query string parameters. property CakeRequest::$params An array of route elements and request parameters. property CakeRequest::$here Returns the current request uri. property CakeRequest::$base The base path to the application, usually / unless your application is in a subdirectory. property CakeRequest::$webroot The current webroot.

CakeResponse
CakeResponse is the default response class in CakePHP. It encapsulates a number of features and functionality for generating HTTP responses in your application. It also assists in testing, as it can be

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mocked/stubbed allowing you to inspect headers that will be sent. Like CakeRequest, CakeResponse consolidates a number of methods previously found on Controller, RequestHandlerComponent and Dispatcher. The old methods are deprecated in favour of using CakeResponse. CakeResponse provides an interface to wrap the common response related tasks such as: Sending headers for redirects. Sending content type headers. Sending any header. Sending the response body. Changing the response class CakePHP uses CakeResponse by default. CakeResponse is a exible and transparent to use class. But if you need to replace it with an application specic class, you can override and replace CakeResponse with your own class. By replacing the CakeResponse used in index.php. This will make all the controllers in your application use CustomResponse instead of CakeResponse. You can also replace the response instance used by setting $this->response in your controllers. Overriding the response object is handy during testing, as it allows you to stub out the methods that interact with header(). See the section on CakeResponse and testing for more information. Dealing with content types You can control the Content-Type of your applications responses with using CakeResponse::type(). If your application needs to deal with content types that are not built into CakeResponse, you can map those types with type() as well:
// Add a vCard type $this->response->type(array(vcf => text/v-card)); // Set the response Content-Type to vcard. $this->response->type(vcf);

Usually youll want to map additional content types in your controllers beforeFilter callback, so you can leverage the automatic view switching features of RequestHandlerComponent if you are using it. Sending les There are times when you want to send les as responses for your requests. Prior to version 2.3 you could use Media Views to accomplish that. As of 2.3 MediaView is deprecated and you can use CakeResponse::file() to send a le as response:
public function sendFile($id) { $file = $this->Attachment->getFile($id); $this->response->file($file[path]); //Return reponse object to prevent controller from trying to render a view

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return $this->response; }

As shown in above example as expected you have to pass the le path to the method. Cake will send proper content type header if its a known le type listed in CakeReponse::$_mimeTypes. You can add new types prior to calling CakeResponse::file() by using the CakeResponse::type() method. If you want you can also force a le to be downloaded instead of being displayed in the browser by specifying the options:
$this->response->file($file[path], array(download => true, name => foo));

Setting headers Setting headers is done with the CakeResponse::header() method. It can be called with a few different parameter congurations:
// Set a single header $this->response->header(Location, http://example.com);

// Set multiple headers $this->response->header(array(Location => http://example.com, X-Extra => My header) $this->response->header(array(WWW-Authenticate: Negotiate, Content-type: application/pdf

Setting the same header multiple times will result in overwriting the previous values, just like regular header calls. Headers are not sent when CakeResponse::header() is called either. They are just buffered until the response is actually sent. Interacting with browser caching You sometimes need to force browsers to not cache the results of a controller action. CakeResponse::disableCache() is intended for just that:
public function index() { // do something. $this->response->disableCache(); }

Warning: Using disableCache() with downloads from SSL domains while trying to send les to Internet Explorer can result in errors. You can also tell clients that you want them to cache responses. By using CakeResponse::cache():
public function index() { //do something $this->response->cache(-1 minute, +5 days); }

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The above would tell clients to cache the resulting response for 5 days, hopefully speeding up your visitors experience. cache() sets the Last-Modied value to the rst argument. Expires, and Max-age are set based on the second parameter. Cache-Control is set to public as well. Fine tuning HTTP cache One of the best and easiest ways of speeding up your application is using HTTP cache. Under this caching model you are only required to help clients decide if they should use a cached copy of the response by setting a few headers such as modied time, response entity tag and others. Opposed to having to code the logic for caching and for invalidating (refreshing) it once the data has changed, HTTP uses two models, expiration and validation which usually are a lot simpler than having to manage the cache yourself. Apart from using CakeResponse::cache() you can also use many other methods to ne tune HTTP cache headers to take advantage of browser or reverse proxy caching.
The Cache Control header

New in version 2.1. Used under the expiration model, this header contains multiple indicators which can change the way browsers or proxies use the cached content. A Cache-Control header can look like this:
Cache-Control: private, max-age=3600, must-revalidate

CakeResponse class helps you set this header with some utility methods that will produce a nal valid Cache-Control header. First of them is CakeResponse::sharable() method, which indicates whether a response in to be considered sharable across different users or clients or users. This method actually controls the public or private part of this header. Setting a response as private indicates that all or part of it is intended for a single user. To take advantage of shared caches it is needed to set the control directive as public Second parameter of this method is used to specify a max-age for the cache, which is the number of seconds after which the response is no longer considered fresh.:
public function view() { ... // set the Cache-Control as public for 3600 seconds $this->response->sharable(true, 3600); } public function my_data() { ... // set the Cache-Control as private for 3600 seconds $this->response->sharable(false, 3600); }

CakeResponse exposes separate methods for setting each of the components in the Cache-Control header.

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The Expiration header

New in version 2.1. Also under the cache expiration model, you can set the Expires header, which according to the HTTP specication is the date/time after which the response is no longer considered fresh. This header can be set using the CakeResponse::expires() method:
public function view() { $this->response->expires(+5 days); }

This method also accepts a DateTime or any string that can be parsed by the DateTime class.
The Etag header

New in version 2.1. Cache validation in HTTP is often used when content is constantly changing, and asks the application to only generate the response contents if the cache is no longer fresh. Under this model, the client continues to store pages in the cache, but instead of using it directly, it asks the application every time whether the resources changed or not. This is commonly used with static resources such as images and other assets. The Etag header (called entity tag) is string that uniquely identies the requested resource. It is very much like the checksum of a le, caching will compare checksums to tell whether they match or not. To actually get advantage of using this header you have to either call manually CakeResponse::checkNotModified() method or have the RequestHandlerComponent included in your controller:
public function index() { $articles = $this->Article->find(all); $this->response->etag($this->Article->generateHash($articles)); if ($this->response->checkNotModified($this->request)) { return $this->response; } ... }

The Last Modied header

New in version 2.1. Also under the HTTP cache validation model, you can set the Last-Modied header to indicate the date and time at which the resource was modied for the last time. Setting this header helps CakePHP respond to caching clients whether the response was modied or not based on the client cache. To actually get advantage of using this header you have to either call manually CakeResponse::checkNotModified() method or have the RequestHandlerComponent included in your controller:
public function view() { $article = $this->Article->find(first); $this->response->modified($article[Article][modified]); if ($this->response->checkNotModified($this->request)) {

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return $this->response; } ... }

The Vary header

In some cases you might want to serve different contents using the same url. This is often the case when you have a multilingual page or respond with different HTML according to the browser that is requesting the resource. For such circumstances, you use the Vary header:
$this->response->vary(User-Agent); $this->response->vary(Accept-Encoding, User-Agent); $this->response->vary(Accept-Language);

CakeResponse and testing Probably one of the biggest wins from CakeResponse comes from how it makes testing controllers and components easier. Instead of methods spread across several objects, you only have a single object to mock as controllers and components delegate to CakeResponse. This helps you get closer to a unit test and makes testing controllers easier:
public function testSomething() { $this->controller->response = $this->getMock(CakeResponse); $this->controller->response->expects($this->once())->method(header); // ... }

Additionally you can more easily run tests from the command line, as you can use mocks to avoid the headers sent errors that can come up from trying to set headers in CLI. CakeResponse API class CakeResponse CakeResponse provides a number of useful methods for interacting with the response you are sending to a client. CakeResponse::header($header = null, $value = null) Allows you to directly set one or many headers to be sent with the response. CakeResponse::charset($charset = null) Sets the charset that will be used in the response. CakeResponse::type($contentType = null) Sets the content type for the response. You can either use a known content type alias or the full content type name. CakeResponse::cache($since, $time = +1 day) Allows you to set caching headers in the response. More on controllers 67

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CakeResponse::disableCache() Sets the headers to disable client caching for the response. CakeResponse::sharable($public = null, $time = null) Sets the Cache-Control header to be either public or private and optionally sets a max-age directive of the resource New in version 2.1. CakeResponse::expires($time = null) Allows to set the Expires header to a specic date. New in version 2.1. CakeResponse::etag($tag = null, $weak = false) Sets the Etag header to uniquely identify a response resource. New in version 2.1. CakeResponse::modified($time = null) Sets the Last-Modied header to a specic date and time in the correct format. New in version 2.1. CakeResponse::checkNotModified(CakeRequest $request) Compares the cache headers for the request object with the cache header from the response and determines if it can still be considered fresh. In that case deletes any response contents and sends the 304 Not Modied header. New in version 2.1. CakeResponse::compress() Turns on gzip compression for the request. CakeResponse::download($lename) Allows you to send the response as an attachment and set the lename. CakeResponse::statusCode($code = null) Allows you to set the status code for the response. CakeResponse::body($content = null) Set the content body for the response. CakeResponse::send() Once you are done creating a response, calling send() will send all the set headers as well as the body. This is done automatically at the end of each request by Dispatcher CakeResponse::file($path, $options = array()) Allows you to set a le for display or download New in version 2.3. CakeResponse::param($name) Safely read values in $request->params. This removes the need to call isset() or empty() before using param values. New in version 2.4.

Scaffolding
Application scaffolding is a technique that allows a developer to dene and create a basic application that can create, retrieve, update and delete objects. Scaffolding in CakePHP also allows developers to dene how objects are related to each other, and to create and break those links. All thats needed to create a scaffold is a model and its controller. Once you set the $scaffold variable in the controller, youre up and running.

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CakePHPs scaffolding is pretty cool. It allows you to get a basic CRUD application up and going in minutes. Its so cool that youll want to use it in production apps. Now, we think its cool too, but please realize that scaffolding is... well... just scaffolding. Its a loose structure you throw up real quick during the beginning of a project in order to get started. It isnt meant to be completely exible, its meant as a temporary way to get up and going. If you nd yourself really wanting to customize your logic and your views, its time to pull your scaffolding down in order to write some code. CakePHPs Bake console, covered in the next section, is a great next step: it generates all the code that would produce the same result as the most current scaffold. Scaffolding is a great way of getting the early parts of developing a web application started. Early database schemas are subject to change, which is perfectly normal in the early part of the design process. This has a downside: a web developer hates creating forms that never will see real use. To reduce the strain on the developer, scaffolding has been included in CakePHP. Scaffolding analyzes your database tables and creates standard lists with add, delete and edit buttons, standard forms for editing and standard views for inspecting a single item in the database. To add scaffolding to your application, in the controller, add the $scaffold variable:
class CategoriesController extends AppController { public $scaffold; }

Assuming youve created even the most basic Category model class le (in /app/Model/Category.php), youre ready to go. Visit http://example.com/categories to see your new scaffold. Note: Creating methods in controllers that are scaffolded can cause unwanted results. For example, if you create an index() method in a scaffolded controller, your index method will be rendered rather than the scaffolding functionality. Scaffolding is knowledgeable about model associations, so if your Category model belongsTo a User, youll see related User IDs in the Category listings. While scaffolding knows about model associations, you will not see any related records in the scaffold views until you manually add the association code to the model. For example, if Group hasMany User and User belongsTo Group, you have to manually add the following code in your User and Group models. Before you add the following code, the view displays an empty select input for Group in the New User form. After you add the following code, the view displays a select input populated with IDs or names from the Group table in the New User form:
// In Group.php public $hasMany = User; // In User.php public $belongsTo = Group;

If youd rather see something besides an ID (like the users rst name), you can set the $displayField variable in the model. Lets set the $displayField variable in our User class so that users related to categories will be shown by rst name rather than just an ID in scaffolding. This feature makes scaffolding more readable in many instances:
class User extends AppModel { public $displayField = first_name; }

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Creating a simple admin interface with scaffolding If you have enabled admin routing in your app/Cong/core.php, with Configure::write(Routing.prefixes, array(admin)); you can use scaffolding to generate an admin interface. Once you have enabled admin routing assign your admin prex to the scaffolding variable:
public $scaffold = admin;

You will now be able to access admin scaffolded actions:

http://example.com/admin/controller/index http://example.com/admin/controller/view http://example.com/admin/controller/edit http://example.com/admin/controller/add http://example.com/admin/controller/delete

This is an easy way to create a simple backend interface quickly. Keep in mind that you cannot have both admin and non-admin methods scaffolded at the same time. As with normal scaffolding you can override individual methods and replace them with your own:
public function admin_view($id = null) { // custom code here }

Once you have replaced a scaffolded action you will need to create a view le for the action as well. Customizing Scaffold Views If youre looking for something a little different in your scaffolded views, you can create templates. We still dont recommend using this technique for production applications, but such a customization may be useful during prototyping iterations. Custom scaffolding views for a specic controller (PostsController in this example) should be placed like so:
/app/View/Posts/scaffold.index.ctp /app/View/Posts/scaffold.form.ctp /app/View/Posts/scaffold.view.ctp

Custom scaffolding views for all controllers should be placed like so:
/app/View/Scaffolds/index.ctp /app/View/Scaffolds/form.ctp /app/View/Scaffolds/view.ctp

The Pages Controller

CakePHP ships with a default controller PagesController.php. This is a simple and optional controller for serving up static content. The home page you see after installation is generated using this controller. If you make the view le app/View/Pages/about_us.ctp you can access it using the url 70 Chapter 4. Controllers

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http://example.com/pages/about_us. You are free to modify the Pages Controller to meet your needs. When you bake an app using CakePHPs console utility the Pages Controller is created in your app/Controller/ folder. You can also copy the le from lib/Cake/Console/Templates/skel/Controller/PagesController.php. Changed in version 2.1: With CakePHP 2.0 the Pages Controller was part of lib/Cake. Since 2.1 the Pages Controller is no longer part of the core but ships in the app folder. Warning: Do not directly modify ANY le under the lib/Cake folder to avoid issues when updating the core in future.

Components
Components are packages of logic that are shared between controllers. If you nd yourself wanting to copy and paste things between controllers, you might consider wrapping some functionality in a component. CakePHP also comes with a fantastic set of core components you can use to aid in: Security Sessions Access control lists Emails Cookies Authentication Request handling Pagination Each of these core components are detailed in their own chapters. For now, well show you how to create your own components. Creating components keeps controller code clean and allows you to reuse code between projects. Conguring Components Many of the core components require conguration. Some examples of components requiring conguration are Authentication, Cookie and EmailComponent. Conguration for these components, and for components in general, is usually done in the $components array or your controllers beforeFilter() method:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array( Auth => array( authorize => array(controller), loginAction => array(controller => users, action => login) ), Cookie => array(name => CookieMonster) );

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Would be an example of conguring a component with the $components array. All core components allow their conguration settings to be set in this way. In addition you can congure components in your controllers beforeFilter() method. This is useful when you need to assign the results of a function to a component property. The above could also be expressed as:
public function beforeFilter() { $this->Auth->authorize = array(controller); $this->Auth->loginAction = array(controller => users, action => login); $this->Cookie->name = CookieMonster; }

Its possible, however, that a component requires certain conguration options to be set before the controllers beforeFilter() is run. To this end, some components allow conguration options be set in the $components array:
public $components = array( DebugKit.Toolbar => array(panels => array(history, session)) );

Consult the relevant documentation to determine what conguration options each component provides. One common setting to use is the className option, which allows you to alias components. This feature is useful when you want to replace $this->Auth or another common Component reference with a custom implementation:
// app/Controller/PostsController.php class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array( Auth => array( className => MyAuth ) ); } // app/Controller/Component/MyAuthComponent.php App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component); class MyAuthComponent extends AuthComponent { // Add your code to override the core AuthComponent }

The above would alias MyAuthComponent to $this->Auth in your controllers. Note: Aliasing a component replaces that instance anywhere that component is used, including inside other Components.

Using Components Once youve included some components in your controller, using them is pretty simple. Each component you use is exposed as a property on your controller. If you had loaded up the SessionComponent and the CookieComponent in your controller, you could access them like so: 72 Chapter 4. Controllers

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class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array(Session, Cookie); public function delete() { if ($this->Post->delete($this->request->data(Post.id)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Post deleted.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } }

Note: Since both Models and Components are added to Controllers as properties they share the same namespace. Be sure to not give a component and a model the same name.

Loading components on the y

You might not need all of your components available on every controller action. In situations like this you can load a component at runtime using the Component Collection. From inside a controllers method you can do the following:
$this->OneTimer = $this->Components->load(OneTimer); $this->OneTimer->getTime();

Note: Keep in mind that loading a component on the y will not call its initialize method. If the component you are calling has this method you will need to call it manually after load.

Component Callbacks Components also offer a few request life-cycle callbacks that allow them to augment the request cycle. See the base Component API for more information on the callbacks components offer. Creating a Component Suppose our online application needs to perform a complex mathematical operation in many different parts of the application. We could create a component to house this shared logic for use in many different controllers. The rst step is to create a new component le and class. Create the le in /app/Controller/Component/MathComponent.php. The basic structure for the component would look something like this:
App::uses(Component, Controller); class MathComponent extends Component { public function doComplexOperation($amount1, $amount2) { return $amount1 + $amount2;

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} }

Note: All components must extend Component. Failing to do this will trigger an exception.

Including your component in your controllers

Once our component is nished, we can use it in the applications controllers by placing the components name (minus the Component part) in the controllers $components array. The controller will automatically be given a new attribute named after the component, through which we can access an instance of it:
/* Make the new component available at $this->Math, as well as the standard $this->Session */ public $components = array(Math, Session);

Components declared in AppController will be merged with those in your other controllers. So there is no need to re-declare the same component twice. When including Components in a Controller you can also declare a set of parameters that will be passed on to the Components constructor. These parameters can then be handled by the Component:
public $components = array( Math => array( precision => 2, randomGenerator => srand ), Session, Auth );

The above would pass the array containing precision and randomGenerator to MathComponent::__construct() as the second parameter. By convention, any settings that have been passed that are also public properties on your component will have the values set based on the settings.
Using other Components in your Component

Sometimes one of your components may need to use another component. In this case you can include other components in your component the exact same way you include them in controllers - using the $components var:
// app/Controller/Component/CustomComponent.php App::uses(Component, Controller); class CustomComponent extends Component { // the other component your component uses public $components = array(Existing); public function initialize(Controller $controller) {

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$this->Existing->foo(); } public function bar() { // ... } } // app/Controller/Component/ExistingComponent.php App::uses(Component, Controller); class ExistingComponent extends Component { public function foo() { // ... } }

Note that in contrast to a component included in a controller no callbacks will be triggered on an components component. Component API class Component The base Component class offers a few methods for lazily loading other Components through ComponentCollection as well as dealing with common handling of settings. It also provides prototypes for all the component callbacks. Component::__construct(ComponentCollection $collection, $settings = array()) Constructor for the base component class. All $settings that are also public properties will have their values changed to the matching value in $settings.
Callbacks

Component::initialize(Controller $controller) The initialize method is called before the controllers beforeFilter method. Component::startup(Controller $controller) The startup method is called after the controllers beforeFilter method but before the controller executes the current action handler. Component::beforeRender(Controller $controller) The beforeRender method is called after the controller executes the requested actions logic but before the controllers renders views and layout. Component::shutdown(Controller $controller) The shutdown method is called before output is sent to browser. Component::beforeRedirect(Controller $controller, $url, $status=null, $exit=true) The beforeRedirect method is invoked when the controllers redirect method is called but before any further action. If this method returns false the controller will not continue on to redirect the request.

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The $url, $status and $exit variables have same meaning as for the controllers method. You can also return a string which will be interpreted as the url to redirect to or return associative array with key url and optionally status and exit.

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CHAPTER 5

Views

Views are the V in MVC. Views are responsible for generating the specic output required for the request. Often this is in the form of HTML, XML, or JSON, but streaming les and creating PDFs that users can download are also responsibilities of the View Layer. CakePHP comes with a few built-in View classes for handling the most common rendering scenarios: To create XML or JSON webservices you can use the JSON and XML views. To serve protected les, or dynamically generated les, you can use Media Views To create multiple themed views, you can use Themes

View Templates
The view layer of CakePHP is how you speak to your users. Most of the time your views will be showing (X)HTML documents to browsers, but you might also need to serve AMF data to a Flash object, reply to a remote application via SOAP, or output a CSV le for a user. By default CakePHP view les are written in plain PHP and have a default extension of .ctp (CakePHP Template). These les contain all the presentational logic needed to get the data it received from the controller in a format that is ready for the audience youre serving to. If youd prefer using a templating language like Twig, or Smarty, a subclass of View will bridge your templating language and CakePHP. View les are stored in /app/View/, in a folder named after the controller that uses the les, and named after the action it corresponds to. For example, the view le for the Products controllers view() action, would normally be found in /app/View/Products/view.ctp. The view layer in CakePHP can be made up of a number of different parts. Each part has different uses, and will be covered in this chapter: views: Views are the part of the page that is unique to the action being run. They form the meat of your applications response. elements: smaller, reusable bits of view code. Elements are usually rendered inside of views.

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layouts: view les that contain presentational code that is found wrapping many interfaces in your application. Most views are rendered inside of a layout. helpers: these classes encapsulate view logic that is needed in many places in the view layer. Among other things, helpers in CakePHP can help you build forms, build AJAX functionality, paginate model data, or serve RSS feeds.

Extending Views
New in version 2.1. View extending allows you to wrap one view in another. Combining this with view blocks gives you a powerful way to keep your views DRY . For example, your application has a sidebar that needs to change depending on the specic view being rendered. By extending a common view le you can avoid repeating the common markup for your sidebar, and only dene the parts that change:
// app/View/Common/view.ctp <h1><?php echo $this->fetch(title); ?></h1> <?php echo $this->fetch(content); ?> <div class="actions"> <h3>Related actions</h3> <ul> <?php echo $this->fetch(sidebar); ?> </ul> </div>

The above view le could be used as a parent view. It expects that the view extending it will dene the sidebar and title blocks. The content block is a special block that CakePHP creates. It will contain all the un-captured content from the extending view. Assuming our view le has a $posts variable with the data about our post. Our view could look like:
<?php // app/View/Posts/view.ctp $this->extend(/Common/view); $this->assign(title, $post); $this->start(sidebar); ?> <li> <?php echo $this->Html->link(edit, array( action => edit, $post[Post][id] )); ?> </li> <?php $this->end(); ?> // The remaining content will be available as the content block // in the parent view. <?php echo h($post[Post][body]);

The post view above shows how you can extend a view, and populate a set of blocks. Any content not 78 Chapter 5. Views

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already in a dened block will be captured and put into a special block named content. When a view contains a call to extend() execution continues to the bottom of the current view le. Once its complete, the extended view will be rendered. Calling extend() more than once in a view le will override the parent view that will be processed next:
$this->extend(/Common/view); $this->extend(/Common/index);

The above will result in /Common/index.ctp being rendered as the parent view to the current view. You can nest extended views as many times as necessary. Each view can extend another view if desired. Each parent view will get the previous views content as the content block. Note: You should avoid using content as a block name in your application. CakePHP uses this for un-captured content in extended views.

Using view blocks

New in version 2.1. View blocks replace $scripts_for_layout and provide a exible API that allows you to dene slots or blocks in your views/layouts that will be dened elsewhere. For example blocks are ideal for implementing things such as sidebars, or regions to load assets at the bottom/top of the layout. Blocks can be dened in two ways. Either as a capturing block, or by direct assignment. The start(), append() and end() methods allow to work with capturing blocks:
// create the sidebar block. $this->start(sidebar); echo $this->element(sidebar/recent_topics); echo $this->element(sidebar/recent_comments); $this->end();

// Append into the sidebar later on. $this->append(sidebar); echo $this->element(sidebar/popular_topics); $this->end();

You can also append into a block using start() multiple times. assign() can be used to clear or overwrite a block at any time:
// Clear the previous content from the sidebar block. $this->assign(sidebar, );

In 2.3, a few new methods were added for working with blocks. The prepend() to prepend content to an existing block:
// Prepend to sidebar $this->prepend(sidebar, this content goes on top of sidebar);

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default content for a block should it not already exist:

// In a view file. // Create a navbar block $this->startIfEmpty(navbar); echo $this->element(navbar); echo $this->element(notifications); $this->end(); // In a parent view/layout $this->startIfEmpty(navbar); Default content $this->end(); echo $this->fetch(navbar);

In the above example, the navbar block will only contain the content added in the rst section. Since the block was dened in the child view, the default content will be discarded. Note: You should avoid using content as a block name. This is used by CakePHP internally for extended views, and view content in the layout.

Displaying blocks
New in version 2.1. You can display blocks using the fetch() method. fetch() will safely output a block, returning if a block does not exist:
echo $this->fetch(sidebar);

You can also use fetch to conditionally show content that should surround a block should it exist. This is helpful in layouts, or extended views where you want to conditionally show headings or other markup:
// in app/View/Layouts/default.ctp <?php if ($this->fetch(menu)): ?> <div class="menu"> <h3>Menu options</h3> <?php echo $this->fetch(menu); ?> </div> <?php endif; ?>

As of 2.3.0 you can also provide a default value for a block should it not have any content. This allows you to easily add placeholder content, for empty states. You can provide a default value using the 2nd argument:
<div class="shopping-cart"> <h3>Your Cart</h3> <?php echo $this->fetch(cart, Your cart is empty); ?> </div>

Changed in version 2.3: The $default argument was added in 2.3.

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Using blocks for script and CSS les

New in version 2.1. Blocks replace the deprecated $scripts_for_layout layout variable. Instead you should use blocks. The HtmlHelper ties into view blocks, and its script(), css(), and meta() methods each update a block with the same name when used with the inline = false option:
<?php // in your view file $this->Html->script(carousel, array(inline => false)); $this->Html->css(carousel, null, array(inline => false)); ?> // In your layout file. <!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <title><?php echo $this->fetch(title); ?></title> <?php echo $this->fetch(script); ?> <?php echo $this->fetch(css); ?> </head> // rest of the layout follows

The HtmlHelper also allows you to control which block the scripts and CSS go to:
// in your view $this->Html->script(carousel, array(block => scriptBottom)); // in your layout echo $this->fetch(scriptBottom);

Layouts
A layout contains presentation code that wraps around a view. Anything you want to see in all of your views should be placed in a layout. Layout les should be placed in /app/View/Layouts. CakePHPs default layout can be overridden by creating a new default layout at /app/View/Layouts/default.ctp. Once a new default layout has been created, controller-rendered view code is placed inside of the default layout when the page is rendered. When you create a layout, you need to tell CakePHP where to place the code for your views. To do so, make sure your layout includes a place for $this->fetch(content) Heres an example of what a default layout might look like:
<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <title><?php echo $title_for_layout?></title> <link rel="shortcut icon" href="favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon"> <!-- Include external files and scripts here (See HTML helper for more info.) --> <?php echo $this->fetch(meta);

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echo $this->fetch(css); echo $this->fetch(script); ?> </head> <body> <!-- If youd like some sort of menu to show up on all of your views, include it here --> <div id="header"> <div id="menu">...</div> </div> <!-- Heres where I want my views to be displayed --> <?php echo $this->fetch(content); ?> <!-- Add a footer to each displayed page --> <div id="footer">...</div> </body> </html>

Note: Prior to version 2.1, method fetch() was not available, fetch(content) is a replacement for $content_for_layout and lines fetch(meta), fetch(css) and fetch(script) are contained in the $scripts_for_layout variable in version 2.0 The script, css and meta blocks contain any content dened in the views using the built-in HTML helper. Useful for including javascript and CSS les from views. Note: When using HtmlHelper::css() or HtmlHelper::script() in view les, specify false for the inline option to place the html source in a block with the same name. (See API for more details on usage). The content block contains the contents of the rendered view. $title_for_layout contains the page title. This variable is generated automatically, but you can override it by setting it in your controller/view. To set the title for the layout, its easiest to do so in the controller, setting the $title_for_layout variable:
class UsersController extends AppController { public function view_active() { $this->set(title_for_layout, View Active Users); } }

You can also set the title_for_layout variable from inside the view le:
$this->set(title_for_layout, $titleContent);

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You can create as many layouts as you wish: just place them in the app/View/Layouts directory, and switch between them inside of your controller actions using the controller or views $layout property:
// from a controller public function admin_view() { // stuff $this->layout = admin; } // from a view file $this->layout = loggedin;

For example, if a section of my site included a smaller ad banner space, I might create a new layout with the smaller advertising space and specify it as the layout for all controllers actions using something like:
class UsersController extends AppController { public function view_active() { $this->set(title_for_layout, View Active Users); $this->layout = default_small_ad; } public function view_image() { $this->layout = image; //output user image } }

CakePHP features two core layouts (besides CakePHPs default layout) you can use in your own application: ajax and ash. The Ajax layout is handy for crafting Ajax responses - its an empty layout (most ajax calls only require a bit of markup in return, rather than a fully-rendered interface). The ash layout is used for messages shown by Controller::flash() method. Three other layouts, xml, js, and rss, exist in the core for a quick and easy way to serve up content that isnt text/html.

Using layouts from plugins

New in version 2.1. If you want to use a layout that exists in a plugin, you can use plugin syntax. For example to use the contact layout from the Contacts plugin:
class UsersController extends AppController { public function view_active() { $this->layout = Contacts.contact; } }

Elements
Many applications have small blocks of presentation code that need to be repeated from page to page, sometimes in different places in the layout. CakePHP can help you repeat parts of your website that need to Elements 83

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be reused. These reusable parts are called Elements. Ads, help boxes, navigational controls, extra menus, login forms, and callouts are often implemented in CakePHP as elements. An element is basically a miniview that can be included in other views, in layouts, and even within other elements. Elements can be used to make a view more readable, placing the rendering of repeating elements in its own le. They can also help you re-use content fragments in your application. Elements live in the /app/View/Elements/ folder, and have the .ctp lename extension. They are output using the element method of the view:
echo $this->element(helpbox);

Passing Variables into an Element

You can pass data to an element through the elements second argument:
echo $this->element(helpbox, array( "helptext" => "Oh, this text is very helpful." ));

Inside the element le, all the passed variables are available as members of the parameter array (in the same way that Controller::set() in the controller works with view les). In the above example, the /app/View/Elements/helpbox.ctp le can use the $helptext variable:
// inside app/View/Elements/helpbox.ctp echo $helptext; //outputs "Oh, this text is very helpful."

The View::element() method also supports options for the element. The options supported are cache and callbacks. An example:

echo $this->element(helpbox, array( "helptext" => "This is passed to the element as $helptext", "foobar" => "This is passed to the element as $foobar ", ), array( "cache" => "long_view", // uses the "long_view" cache configuration "callbacks" => true // set to true to have before/afterRender called for the elemen ) );

Element caching is facilitated through the Cache class. You can congure elements to be stored in any Cache conguration youve setup. This gives you a great amount of exibility to decide where and for how long elements are stored. To cache different versions of the same element in an application, provide a unique cache key value using the following format:
$this->element(helpbox, array(), array( "cache" => array(config => short, key => unique value) ) );

You can take full advantage of elements by using requestAction(). The requestAction() function fetches view variables from a controller action and returns them as an array. This enables your elements to perform in true MVC style. Create a controller action that prepares the view variables for your elements, 84 Chapter 5. Views

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then call requestAction() inside the second parameter of element() to feed the element the view variables from your controller. To do this, in your controller add something like the following for the Post example:
class PostsController extends AppController { // ... public function index() { $posts = $this->paginate(); if ($this->request->is(requested)) { return $posts; } else { $this->set(posts, $posts); } } }

And then in the element we can access the paginated posts model. To get the latest ve posts in an ordered list we would do something like the following:
<h2>Latest Posts</h2> <?php $posts = $this->requestAction(posts/index/sort:created/direction:asc/limit:5); ?> <ol> <?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <li><?php echo $post[Post][title]; ?></li> <?php endforeach; ?> </ol>

Caching Elements
You can take advantage of CakePHP view caching if you supply a cache parameter. If set to true, it will cache the element in the default Cache conguration. Otherwise, you can set which cache conguration should be used. See Caching for more information on conguring Cache. A simple example of caching an element would be:
echo $this->element(helpbox, array(), array(cache => true));

If you render the same element more than once in a view and have caching enabled be sure to set the key parameter to a different name each time. This will prevent each successive call from overwriting the previous element() calls cached result. E.g.:
echo $this->element( helpbox, array(var => $var), array(cache => array(key => first_use, config => view_long) ); echo $this->element( helpbox, array(var => $differenVar), array(cache => array(key => second_use, config => view_long) );

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The above will ensure that both element results are cached separately. If you want all element caching to use the same cache conguration, you can save some repetition, by setting View::$elementCache to the cache conguration you want to use. CakePHP will use this conguration, when none is given.

Requesting Elements from a Plugin 2.0

To load an element from a plugin, use the plugin option (moved out of the data option in 1.x):
echo $this->element(helpbox, array(), array(plugin => Contacts));

2.1
If you are using a plugin and wish to use elements from within the plugin, just use the familiar plugin syntax. If the view is being rendered for a plugin controller/action, the plugin name will automatically be prexed onto all elements used, unless another plugin name is present. If the element doesnt exist in the plugin, it will look in the main APP folder.:
echo $this->element(Contacts.helpbox);

If your view is a part of a plugin you can omit the plugin name. ContactsController of the Contacts plugin:
echo $this->element(helpbox); // and echo $this->element(Contacts.helpbox);

For example, if you are in the

Are equivalent and will result in the same element being rendered. Changed in version 2.1: The $options[plugin] option was deprecated and support for Plugin.element was added.

Creating your own view classes

You may need to create custom view classes to enable new types of data views, or add additional custom view rendering logic to your application. Like most components of CakePHP view classes have a few conventions: View class les should be put in App/View. For example App/View/PdfView.php View classes should be sufxed with View. For example PdfView. When referencing view class names you should omit the View sufx. $this->viewClass = Pdf;. Youll also want to extend View to ensure things work correctly:
// in App/View/PdfView.php App::uses(View, View);

For example

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class PdfView extends View { public function render($view = null, $layout = null) { // custom logic here. } }

Replacing the render method lets you take full control over how your content is rendered.

View API
class View View methods are accessible in all view, element and layout les. $this->method() To call any view method use

View::set(string $var, mixed $value) Views have a set() method that is analogous to the set() found in Controller objects. Using set() from your view le will add the variables to the layout and elements that will be rendered later. See Controller Methods for more information on using set(). In your view le you can do:
$this->set(activeMenuButton, posts);

Then in your layout the $activeMenuButton variable will be available and contain the value posts. View::getVar(string $var) Gets the value of the viewVar with the name $var View::getVars() Gets a list of all the available view variables in the current rendering scope. Returns an array of variable names. View::element(string $elementPath, array $data, array $options = array()) Renders an element or view partial. See the section on Elements for more information and examples. View::uuid(string $object, mixed $url) Generates a unique non-random DOM ID for an object, based on the object type and url. This method is often used by helpers that need to generate unique DOM IDs for elements such as the JsHelper:
$uuid = $this->uuid(form, array(controller => posts, action => index)); //$uuid contains form0425fe3bad

View::addScript(string $name, string $content) Adds content to the internal scripts buffer. This buffer is made available in the layout as $scripts_for_layout. This method is helpful when creating helpers that need to add javascript or css directly to the layout. Keep in mind that scripts added from the layout, or elements in the layout will not be added to $scripts_for_layout. This method is most often used from inside helpers, like the JsHelper and HtmlHelper Helpers. Deprecated since version 2.1: Use the Using view blocks features instead.

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View::blocks() Get the names of all dened blocks as an array. View::start($name) Start a capturing block for a view block. See the section on Using view blocks for examples. New in version 2.1. View::end() End the top most open capturing block. See the section on Using view blocks for examples. New in version 2.1. View::append($name, $content) Append into the block with $name. See the section on Using view blocks for examples. New in version 2.1. View::prepend($name, $content) Prepend into the block with $name. See the section on Using view blocks for examples. New in version 2.3. View::startIfEmpty($name) Conditionally start a block, only if its empty. All content in the block will be captured and discarded if the block is already dened. New in version 2.3. View::assign($name, $content) Assign the value of a block. This will overwrite any existing content. See the section on Using view blocks for examples. New in version 2.1. View::fetch($name) Fetch the value of a block. Will be returned for blocks that are not dened. See the section on Using view blocks for examples. New in version 2.1. View::extend($name) Extend the current view/element/layout with the named one. See the section on Extending Views for examples. New in version 2.1. property View::$layout Set the layout the current view will be wrapped in. property View::$elementCache The cache conguration used to cache elements. Setting this property will change the default conguration used to cache elements. This default can be overridden using the cache option in the element method. property View::$request An instance of CakeRequest. Use this instance to access information about the current request. property View::$output Contains the last rendered content from a view, either the view le, or the layout content. Deprecated since version 2.1: Use $view->Blocks->get(content); instead. property View::$Blocks An instance of ViewBlock. Used to provide view block functionality in view rendering. New in version 2.1.

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More about Views

Themes
You can take advantage of themes, making it easy to switch the look and feel of your page quickly and easily. To use themes, specify the theme name in your controller:
class ExampleController extends AppController { public $theme = Example; }

Changed in version 2.1: Versions previous to 2.1 required setting the $this->viewClass = Theme. 2.1 removes this requirement as the normal View class supports themes You can also set or change the theme name within an action or within the beforeFilter or beforeRender callback functions:
$this->theme = AnotherExample;

Theme view les need to be within the /app/View/Themed/ folder. Within the themed folder, create a folder using the same name as your theme name. For example, the above theme would be found in /app/View/Themed/AnotherExample. Its important to remember that CakePHP expects CamelCase theme names. Beyond that, the folder structure within the /app/View/Themed/Example/ folder is exactly the same as /app/View/. For example, the view le for an edit action of a Posts controller would reside at /app/View/Themed/Example/Posts/edit.ctp. Layout les would reside in /app/View/Themed/Example/Layouts/. If a view le cant be found in the theme, CakePHP will try to locate the view le in the /app/View/ folder. This way, you can create master view les and simply override them on a case-by-case basis within your theme folder. Theme assets Themes can contain static assets as well as view les. A theme can include any necessary assets in its webroot directory. This allows for easy packaging and distribution of themes. While in development, requests for theme assets will be handled by Dispatcher. To improve performance for production environments, its recommended that you either symlink or copy theme assets into the applications webroot. See below for more information.

To use the new theme webroot create directories like app/View/Themed/<themeName>/webroot<path_to_file in your theme. The Dispatcher will handle nding the correct theme assets in your view paths. All of CakePHPs built-in helpers are aware of themes and will create the correct paths automatically. Like view les, if a le isnt in the theme folder, it will default to the main webroot folder:
//When in a theme with the name of purple_cupcake $this->Html->css(main.css);

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//creates a path like /theme/purple_cupcake/css/main.css //and links to app/View/Themed/PurpleCupcake/webroot/css/main.css

Increasing performance of plugin and theme assets Its a well known fact that serving assets through PHP is guaranteed to be slower than serving those assets without invoking PHP. And while the core team has taken steps to make plugin and theme asset serving as fast as possible, there may be situations where more performance is required. In these situations its recommended that you either symlink or copy out plugin/theme assets to directories in app/webroot with paths matching those used by CakePHP. app/Plugin/DebugKit/webroot/js/my_file.js app/webroot/debug_kit/js/my_file.js app/View/Themed/Navy/webroot/css/navy.css app/webroot/theme/Navy/css/navy.css becomes becomes

Media Views
class MediaView Deprecated since version 2.3: Use Sending les instead. Media views allow you to send binary les to the user. For example, you may wish to have a directory of les outside of the webroot to prevent users from direct linking them. You can use the Media view to pull the le from a special folder within /app/, allowing you to perform authentication before delivering the le to the user. To use the Media view, you need to tell your controller to use the MediaView class instead of the default View class. After that, just pass in additional parameters to specify where your le is located:
class ExampleController extends AppController { public function download() { $this->viewClass = Media; // Download app/outside_webroot_dir/example.zip $params = array( id => example.zip, name => example, download => true, extension => zip, path => APP . outside_webroot_dir . DS ); $this->set($params); } }

Heres an example of rendering a le whose mime type is not included in the MediaViews $mimeType array. We are also using a relative path which will default to your app/webroot folder:

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public function download() { $this->viewClass = Media; // Render app/webroot/files/example.docx $params = array( id => example.docx, name => example, extension => docx, mimeType => array( docx => application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.docum ), path => files . DS ); $this->set($params); }

Settable Parameters id The ID is the le name as it resides on the le server including the le extension. name The name allows you to specify an alternate le name to be sent to the user. Specify the name without the le extension. download A boolean value indicating whether headers should be set to force download. extension The le extension. This is matched against an internal list of acceptable mime types. If the mime type specied is not in the list (or sent in the mimeType parameter array), the le will not be downloaded. path The folder name, including the nal directory separator. The path should be absolute but can be relative to the app/webroot folder. mimeType An array with additional mime types to be merged with MediaView internal list of acceptable mime types. cache A boolean or integer value - If set to true it will allow browsers to cache the le (defaults to false if not set); otherwise set it to the number of seconds in the future for when the cache should expire.

JSON and XML views

New in CakePHP 2.1 are two new view classes. The XmlView and JsonView let you easily create XML and JSON responses, and integrate with the RequestHandlerComponent. By enabling RequestHandlerComponent in your application, and enabling support for the xml and or json extensions, you can automatically leverage the new view classes. XmlView and JsonView will be referred to as data views for the rest of this page. There are two ways you can generate data views. The rst is by using the _serialize key, and the second is by creating normal view les.

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Enabling data views in your application Before you can use the data view classes, youll need to do a bit of setup: 1. Enable the json and or xml extensions with Router::parseExtensions(). This will enable Router to handle multiple extensions. 2. Add the RequestHandlerComponent to your controllers list of components. This will enable automatic view class switching on content types. You can also set the component up with the viewClassMap setting, to map types to your custom classes and/or map other data types. New in version 2.3: RequestHandlerComponent::viewClassMap() method has been added to map types to viewClasses. The viewClassMap setting will not work on earlier versions. After adding Router::parseExtensions(json); to your routes le, CakePHP will automatically switch view classes when a request is done with the .json extension, or the Accept header is application/json. Using data views with the serialize key The _serialize key is a special view variable that indicates which other view variable(s) should be serialized when using a data view. This lets you skip dening view les for your controller actions if you dont need to do any custom formatting before your data is converted into json/xml. If you need to do any formatting or manipulation of your view variables before generating the response, you should use view les. The value of _serialize can be either a string or an array of view variables to serialize:
class PostsController extends AppController { public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->paginate()); $this->set(_serialize, array(posts)); } }

You can also dene _serialize as an array of view variables to combine:

class PostsController extends AppController { public function index() { // some code that created $posts and $comments $this->set(compact(posts, comments)); $this->set(_serialize, array(posts, comments)); } }

Dening _serialize as an array has the added benet of automatically appending a top-level <response> element when using XmlView. If you use a string value for _serialize and XmlView, make sure that your view variable has a single top-level element. Without a single top-level element the Xml will fail to generate.

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Using a data view with view les You should use view les if you need to do some manipulation of your view content before creating the nal output. For example if we had posts, that had a eld containing generated HTML, we would probably want to omit that from a JSON response. This is a situation where a view le would be useful:
// Controller code class PostsController extends AppController { public function index() { $this->set(compact(posts, comments)); } } // View code - app/View/Posts/json/index.ctp foreach ($posts as &$post) { unset($post[Post][generated_html]); } echo json_encode(compact(posts, comments));

You can do more more complex manipulations, or use helpers to do formatting as well. Note: The data view classes dont support layouts. They assume that the view le will output the serialized content. class XmlView A view class for generating Xml view data. See above for how you can use XmlView in your application. By default when using _serialize the XmlView will wrap your serialized view variables with a <response> node. You can set a custom name for this node using the _rootNode view variable. New in version 2.3: The _rootNode feature was added. class JsonView A view class for generating Json view data. See above for how you can use JsonView in your application. JSONP response New in version 2.3. When using JsonView you can use the special view variable _jsonp to enable returning a JSONP response. Setting it to true makes the view class check if query string parameter named callback is set and if so wrap the json response in the function name provided. If you want to use a custom query string paramer name instead of callback set _jsonp to required name instead of true.

Helpers
Helpers are the component-like classes for the presentation layer of your application. They contain presentational logic that is shared between many views, elements, or layouts. This chapter will show you how to create your own helpers, and outline the basic tasks CakePHPs core helpers can help you accomplish.

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CakePHP features a number of helpers that aid in view creation. They assist in creating well-formed markup (including forms), aid in formatting text, times and numbers, and can even speed up Ajax functionality. For more information on the helpers included in CakePHP, check out Helpers. Using and Conguring Helpers You enable helpers in CakePHP by making a controller aware of them. Each controller has a $helpers property that lists the helpers to be made available in the view. To enable a helper in your view, add the name of the helper to the controllers $helpers array:
class BakeriesController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Form, Html, Js, Time); }

Adding helpers from plugins uses the plugin syntax used elsewhere in CakePHP:
class BakeriesController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Blog.Comment); }

You can also add helpers from within an action, so they will only be available to that action and not the other actions in the controller. This saves processing power for the other actions that do not use the helper as well as help keep the controller better organized:
class BakeriesController extends AppController { public function bake { $this->helpers[] = Time; } public function mix { // The Time helper is not loaded here and thus not available } }

If you need to enable a helper for all controllers add the name of the helper to the $helpers array in /app/Controller/AppController.php (or create if not present). Remember to include the default Html and Form helpers:
class AppController extends Controller { public $helpers = array(Form, Html, Js, Time); }

You can pass options to helpers. These options can be used to set attribute values or modify behavior of a helper:
class AwesomeHelper extends AppHelper { public function __construct(View $view, $settings = array()) { parent::__construct($view, $settings); debug($settings); } } class AwesomeController extends AppController {

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public $helpers = array(Awesome => array(option1 => value1)); }

As of 2.3 the options are merged with the Helper::$settings property of the helper. One common setting to use is the className option, which allows you to create aliased helpers in your views. This feature is useful when you want to replace $this->Html or another common Helper reference with a custom implementation:
// app/Controller/PostsController.php class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array( Html => array( className => MyHtml ) ); } // app/View/Helper/MyHtmlHelper.php App::uses(HtmlHelper, View/Helper); class MyHtmlHelper extends HtmlHelper { // Add your code to override the core HtmlHelper }

The above would alias MyHtmlHelper to $this->Html in your views. Note: Aliasing a helper replaces that instance anywhere that helper is used, including inside other Helpers.

Tip: Aliasing the Html or Session Helper while using the core PagesController will not work. It is better to copy lib/Cake/Controller/PagesController.php into your app/Controller/ folder. Using helper settings allows you to declaratively congure your helpers and keep conguration logic out of your controller actions. If you have conguration options that cannot be included as part of a class declaration, you can set those in your controllers beforeRender callback:
class PostsController extends AppController { public function beforeRender() { parent::beforeRender(); $this->helpers[CustomStuff] = $this->_getCustomStuffSettings(); } }

Using Helpers Once youve congured which helpers you want to use in your controller, each helper is exposed as a public property in the view. For example, if you were using the HtmlHelper you would be able to access it by doing the following:

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echo $this->Html->css(styles);

The above would call the css method on the HtmlHelper. You can access any loaded helper using $this->{$helperName}. There may come a time where you need to dynamically load a helper from inside a view. You can use the views HelperCollection to do this:
$mediaHelper = $this->Helpers->load(Media, $mediaSettings);

The HelperCollection is a collection and supports the collection API used elsewhere in CakePHP. Callback methods Helpers feature several callbacks that allow you to augment the view rendering process. See the Helper API and the Collections documentation for more information. Creating Helpers If a core helper (or one showcased on github or the Bakery) doesnt t your needs, helpers are easy to create. Lets say we wanted to create a helper that could be used to output a specically crafted CSS-styled link you needed many different places in your application. In order to t your logic in to CakePHPs existing helper structure, youll need to create a new class in /app/View/Helper. Lets call our helper LinkHelper. The actual PHP class le would look something like this:
/* /app/View/Helper/LinkHelper.php */ App::uses(AppHelper, View/Helper); class LinkHelper extends AppHelper { public function makeEdit($title, $url) { // Logic to create specially formatted link goes here... } }

Note: Helpers must extend either AppHelper or Helper or implement all the callbacks in the Helper API .

Including other Helpers

You may wish to use some functionality already existing in another helper. To do so, you can specify helpers you wish to use with a $helpers array, formatted just as you would in a controller:
/* /app/View/Helper/LinkHelper.php (using other helpers) */ App::uses(AppHelper, View/Helper); class LinkHelper extends AppHelper { public $helpers = array(Html);

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public function makeEdit($title, $url) { // Use the HTML helper to output // formatted data: $link = $this->Html->link($title, $url, array(class => edit)); return <div class="editOuter"> . $link . </div>; } }

Using your Helper

Once youve created your helper and placed it in /app/View/Helper/, youll be able to include it in your controllers using the special variable $helpers:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Link); }

Once your controller has been made aware of this new class, you can use it in your views by accessing an object named after the helper:
<!-- make a link using the new helper --> <?php echo $this->Link->makeEdit(Change this Recipe, /recipes/edit/5); ?>

Creating Functionality for All Helpers All helpers extend a special class, AppHelper (just like models extend AppModel and controllers extend AppController). To create functionality that would be available to all helpers, create /app/View/Helper/AppHelper.php:
App::uses(Helper, View); class AppHelper extends Helper { public function customMethod() { } }

Helper API class Helper The base class for Helpers. It provides a number of utility methods and features for loading other helpers. Helper::webroot($le) Resolve a le name to the webroot of the application. If a theme is active and the le exists in the current themes webroot, the path to the themed le will be returned.

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Helper::url($url, $full = false) Generates an HTML escaped URL, delegates to Router::url(). Helper::value($options = array(), $eld = null, $key = value) Get the value for a given input name. Helper::domId($options = null, $id = id) Generate a CamelCased id value for the currently selected eld. Overriding this method in your AppHelper will allow you to change how CakePHP generates ID attributes.
Callbacks

Helper::beforeRenderFile($viewFile) Is called before each view le is rendered. This includes elements, views, parent views and layouts. Helper::afterRenderFile($viewFile, $content) Is called after each view le is rendered. This includes elements, views, parent views and layouts. A callback can modify and return $content to change how the rendered content will be displayed in the browser. Helper::beforeRender($viewFile) The beforeRender method is called after the controllers beforeRender method but before the controller renders view and layout. Receives the le being rendered as an argument. Helper::afterRender($viewFile) Is called after the view has been rendered but before layout rendering has started. Helper::beforeLayout($layoutFile) Is called before layout rendering starts. Receives the layout lename as an argument. Helper::afterLayout($layoutFile) Is called after layout rendering is complete. Receives the layout lename as an argument. Core Helpers CacheHelper Used by the core to cache view content. FormHelper Creates HTML forms and form elements that self populate and handle validation problems. HtmlHelper Convenience methods for crafting well-formed markup. Images, links, tables, header tags and more. JsHelper Used to create Javascript compatible with various Javascript libraries. NumberHelper Number and currency formatting. Paginator Model data pagination and sorting. RSS Convenience methods for outputting RSS feed XML data. SessionHelper Access for reading session values in views. TextHelper Smart linking, highlighting, word smart truncation.

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TimeHelper Proximity detection (is this next year?), nice string formatting(Today, 10:30 am) and time zone conversion.

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CHAPTER 6

Models

Models are the classes that sit as the business layer in your application. This means that they should be responsible for managing almost everything that happens regarding your data, its validity, interactions and evolution of the information workow in your domain of work. Usually model classes represent data and are used in CakePHP applications for data access, more specically they represent a database table but they are not limited to this, but can be used to access anything that manipulates data such as les, external web services, iCal events, or rows in a CSV le. A model can be associated with other models. For example, a Recipe may be associated with the Author of the recipe as well as the Ingredient in the recipe. This section will explain what features of the model can be automated, how to override those features, and what methods and properties a model can have. Itll explain the different ways to associate your data. Itll describe how to nd, save, and delete data. Finally, itll look at Datasources.

Understanding Models
A Model represents your data model. In object-oriented programming a data model is an object that represents a thing, like a car, a person, or a house. A blog, for example, may have many blog posts and each blog post may have many comments. The Blog, Post, and Comment are all examples of models, each associated with another. Here is a simple example of a model denition in CakePHP:
App::uses(AppModel, Model); class Ingredient extends AppModel { public $name = Ingredient; }

With just this simple declaration, the Ingredient model is bestowed with all the functionality you need to create queries along with saving and deleting data. These magic methods come from CakePHPs Model class by the magic of inheritance. The Ingredient model extends the application model, AppModel, which extends CakePHPs internal Model class. It is this core Model class that bestows the functionality onto

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your Ingredient model. App::uses(AppModel, Model) ensures that the model is lazy loaded in every instance of its usage. This intermediate class, AppModel, is empty and if you havent created your own, is taken from within the CakePHP core folder. Overriding the AppModel allows you to dene functionality that should be made available to all models within your application. To do so, you need to create your own AppModel.php le that resides in the Model folder, as all other models in your application. Creating a project using Bake will automatically generate this le for you. See also Behaviors for more information on how to apply similar logic to multiple models. Back to our Ingredient model, in order to work on it, create the PHP le in the /app/Model/ directory. By convention it should have the same name as the class; for this example Ingredient.php. Note: CakePHP will dynamically create a model object for you if it cannot nd a corresponding le in /app/Model. This also means that if your model le isnt named correctly (i.e. ingredient.php or Ingredients.php) CakePHP will use an instance of AppModel rather than your missing (from CakePHPs perspective) model le. If youre trying to use a method youve dened in your model, or a behavior attached to your model and youre getting SQL errors that are the name of the method youre calling - its a sure sign CakePHP cant nd your model and you either need to check the le names, your application cache, or both.

Note: Some class names are not usable for model names. For instance File cannot be used as File is a class already existing in the CakePHP core. With your model dened, it can be accessed from within your Controller. CakePHP will automatically make the model available for access when its name matches that of the controller. For example, a controller named IngredientsController will automatically initialize the Ingredient model and attach it to the controller at $this->Ingredient:
class IngredientsController extends AppController { public function index() { //grab all ingredients and pass it to the view: $ingredients = $this->Ingredient->find(all); $this->set(ingredients, $ingredients); } }

Associated models are available through the main model. In the following example, Recipe has an association with the Ingredient model:
class Recipe extends AppModel { public function steakRecipes() { $ingredient = $this->Ingredient->findByName(Steak); return $this->findAllByMainIngredient($ingredient[Ingredient][id]); } }

This shows how to use models that are already linked. To understand how associations are dened take a look at the Associations section 102 Chapter 6. Models

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More on models
Associations: Linking Models Together
One of the most powerful features of CakePHP is the ability to link relational mapping provided by the model. In CakePHP, the links between models are handled through associations. Dening relations between different objects in your application should be a natural process. For example: in a recipe database, a recipe may have many reviews, reviews have a single author, and authors may have many recipes. Dening the way these relations work allows you to access your data in an intuitive and powerful way. The purpose of this section is to show you how to plan for, dene, and utilize associations between models in CakePHP. While data can come from a variety of sources, the most common form of storage in web applications is a relational database. Most of what this section covers will be in that context. For information on associations with Plugin models, see Plugin Models. Relationship Types The four association types in CakePHP are: hasOne, hasMany, belongsTo, and hasAndBelongsToMany (HABTM). Relationship one to one one to many many to one many to many Association Type hasOne hasMany belongsTo hasAndBelongsToMany Example A user has one prole. A user can have multiple recipes. Many recipes belong to a user. Recipes have, and belong to many ingredients.

Associations are dened by creating a class variable named after the association you are dening. The class variable can sometimes be as simple as a string, but can be as complete as a multidimensional array used to dene association specics.
class User extends AppModel { public $hasOne = Profile; public $hasMany = array( Recipe => array( className => Recipe, conditions => array(Recipe.approved => 1), order => Recipe.created DESC ) ); }

In the above example, the rst instance of the word Recipe is what is termed an Alias. This is an identier for the relationship and can be anything you choose. Usually, you will choose the same name as the class that it references. However, aliases for each model must be unique app wide. For example it is appropriate to have:

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class User extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( MyRecipe => array( className => Recipe, ) ); public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array( MemberOf => array( className => Group, ) ); } class Group extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( MyRecipe => array( className => Recipe, ) ); public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array( Member => array( className => User, ) ); }

but the following will not work well in all circumstances:

class User extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( MyRecipe => array( className => Recipe, ) ); public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array( Member => array( className => Group, ) ); } class Group extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( MyRecipe => array( className => Recipe, ) ); public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array( Member => array( className => User, ) ); }

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because here we have the alias Member referring to both the User (in Group) and the Group (in User) model in the HABTM associations. Choosing non-unique names for model aliases across models can cause unexpected behavior. Cake will automatically create links between associated model objects. So for example in your User model you can access the Recipe model as:
$this->Recipe->someFunction();

Similarly in your controller you can access an associated model simply by following your model associations:
$this->User->Recipe->someFunction();

Note: Remember that associations are dened one way. If you dene User hasMany Recipe that has no effect on the Recipe Model. You need to dene Recipe belongsTo User to be able to access the User model from your Recipe model

hasOne Lets set up a User model with a hasOne relationship to a Prole model. First, your database tables need to be keyed correctly. For a hasOne relationship to work, one table has to contain a foreign key that points to a record in the other. In this case the proles table will contain a eld called user_id. The basic pattern is: hasOne: the other model contains the foreign key. Relation Apple hasOne Banana User hasOne Prole Doctor hasOne Mentor Schema bananas.apple_id proles.user_id mentors.doctor_id

Note: It is not mandatory to follow CakePHP conventions, you can easily override the use of any foreignKey in your associations denitions. Nevertheless sticking to conventions will make your code less repetitive, easier to read and to maintain. The User model le will be saved in /app/Model/User.php. To dene the User hasOne Prole association, add the $hasOne property to the model class. Remember to have a Prole model in /app/Model/Prole.php, or the association wont work:
class User extends AppModel { public $hasOne = Profile; }

There are two ways to describe this relationship in your model les. The simplest method is to set the $hasOne attribute to a string containing the classname of the associated model, as weve done above. If you need more control, you can dene your associations using array syntax. For example, you might want to limit the association to include only certain records. More on models 105

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class User extends AppModel { public $hasOne = array( Profile => array( className => Profile, conditions => array(Profile.published => 1), dependent => true ) ); }

Possible keys for hasOne association arrays include: className: the classname of the model being associated to the current model. If youre dening a User hasOne Prole relationship, the className key should equal Prole. foreignKey: the name of the foreign key found in the other model. This is especially handy if you need to dene multiple hasOne relationships. The default value for this key is the underscored, singular name of the current model, sufxed with _id. In the example above it would default to user_id. conditions: an array of nd() compatible conditions or SQL strings such as array(Prole.approved => true) elds: A list of elds to be retrieved when the associated model data is fetched. Returns all elds by default. order: an array of nd() compatible order clauses or SQL strings such as array(Prole.last_name => ASC) dependent: When the dependent key is set to true, and the models delete() method is called with the cascade parameter set to true, associated model records are also deleted. In this case we set it true so that deleting a User will also delete her associated Prole. Once this association has been dened, nd operations on the User model will also fetch a related Prole record if it exists:
//Sample results from a $this->User->find() call. Array ( [User] => Array ( [id] => 121 [name] => Gwoo the Kungwoo [created] => 2007-05-01 10:31:01 ) [Profile] => Array ( [id] => 12 [user_id] => 121 [skill] => Baking Cakes [created] => 2007-05-01 10:31:01 ) )

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belongsTo Now that we have Prole data access from the User model, lets dene a belongsTo association in the Prole model in order to get access to related User data. The belongsTo association is a natural complement to the hasOne and hasMany associations: it allows us to see the data from the other direction. When keying your database tables for a belongsTo relationship, follow this convention: belongsTo: the current model contains the foreign key. Relation Banana belongsTo Apple Prole belongsTo User Mentor belongsTo Doctor Schema bananas.apple_id proles.user_id mentors.doctor_id

Tip: If a model(table) contains a foreign key, it belongsTo the other model(table). We can dene the belongsTo association in our Prole model at /app/Model/Prole.php using the string syntax as follows:
class Profile extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = User; }

We can also dene a more specic relationship using array syntax:

class Profile extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( User => array( className => User, foreignKey => user_id ) ); }

Possible keys for belongsTo association arrays include: className: the classname of the model being associated to the current model. If youre dening a Prole belongsTo User relationship, the className key should equal User. foreignKey: the name of the foreign key found in the current model. This is especially handy if you need to dene multiple belongsTo relationships. The default value for this key is the underscored, singular name of the other model, sufxed with _id. conditions: an array of nd() compatible array(User.active => true) conditions or SQL strings such as

type: the type of the join to use in the SQL query, default is LEFT which may not t your needs in all situations, INNER may be helpful when you want everything from your main and associated models or nothing at all! (effective when used with some conditions of course). (NB: type value is in lower case - i.e. left, inner) elds: A list of elds to be retrieved when the associated model data is fetched. Returns all elds by default. More on models 107

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order: an array of nd() compatible array(User.username => ASC)

order

clauses

or

SQL

strings

such

as

counterCache: If set to true the associated Model will automatically increase or decrease the [singular_model_name]_count eld in the foreign table whenever you do a save() or delete(). If its a string then its the eld name to use. The value in the counter eld represents the number of related rows. You can also specify multiple counter caches by dening an array, see Multiple counterCache counterScope: Optional conditions array to use for updating counter cache eld. Once this association has been dened, nd operations on the Prole model will also fetch a related User record if it exists:
//Sample results from a $this->Profile->find() call. Array ( [Profile] => Array ( [id] => 12 [user_id] => 121 [skill] => Baking Cakes [created] => 2007-05-01 10:31:01 ) [User] => Array ( [id] => 121 [name] => Gwoo the Kungwoo [created] => 2007-05-01 10:31:01 ) )

hasMany Next step: dening a User hasMany Comment association. A hasMany association will allow us to fetch a users comments when we fetch a User record. When keying your database tables for a hasMany relationship, follow this convention: hasMany: the other model contains the foreign key. Relation User hasMany Comment Cake hasMany Virtue Product hasMany Option Schema Comment.user_id Virtue.cake_id Option.product_id

We can dene the hasMany association in our User model at /app/Model/User.php using the string syntax as follows:
class User extends AppModel { public $hasMany = Comment; }

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We can also dene a more specic relationship using array syntax:

class User extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( Comment => array( className => foreignKey => conditions => order => limit => dependent => ) ); }

Comment, user_id, array(Comment.status => 1), Comment.created DESC, 5, true

Possible keys for hasMany association arrays include: className: the classname of the model being associated to the current model. If youre dening a User hasMany Comment relationship, the className key should equal Comment. foreignKey: the name of the foreign key found in the other model. This is especially handy if you need to dene multiple hasMany relationships. The default value for this key is the underscored, singular name of the actual model, sufxed with _id. conditions: an array of nd() compatible conditions or SQL strings such as array(Comment.visible => true) order: an array of nd() compatible order clauses or SQL strings such as array(Prole.last_name => ASC) limit: The maximum number of associated rows you want returned. offset: The number of associated rows to skip over (given the current conditions and order) before fetching and associating. dependent: When dependent is set to true, recursive model deletion is possible. In this example, Comment records will be deleted when their associated User record has been deleted. exclusive: When exclusive is set to true, recursive model deletion does the delete with a deleteAll() call, instead of deleting each entity separately. This greatly improves performance, but may not be ideal for all circumstances. nderQuery: A complete SQL query CakePHP can use to fetch associated model records. This should be used in situations that require very custom results. If a query youre building requires a reference to the associated model ID, use the special {$__cakeID__$} marker in the query. For example, if your Apple model hasMany Orange, the query should look something like this: SELECT Orange.* from oranges as Orange WHERE Orange.apple_id = {$__cakeID__$}; Once this association has been dened, nd operations on the User model will also fetch related Comment records if they exist:
//Sample results from a $this->User->find() call. Array

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( [User] => Array ( [id] => 121 [name] => Gwoo the Kungwoo [created] => 2007-05-01 10:31:01 ) [Comment] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 123 [user_id] => 121 [title] => On Gwoo the Kungwoo [body] => The Kungwooness is not so Gwooish [created] => 2006-05-01 10:31:01 ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 124 [user_id] => 121 [title] => More on Gwoo [body] => But what of the Nut? [created] => 2006-05-01 10:41:01 ) ) )

One thing to remember is that youll need a complimentary Comment belongsTo User association in order to get the data from both directions. What weve outlined in this section empowers you to get Comment data from the User. Adding the Comment belongsTo User association in the Comment model empowers you to get User data from the Comment model - completing the connection and allowing the ow of information from either models perspective. counterCache - Cache your count() This function helps you cache the count of related data. Instead of counting the records manually via find(count), the model itself tracks any addition/deleting towards the associated $hasMany model and increases/decreases a dedicated integer eld within the parent model table. The name of the eld consists of the singular model name followed by a underscore and the word count:
my_model_count

Lets say you have a model called ImageComment and a model called Image, you would add a new INT-eld to the images table and name it image_comment_count. Here are some more examples:

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Model User Image BlogEntry

Associated Model Image ImageComment BlogEntryComment

Example users.image_count images.image_comment_count blog_entries.blog_entry_comment_count

Once you have added the counter eld you are good to go. Activate counter-cache in your association by adding a counterCache key and set the value to true:
class ImageComment extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( Image => array( counterCache => true, ) ); }

From now on, every time you add or remove a ImageComment associated to Image, the number within image_comment_count is adjusted automatically.
counterScope

You can also specify counterScope. It allows you to specify a simple condition which tells the model when to update (or when not to, depending on how you look at it) the counter value. Using our Image model example, we can specify it like so:

class ImageComment extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( Image => array( counterCache => true, counterScope => array(Image.active => 1) // only count if "Image" is active ) ); }

Multiple counterCache

Since 2.0 CakePHP supports having multiple counterCache in a single model relation. It is also possible to dene a counterScope for each counterCache. Assuming you have a User model and a Message model and you want to be able to count the amount of read and unread messages for each user. Model User User Message Field users.messages_read users.messages_unread messages.is_read Description Count read Message Count unread Message Determines if a Message is read or not.

With this setup your belongsTo would look like this:

class Message extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( User => array(

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counterCache => array( messages_read => array(Message.is_read => 1), messages_unread => array(Message.is_read => 0) ) ) ); }

hasAndBelongsToMany (HABTM) Alright. At this point, you can already call yourself a CakePHP model associations professional. Youre already well versed in the three associations that take up the bulk of object relations. Lets tackle the nal relationship type: hasAndBelongsToMany, or HABTM. This association is used when you have two models that need to be joined up, repeatedly, many times, in many different ways. The main difference between hasMany and HABTM is that a link between models in HABTM is not exclusive. For example, were about to join up our Recipe model with an Ingredient model using HABTM. Using tomatoes as an Ingredient for my grandmas spaghetti recipe doesnt use up the ingredient. I can also use it for a salad Recipe. Links between hasMany associated objects are exclusive. If my User hasMany Comments, a comment is only linked to a specic user. Its no longer up for grabs. Moving on. Well need to set up an extra table in the database to handle HABTM associations. This new join tables name needs to include the names of both models involved, in alphabetical order, and separated with an underscore ( _ ). The contents of the table should be two elds, each foreign keys (which should be integers) pointing to both of the primary keys of the involved models. To avoid any issues - dont dene a combined primary key for these two elds, if your application requires it you can dene a unique index. If you plan to add any extra information to this table, or use a with model, you should add an additional primary key eld (by convention id). HABTM requires a separate join table that includes both model names. Relationship Recipe HABTM Ingredient Cake HABTM Fan Foo HABTM Bar HABTM Table Fields ingredients_recipes.id, ingredients_recipes.ingredient_id, ingredients_recipes.recipe_id cakes_fans.id, cakes_fans.cake_id, cakes_fans.fan_id bars_foos.id, bars_foos.foo_id, bars_foos.bar_id

Note: Table names are by convention in alphabetical order. It is possible to dene a custom table name in association denition Make sure primary keys in tables cakes and recipes have id elds as assumed by convention. If theyre different than assumed, it has to be changed in models primaryKey Once this new table has been created, we can dene the HABTM association in the model les. Were gonna skip straight to the array syntax this time:
class Recipe extends AppModel { public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array(

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Ingredient => array( className joinTable foreignKey associationForeignKey unique conditions fields order limit offset finderQuery deleteQuery insertQuery ) ); }

=> => => => => => => => => => => => =>

Ingredient, ingredients_recipes, recipe_id, ingredient_id, true, , , , , , , ,

Possible keys for HABTM association arrays include: className: the classname of the model being associated to the current model. If youre dening a Recipe HABTM Ingredient relationship, the className key should equal Ingredient. joinTable: The name of the join table used in this association (if the current table doesnt adhere to the naming convention for HABTM join tables). with: Denes the name of the model for the join table. By default CakePHP will auto-create a model for you. Using the example above it would be called IngredientsRecipe. By using this key you can override this default name. The join table model can be used just like any regular model to access the join table directly. By creating a model class with such name and lename you can add any custom behavior to the join table searches, such as adding more information/columns to it foreignKey: the name of the foreign key found in the current model. This is especially handy if you need to dene multiple HABTM relationships. The default value for this key is the underscored, singular name of the current model, sufxed with _id. associationForeignKey: the name of the foreign key found in the other model. This is especially handy if you need to dene multiple HABTM relationships. The default value for this key is the underscored, singular name of the other model, sufxed with _id. unique: boolean or string keepExisting. If true (default value) cake will rst delete existing relationship records in the foreign keys table before inserting new ones. Existing associations need to be passed again when updating. When false, cake will insert the relationship record, and that no join records are deleted during a save operation. When set to keepExisting, the behavior is similar to true, but existing associations are not deleted. conditions: an array of nd() compatible conditions or SQL string. If you have conditions on an

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associated table, you should use a with model, and dene the necessary belongsTo associations on it. elds: A list of elds to be retrieved when the associated model data is fetched. Returns all elds by default. order: an array of nd() compatible order clauses or SQL strings limit: The maximum number of associated rows you want returned. offset: The number of associated rows to skip over (given the current conditions and order) before fetching and associating. nderQuery, deleteQuery, insertQuery: A complete SQL query CakePHP can use to fetch, delete, or create new associated model records. This should be used in situations that require very custom results. Once this association has been dened, nd operations on the Recipe model will also fetch related Tag records if they exist:
// Sample results from a $this->Recipe->find() call. Array ( [Recipe] => Array ( [id] => 2745 [name] => Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs [created] => 2007-05-01 10:31:01 [user_id] => 2346 ) [Ingredient] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 123 [name] => Chocolate ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 124 [name] => Sugar ) [2] => Array ( [id] => 125 [name] => Bombs ) ) )

Remember to dene a HABTM association in the Ingredient model if youd like to fetch Recipe data when using the Ingredient model.

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Note: HABTM data is treated like a complete set, each time a new data association is added the complete set of associated rows in database is dropped and created again so you will always need to pass the whole data set for saving. For an alternative to using HABTM see hasMany through (The Join Model)

Tip: For more information on saving HABTM objects see Saving Related Model Data (HABTM)

hasMany through (The Join Model) It is sometimes desirable to store additional data with a many to many association. Consider the following Student hasAndBelongsToMany Course Course hasAndBelongsToMany Student In other words, a Student can take many Courses and a Course can be taken by many Students. This is a simple many to many association demanding a table such as this:
id | student_id | course_id

Now what if we want to store the number of days that were attended by the student on the course and their nal grade? The table wed want would be:
id | student_id | course_id | days_attended | grade

The trouble is, hasAndBelongsToMany will not support this type of scenario because when hasAndBelongsToMany associations are saved, the association is deleted rst. You would lose the extra data in the columns as it is not replaced in the new insert. Changed in version 2.1. You can set unique setting to keepExisting circumvent losing extra data during the save operation. See unique key in HABTM association arrays. The way to implement our requirement is to use a join model, otherwise known as a hasMany through association. That is, the association is a model itself. So, we can create a new model CourseMembership. Take a look at the following models.:
// Student.php class Student extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( CourseMembership ); } // Course.php class Course extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( CourseMembership ); } // CourseMembership.php

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class CourseMembership extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( Student, Course ); }

The CourseMembership join model uniquely identies a given Students participation on a Course in addition to extra meta-information. Join models are pretty useful things to be able to use and Cake makes it easy to do so with its built-in hasMany and belongsTo associations and saveAll feature. Creating and Destroying Associations on the Fly Sometimes it becomes necessary to create and destroy model associations on the y. This may be for any number of reasons: You want to reduce the amount of associated data fetched, but all your associations are on the rst level of recursion. You want to change the way an association is dened in order to sort or lter associated data. This association creation and destruction is done using the CakePHP model bindModel() and unbindModel() methods. (There is also a very helpful behavior called Containable, please refer to manual section about Built-in behaviors for more information). Lets set up a few models so we can see how bindModel() and unbindModel() work. Well start with two models:
class Leader extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( Follower => array( className => Follower, order => Follower.rank ) ); } class Follower extends AppModel { public $name = Follower; }

Now, in the LeadersController, we can use the nd() method in the Leader model to fetch a Leader and its associated followers. As you can see above, the association array in the Leader model denes a Leader hasMany Followers relationship. For demonstration purposes, lets use unbindModel() to remove that association in a controller action:
public function some_action() { // This fetches Leaders, and their associated Followers $this->Leader->find(all); // Lets remove the hasMany... $this->Leader->unbindModel( array(hasMany => array(Follower))

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); // Now using a find function will return // Leaders, with no Followers $this->Leader->find(all); // NOTE: unbindModel only affects the very next // find function. An additional find call will use // the configured association information. // Weve already used find(all) after unbindModel(), // so this will fetch Leaders with associated // Followers once again... $this->Leader->find(all); }

Note: Removing or adding associations using bind- and unbindModel() only works for the next nd operation only unless the second parameter has been set to false. If the second parameter has been set to false, the bind remains in place for the remainder of the request. Heres the basic usage pattern for unbindModel():
$this->Model->unbindModel( array(associationType => array(associatedModelClassName)) );

Now that weve successfully removed an association on the y, lets add one. Our as-of-yet unprincipled Leader needs some associated Principles. The model le for our Principle model is bare, except for the public $name statement. Lets associate some Principles to our Leader on the y (but rememberonly for just the following nd operation). This function appears in the LeadersController:
public function another_action() { // There is no Leader hasMany Principles in // the leader.php model file, so a find here, // only fetches Leaders. $this->Leader->find(all); // Lets use bindModel() to add a new association // to the Leader model: $this->Leader->bindModel( array(hasMany => array( Principle => array( className => Principle ) ) ) ); // Now that were associated correctly, // we can use a single find function to fetch // Leaders with their associated principles:

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$this->Leader->find(all); }

There you have it. The basic usage for bindModel() is the encapsulation of a normal association array inside an array whose key is named after the type of association you are trying to create:
$this->Model->bindModel( array(associationName => array( associatedModelClassName => array( // normal association keys go here... ) ) ) );

Even though the newly bound model doesnt need any sort of association denition in its model le, it will still need to be correctly keyed in order for the new association to work properly. Multiple relations to the same model There are cases where a Model has more than one relation to another Model. For example you might have a Message model that has two relations to the User model. One relation to the user that sends a message, and a second to the user that receives the message. The messages table will have a eld user_id, but also a eld recipient_id. Now your Message model can look something like:
class Message extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( Sender => array( className => User, foreignKey => user_id ), Recipient => array( className => User, foreignKey => recipient_id ) ); }

Recipient is an alias for the User model. Now lets see what the User model would look like:
class User extends AppModel { public $hasMany = array( MessageSent => array( className => Message, foreignKey => user_id ), MessageReceived => array( className => Message, foreignKey => recipient_id ) ); }

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It is also possible to create self associations as shown below:

class Post extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array( Parent => array( className => Post, foreignKey => parent_id ) ); public $hasMany = array( Children => array( className => Post, foreignKey => parent_id ) ); }

Fetching a nested array of associated records: If your table has parent_id eld you can also use nd(threaded) to fetch nested array of records using a single query without setting up any associations. Joining tables In SQL you can combine related tables using the JOIN statement. This allows you to perform complex searches across multiples tables (i.e: search posts given several tags). In CakePHP some associations (belongsTo and hasOne) performs automatic joins to retrieve data, so you can issue queries to retrieve models based on data in the related one. But this is not the case with hasMany and hasAndBelongsToMany associations. Here is where forcing joins comes to the rescue. You only have to dene the necessary joins to combine tables and get the desired results for your query. Note: Remember you need to set the recursion to -1 for this to work. I.e: $this->Channel->recursive = -1; To force a join between tables you need to use the modern syntax for Model::nd(), adding a joins key to the $options array. For example:
$options[joins] = array( array(table => channels, alias => Channel, type => LEFT, conditions => array( Channel.id = Item.channel_id, ) ) ); $Item->find(all, $options);

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Note: Note that the join arrays are not keyed. In the above example, a model called Item is left joined to the channels table. You can alias the table with the Model name, so the retrieved data complies with the CakePHP data structure. The keys that dene the join are the following: table: The table for the join. alias: An alias to the table. The name of the model associated with the table is the best bet. type: The type of join: inner, left or right. conditions: The conditions to perform the join. With joins, you could add conditions based on Related model elds:
$options[joins] = array( array(table => channels, alias => Channel, type => LEFT, conditions => array( Channel.id = Item.channel_id, ) ) ); $options[conditions] = array( Channel.private => 1 ); $privateItems = $Item->find(all, $options);

You could perform several joins as needed in hasAndBelongsToMany: Suppose a Book hasAndBelongsToMany Tag association. This relation uses a books_tags table as join table, so you need to join the books table to the books_tags table, and this with the tags table:
$options[joins] = array( array(table => books_tags, alias => BooksTag, type => inner, conditions => array( Books.id = BooksTag.books_id ) ), array(table => tags, alias => Tag, type => inner, conditions => array( BooksTag.tag_id = Tag.id ) ) );

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$options[conditions] = array( Tag.tag => Novel ); $books = $Book->find(all, $options);

Using joins allows you to have a maximum exibility in how CakePHP handles associations and fetch the data, however in most cases you can use other tools to achieve the same results such as correctly dening associations, binding models on the y and using the Containable behavior. This feature should be used with care because it could lead, in a few cases, into bad formed SQL queries if combined with any of the former techniques described for associating models.

Retrieving Your Data

As stated before, one of the roles of the Model layer is to get data from multiple types of storage. The CakePHP Model class comes with some functions that will help you search for this data, sort it, paginate it, and lter it. The most common function you will use in models is Model::find() nd find(string $type = first, array $params = array()) Find is the multifunctional workhorse of all model data-retrieval functions. $type can be either all, first, count, list, neighbors or threaded or any custom nder you can dene. Keep in mind that $type is case sensitive. Using an upper case character (for example All) will not produce the expected results. $params is used to pass all parameters to the various nds, and has the following possible keys by default - all of which are optional:

array( conditions => array(Model.field => $thisValue), //array of conditions recursive => 1, //int fields => array(Model.field1, DISTINCT Model.field2), //array of field names order => array(Model.created, Model.field3 DESC), //string or array defining orde group => array(Model.field), //fields to GROUP BY limit => n, //int page => n, //int offset => n, //int callbacks => true //other possible values are false, before, after )

Its also possible to add and use other parameters, as is made use of by some nd types, behaviors and of course possibly with your own model methods. nd(rst) find(first, $params) will return one result, youd use this for any case where you expect only one result. Below are a couple of simple (controller code) examples: More on models 121

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public function some_function() { // ... $semiRandomArticle = $this->Article->find(first); $lastCreated = $this->Article->find(first, array( order => array(Article.created => desc) )); $specificallyThisOne = $this->Article->find(first, array( conditions => array(Article.id => 1) )); // ... }

In the rst example, no parameters at all are passed to nd - therefore no conditions or sort order will be used. The format returned from find(first) call is of the form:
Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [id] => 83 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) [AssociatedModelName] => Array ( [id] => 1 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) )

nd(count) find(count, $params) returns an integer value. Below are a couple of simple (controller code) examples:
public function some_function() { // ... $total = $this->Article->find(count); $pending = $this->Article->find(count, array( conditions => array(Article.status => pending) )); $authors = $this->Article->User->find(count); $publishedAuthors = $this->Article->find(count, array( fields => DISTINCT Article.user_id, conditions => array(Article.status != => pending) )); // ... }

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Note: Dont pass fields as an array to find(count). You would only need to specify elds for a DISTINCT count (since otherwise, the count is always the same - dictated by the conditions).

nd(all) find(all, $params) returns an array of (potentially multiple) results. It is in fact the mechanism used by all find() variants, as well as paginate. Below are a couple of simple (controller code) examples:
public function some_function() { // ... $allArticles = $this->Article->find(all); $pending = $this->Article->find(all, array( conditions => array(Article.status => pending) )); $allAuthors = $this->Article->User->find(all); $allPublishedAuthors = $this->Article->User->find(all, array( conditions => array(Article.status != => pending) )); // ... }

Note: In the above example $allAuthors will contain every user in the users table. There will be no condition applied to the nd as none were passed. The results of a call to find(all) will be of the following form:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [id] => 83 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) [AssociatedModelName] => Array ( [id] => 1 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) )

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nd(list) find(list, $params) returns an indexed array, useful for any place where you would want a list such as for populating input select boxes. Below are a couple of simple (controller code) examples:
public function some_function() { // ... $allArticles = $this->Article->find(list); $pending = $this->Article->find(list, array( conditions => array(Article.status => pending) )); $allAuthors = $this->Article->User->find(list); $allPublishedAuthors = $this->Article->find(list, array( fields => array(User.id, User.name), conditions => array(Article.status != => pending), recursive => 0 )); // ... }

Note: In the above example $allAuthors will contain every user in the users table. There will be no condition applied to the nd as none were passed. The results of a call to find(list) will be in the following form:
Array ( //[id] [1] => [2] => [4] => [5] => [6] => [3] => )

=> displayValue, displayValue1, displayValue2, displayValue4, displayValue5, displayValue6, displayValue3,

When calling find(list) the fields passed are used to determine what should be used as the array key, value and optionally what to group the results by. By default the primary key for the model is used for the key, and the display eld (which can be congured using the model attribute displayField) is used for the value. Some further examples to clarify:
public function some_function() { // ... $justusernames = $this->Article->User->find(list, array( fields => array(User.username) )); $usernameMap = $this->Article->User->find(list, array( fields => array(User.username, User.first_name)

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)); $usernameGroups = $this->Article->User->find(list, array( fields => array(User.username, User.first_name, User.group) )); // ... }

With the above code example, the resultant vars would look something like this:
$justusernames = Array ( //[id] => username, [213] => AD7six, [25] => _psychic_, [1] => PHPNut, [2] => gwoo, [400] => jperras, ) $usernameMap = Array ( //[username] => firstname, [AD7six] => Andy, [_psychic_] => John, [PHPNut] => Larry, [gwoo] => Gwoo, [jperras] => Jol, ) $usernameGroups = Array ( [User] => Array ( [PHPNut] => Larry, [gwoo] => Gwoo, ) [Admin] => Array ( [_psychic_] => John, [AD7six] => Andy, [jperras] => Jol, ) )

nd(threaded) find(threaded, $params) returns a nested array, and is appropriate if you want to use the parent_id eld of your model data to build nested results. Below are a couple of simple (controller code) examples:

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public function some_function() { // ... $allCategories = $this->Category->find(threaded); $comments = $this->Comment->find(threaded, array( conditions => array(article_id => 50) )); // ... }

Tip: A better way to deal with nested data is using the Tree behavior In the above code example, $allCategories will contain a nested array representing the whole category structure. The results of a call to find(threaded) will be of the following form:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [id] => 83 [parent_id] => null [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) [AssociatedModelName] => Array ( [id] => 1 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) [children] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [id] => 42 [parent_id] => 83 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) [AssociatedModelName] => Array ( [id] => 2 [field1] => value1

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[field2] => value2 [field3] => value3 ) [children] => Array ( ) ) ... ) ) )

The order results appear can be changed as it is inuenced by the order of processing. For example, if order => name ASC is passed in the params to find(threaded), the results will appear in name order. Likewise any order can be used, there is no inbuilt requirement of this method for the top result to be returned rst. Warning: If you specify fields, you need to always include the parent_id (or its current alias):
public function some_function() { $categories = $this->Category->find(threaded, array( fields => array(id, name, parent_id) )); }

Otherwise the returned array will not be of the expected nested structure from above.

nd(neighbors) find(neighbors, $params) will perform a nd similar to rst, but will return the row before and after the one you request. Below is a simple (controller code) example:
public function some_function() { $neighbors = $this->Article->find(neighbors, array(field => id, value => 3)); }

You can see in this example the two required elements of the $params array: eld and value. Other elements are still allowed as with any other nd (Ex: If your model acts as containable, then you can specify contain in $params). The format returned from a find(neighbors) call is in the form:
Array ( [prev] => Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [id] => 2 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 ...

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) [AssociatedModelName] => Array ( [id] => 151 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 ... ) ) [next] => Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [id] => 4 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 ... ) [AssociatedModelName] => Array ( [id] => 122 [field1] => value1 [field2] => value2 ... ) ) )

Note: Note how the result always contains only two root elements: prev and next. This function does not honor a models default recursive var. The recursive setting must be passed in the parameters on each call.

Creating custom nd types The find method is exible enough to accept your custom nders, this is done by declaring your own types in a model variable and by implementing a special function in your model class. A Model Find Type is a shortcut to nd options. For example, the following two nds are equivalent
$this->User->find(first); $this->User->find(all, array(limit => 1));

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neighbors But what about other types? Lets say you want a nder for all published articles in your database. The rst change you need to do is add your type to the Model::$findMethods variable in the model
class Article extends AppModel { public $findMethods = array(available => } true);

Basically this is just telling CakePHP to accept the value available as the rst argument of the find function. Next step is to implement the function _findAvailable. This is done by convention, if you wanted to implement a nder called myFancySearch then the method to implement would be named _findMyFancySearch.
class Article extends AppModel { public $findMethods = array(available => true);

protected function _findAvailable($state, $query, $results = array()) { if ($state === before) { $query[conditions][Article.published] = true; return $query; } return $results; } }

This all comes together in the following example (controller code):

class ArticlesController extends AppController { // Will find all published articles and order them by the created column public function index() { $articles = $this->Article->find(available, array( order => array(created => desc) )); } }

The special _find[Type] methods receive 3 arguments as shown above. The rst one means the state of the query execution, which could be either before or after. It is done this way because this function is just a sort of callback function that has the ability to modify the query before it is done, or to modify the results after they are fetched. Typically the rst thing to check in our custom nd function is the state of the query. The before state is the moment to modify the query, bind new associations, apply more behaviors, and interpret any special key that is passed in the second argument of find. This state requires you to return the $query argument (modied or not). The after state is the perfect place to inspect the results, inject new data, process it to return it in another format, or do whatever you like to the recently fetched data. This state requires you to return the $results array (modied or not). You can create as many custom nders as you like, and they are a great way of reusing code in your More on models 129

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application across models. It is also possible to paginate via a custom nd type as follows:
class ArticlesController extends AppController { // Will paginate all published articles public function index() { $this->paginate = array(available); $articles = $this->paginate(); $this->set(compact(articles)); } }

Setting the $this->paginate property as above on the controller will result in the type of the nd becoming available, and will also allow you to continue to modify the nd results. If your pagination page count is becoming corrupt, it may be necessary to add the following code to your AppModel, which should x pagination count:
class AppModel extends Model { /** * Removes fields key from count query on custom finds when it is an array, * as it will completely break the Model::_findCount() call * * @param string $state Either "before" or "after" * @param array $query * @param array $results * @return int The number of records found, or false * @access protected * @see Model::find() */ protected function _findCount($state, $query, $results = array()) { if ($state === before) { if (isset($query[type]) && isset($this->findMethods[$query[type]])) { $query = $this->{_find . ucfirst($query[type])}(before, $query); if (!empty($query[fields]) && is_array($query[fields])) { if (!preg_match(/^count/i, current($query[fields]))) { unset($query[fields]); } } } } return parent::_findCount($state, $query, $results); } } ?>

Changed in version 2.2. You no longer need to override _ndCount for xing incorrect count results. The before state of your custom nder will now be called again with $query[operation] = count. The returned $query will be used in _findCount() If needed you can distinguish by checking for

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operation key and return a different $query:

protected function _findAvailable($state, $query, $results = array()) { if ($state === before) { $query[conditions][Article.published] = true; if (!empty($query[operation]) && $query[operation] === count) { return $query; } $query[joins] = array( //array of required joins ); return $query; } return $results; }

Magic Find Types These magic functions can be used as a shortcut to search your tables by a certain eld. Just add the name of the eld (in CamelCase format) to the end of these functions, and supply the criteria for that eld as the rst parameter. ndAllBy() functions will return results in a format like find(all), while ndBy() return in the same format as find(first)
ndAllBy

findAllBy<fieldName>(string $value, array $fields, array $order, int $limit, int $page, int $recursive) ndAllBy<x> Example Corresponding SQL Fragment $this->Product->findAllByOrderStatus(3); Product.order_status = 3 $this->Recipe->findAllByType(Cookie); Recipe.type = Cookie $this->User->findAllByLastName(Anderson);User.last_name = Anderson $this->Cake->findAllById(7); Cake.id = 7 $this->User->findAllByEmailOrUsername(jhon, User.email = jhon OR jhon); User.username = jhon; $this->User->findAllByUsernameAndPassword(jhon, User.username = jhon AND 123); User.password = 123; $this->User->findAllByLastName(psychic, User.last_name = psychic array(), array(User.user_name => ORDER BY User.user_name asc)); ASC The returned result is an array formatted just as it would be from find(all).
ndBy

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The ndBy magic functions also accept some optional parameters: findBy<fieldName>(string $value[, mixed $fields[, mixed $order]]); ndBy<x> Example Corresponding SQL Fragment $this->Product->findByOrderStatus(3); Product.order_status = 3 $this->Recipe->findByType(Cookie); Recipe.type = Cookie $this->User->findByLastName(Anderson); User.last_name = Anderson; $this->User->findByEmailOrUsername(jhon, User.email = jhon OR jhon); User.username = jhon; $this->User->findByUsernameAndPassword(jhon, User.username = jhon AND 123); User.password = 123; $this->Cake->findById(7); Cake.id = 7 ndBy() functions return results like find(first) Model::query() query(string $query) SQL calls that you cant or dont want to make via other model methods (this should only rarely be necessary) can be made using the models query() method. If youre ever using this method in your application, be sure to check out CakePHPs Data Sanitization, which aids in cleaning up user-provided data from injection and cross-site scripting attacks. Note: query() does not honor $Model->cacheQueries as its functionality is inherently disjoint from that of the calling model. To avoid caching calls to query, supply a second argument of false, ie: query($query, $cachequeries = false) query() uses the table name in the query as the array key for the returned data, rather than the model name. For example:
$this->Picture->query("SELECT * FROM pictures LIMIT 2;");

might return:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [pictures] => Array ( [id] => 1304 [user_id] => 759 ) ) [1] => Array ( [pictures] => Array

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( [id] => 1305 [user_id] => 759 ) ) )

To use the model name as the array key, and get a result consistent with that returned by the Find methods, the query can be rewritten:
$this->Picture->query("SELECT * FROM pictures AS Picture LIMIT 2;");

which returns:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [Picture] => Array ( [id] => 1304 [user_id] => 759 ) ) [1] => Array ( [Picture] => Array ( [id] => 1305 [user_id] => 759 ) ) )

Note: This syntax and the corresponding array structure is valid for MySQL only. Cake does not provide any data abstraction when running queries manually, so exact results will vary between databases.

Model::field() field(string $name, array $conditions = null, string $order = null) Returns the value of a single eld, specied as $name, from the rst record matched by $conditions as ordered by $order. If no conditions are passed and the model id is set, will return the eld value for the current model result. If no matching record is found returns false.
$this->Post->id = 22; echo $this->Post->field(name); // echo the name for row id 22

echo $this->Post->field(name, array(created < => date(Y-m-d H:i:s)), created DESC); // echo the name of the last created instance

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Model::read() read($fields, $id) read() is a method used to set the current model data (Model::$data)such as during editsbut it can also be used in other circumstances to retrieve a single record from the database. $fields is used to pass a single eld name, as a string, or an array of eld names; if left empty, all elds will be fetched. $id species the ID of the record to be read. By default, the currently selected record, as specied by Model::$id, is used. Passing a different value to $id will cause that record to be selected. read() always returns an array (even if only a single eld name is requested). Use field to retrieve the value of a single eld. Warning: As the read method overwrites any information stored in the data and id property of the model, you should be very careful when using this function in general, especially using it in the model callback functions such as beforeValidate and beforeSave. Generally the find function provides a more robust and easy to work with API than the read method.

Complex Find Conditions Most of the models nd calls involve passing sets of conditions in one way or another. In general CakePHP prefers using arrays for expressing any conditions that needs to be put after the WHERE clause in any SQL query. Using arrays is clearer and easier to read, and also makes it very easy to build queries. This syntax also breaks out the elements of your query (elds, values, operators, etc.) into discrete, manipulatable parts. This allows CakePHP to generate the most efcient query possible, ensure proper SQL syntax, and properly escape each individual part of the query. Using the array syntax also enables CakePHP to secure your queries against any SQL injection attack At its most basic, an array-based query looks like this:
$conditions = array("Post.title" => "This is a post", "Post.author_id" => 1); // Example usage with a model: $this->Post->find(first, array(conditions => $conditions));

The structure here is fairly self-explanatory: it will nd any post where the title equals This is a post. Note that we could have used just title as the eld name, but when building queries, it is good practice to always specify the model name, as it improves the clarity of the code, and helps prevent collisions in the future, should you choose to change your schema. What about other types of matches? These are equally simple. Lets say we wanted to nd all the posts where the title is not This is a post:
array("Post.title !=" => "This is a post")

Notice the != that follows the eld name. CakePHP can parse out any valid SQL comparison operator, including match expressions using LIKE, BETWEEN, or REGEX, as long as you leave a space between

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eld name and the operator. The one exception here is IN (...)-style matches. Lets say you wanted to nd posts where the title was in a given set of values:
array( "Post.title" => array("First post", "Second post", "Third post") )

To do a NOT IN(...) match to nd posts where the title is not in the given set of values:
array( "NOT" => array("Post.title" => array("First post", "Second post", "Third post")) )

Adding additional lters to the conditions is as simple as adding additional key/value pairs to the array:
array ( "Post.title" => array("First post", "Second post", "Third post"), "Post.created >" => date(Y-m-d, strtotime("-2 weeks")) )

You can also create nds that compare two elds in the database:
array("Post.created = Post.modified")

This above example will return posts where the created date is equal to the modied date (ie it will return posts that have never been modied). Remember that if you nd yourself unable to form a WHERE clause in this method (ex. boolean operations), you can always specify it as a string like:
array( Model.field & 8 = 1, // other conditions as usual )

By default, CakePHP joins multiple conditions with boolean AND; which means, the snippet above would only match posts that have been created in the past two weeks, and have a title that matches one in the given set. However, we could just as easily nd posts that match either condition:
array("OR" => array( "Post.title" => array("First post", "Second post", "Third post"), "Post.created >" => date(Y-m-d, strtotime("-2 weeks")) ))

Cake accepts all valid SQL boolean operations, including AND, OR, NOT, XOR, etc., and they can be upper or lower case, whichever you prefer. These conditions are also innitely nest-able. Lets say you had a belongsTo relationship between Posts and Authors. Lets say you wanted to nd all the posts that contained a certain keyword (magic) or were created in the past two weeks, but you want to restrict your search to posts written by Bob:
array( "Author.name" => "Bob", "OR" => array( "Post.title LIKE" => "%magic%",

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"Post.created >" => date(Y-m-d, strtotime("-2 weeks")) ) )

If you need to set multiple conditions on the same eld, like when you want to do a LIKE search with multiple terms, you can do so by using conditions similar to:
array(OR => array( array(Post.title LIKE => %one%), array(Post.title LIKE => %two%) ))

Cake can also check for null elds. In this example, the query will return records where the post title is not null:
array("NOT" => array( "Post.title" => null ) )

To handle BETWEEN queries, you can use the following:

array(Post.read_count BETWEEN ? AND ? => array(1,10))

Note: CakePHP will quote the numeric values depending on the eld type in your DB. How about GROUP BY?:
array( fields => array( Product.type, MIN(Product.price) as price ), group => Product.type )

The data returned for this would be in the following format:

Array ( [0] => Array ( [Product] => Array ( [type] => Clothing ) [0] => Array ( [price] => 32 ) ) [1] => Array ...

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A quick example of doing a DISTINCT query. You can use other operators, such as MIN(), MAX(), etc., in a similar fashion:
array( fields => array(DISTINCT (User.name) AS my_column_name), order = >array(User.id DESC) )

You can create very complex conditions, by nesting multiple condition arrays:
array( OR => array( array(Company.name => Future Holdings), array(Company.city => CA) ), AND => array( array( OR => array( array(Company.status => active), NOT => array( array(Company.status => array(inactive, suspended)) ) ) ) ) )

Which produces the following SQL:

SELECT Company.id, Company.name, Company.description, Company.location, Company.created, Company.status, Company.size FROM companies AS Company WHERE ((Company.name = Future Holdings) OR (Company.name = Steel Mega Works)) AND ((Company.status = active) OR (NOT (Company.status IN (inactive, suspended))))

Sub-queries

For this example, imagine we have a users table with id, name and status. The status can be A, B or C. And we want to get all the users that have status other than B using sub-query. In order to achieve that we are going to get the model data source and ask it to build the query as if we were calling a nd method, but it will just return the SQL statement. After that we make an expression and add it to the conditions array:

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$conditionsSubQuery["User2"."status"] = B; $db = $this->User->getDataSource(); $subQuery = $db->buildStatement( array( fields => array("User2"."id"), table => $db->fullTableName($this->User), alias => User2, limit => null, offset => null, joins => array(), conditions => $conditionsSubQuery, order => null, group => null ), $this->User ); $subQuery = "User"."id" NOT IN ( . $subQuery . ) ; $subQueryExpression = $db->expression($subQuery); $conditions[] = $subQueryExpression; $this->User->find(all, compact(conditions));

This should generate the following SQL:

SELECT "User"."id" AS "User__id", "User"."name" AS "User__name", "User"."status" AS "User__status" FROM "users" AS "User" WHERE "User"."id" NOT IN ( SELECT "User2"."id" FROM "users" AS "User2" WHERE "User2"."status" = B )

Also, if you need to pass just part of your query as raw SQL as the above, datasource expressions with raw SQL work for any part of the nd query.
Prepared Statements

Should you need even more control over your queries, you can make use of prepared statements. This allows you to talk directly to the database driver and send any custom query you like:
$db = $this->getDataSource(); $db->fetchAll(

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SELECT * from users where username = ? AND password = ?, array(jhon, 12345) ); $db->fetchAll( SELECT * from users where username = :username AND password = :password, array(username => jhon,password => 12345) );

Saving Your Data

CakePHP makes saving model data a snap. Data ready to be saved should be passed to the models save() method using the following basic format:
Array ( [ModelName] => Array ( [fieldname1] => value [fieldname2] => value ) )

Most of the time you wont even need to worry about this format: CakePHPs FormHelper, and model nd methods all package data in this format. If youre using either of the helpers, the data is also conveniently available in $this->request->data for quick usage. Heres a quick example of a controller action that uses a CakePHP model to save data to a database table:
public function edit($id) { // Has any form data been POSTed? if ($this->request->is(post)) { // If the form data can be validated and saved... if ($this->Recipe->save($this->request->data)) { // Set a session flash message and redirect. $this->Session->setFlash(Recipe Saved!); $this->redirect(/recipes); } } // If no form data, find the recipe to be edited // and hand it to the view. $this->set(recipe, $this->Recipe->findById($id)); }

When save is called, the data passed to it in the rst parameter is validated using CakePHP validation mechanism (see Data Validation chapter for more information). If for some reason your data isnt saving, be sure to check to see if some validation rules are being broken. You can debug this situation by outputting Model::$validationErrors:
if ($this->Recipe->save($this->request->data)) { // handle the success.

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} debug($this->Recipe->validationErrors);

There are a few other save-related methods in the model that youll nd useful: Model::set($one, $two = null) Model::set() can be used to set one or many elds of data to the data array inside a model. This is useful when using models with the ActiveRecord features offered by Model:
$this->Post->read(null, 1); $this->Post->set(title, New title for the article); $this->Post->save();

Is an example of how you can use set() to update and save single elds, in an ActiveRecord approach. You can also use set() to assign new values to multiple elds:
$this->Post->read(null, 1); $this->Post->set(array( title => New title, published => false )); $this->Post->save();

The above would update the title and published elds and save them to the database. Model::clear() This method can be used to reset model state and clear out any unsaved data and validation errors. New in version 2.4. Model::save(array $data = null, boolean $validate = true, array $fieldList = array()) Featured above, this method saves array-formatted data. The second parameter allows you to sidestep validation, and the third allows you to supply a list of model elds to be saved. For added security, you can limit the saved elds to those listed in $fieldList. Note: If $fieldList is not supplied, a malicious user can add additional elds to the form data (if you are not using SecurityComponent), and by this change elds that were not originally intended to be changed. The save method also has an alternate syntax:
save(array $data = null, array $params = array())

$params array can have any of the following available options as keys:

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validate Set to true/false to enable disable validation. fieldList An array of elds you want to allow for saving. callbacks Set to false to disable callbacks. Using before or after will enable only those callbacks. counterCache (since 2.4) Boolean to control updating of counter caches (if any) More information about model callbacks is available here Tip: If you dont want the modified eld to be automatically updated when saving some data add modified => false to your $data array Once a save has been completed, the ID for the object can be found in the $id attribute of the model object - something especially handy when creating new objects.
$this->Ingredient->save($newData); $newIngredientId = $this->Ingredient->id;

Creating or updating is controlled by the models id eld. If $Model->id is set, the record with this primary key is updated. Otherwise a new record is created:
// Create: id isnt set or is null $this->Recipe->create(); $this->Recipe->save($this->request->data); // Update: id is set to a numerical value $this->Recipe->id = 2; $this->Recipe->save($this->request->data);

Tip: When calling save in a loop, dont forget to call create(). If you want to update a value, rather than create a new one, make sure your are passing the primary key eld into the data array:
$data = array(id => 10, title => My new title); // This will update Recipe with id 10 $this->Recipe->save($data);

Model::create(array $data = array()) This method resets the model state for saving new information. It does not actually create a record in the database but clears Model::$id and sets Model::$data based on your database eld defaults. If you have not dened defaults for your database elds, Model::$data will be set to an empty array. If the $data parameter (using the array format outlined above) is passed, it will be merged with the database eld defaults and the model instance will be ready to save with that data (accessible at $this->data). If false or null are passed for the $data parameter, Model::data will be set to an empty array.

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Tip: If you want to insert a new row instead of updating an existing one you should always call create() rst. This avoids conicts with possible prior save calls in callbacks or other places.

Model::saveField(string $fieldName, string $fieldValue, $validate = false) Used to save a single eld value. Set the ID of the model ($this->ModelName->id = $id) just before calling saveField(). When using this method, $fieldName should only contain the name of the eld, not the name of the model and eld. For example, to update the title of a blog post, the call to saveField from a controller might look something like this:
$this->Post->saveField(title, A New Title for a New Day);

Warning: You cant stop the modified eld being updated with this method, you need to use the save() method. The saveField method also has an alternate syntax:
saveField(string $fieldName, string $fieldValue, array $params = array())

$params array can have any of the following available options as keys: validate Set to true/false to enable disable validation. callbacks Set to false to disable callbacks. Using before or after will enable only those callbacks. counterCache (since 2.4) Boolean to control updating of counter caches (if any) Model::updateAll(array $fields, array $conditions) Updates one or more records in a single call. Records to be updated are identied by the $conditions array, and elds to be updated, along with their values, are identied by the $fields array. For example, to approve all bakers who have been members for over a year, the update call might look something like:
$this_year = date(Y-m-d h:i:s, strtotime(-1 year)); $this->Baker->updateAll( array(Baker.approved => true), array(Baker.created <= => $this_year) );

Tip: The $elds array accepts SQL expressions. Literal values should be quoted manually using Sanitize::escape().

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Note: Even if the modied eld exists for the model being updated, it is not going to be updated automatically by the ORM. Just add it manually to the array if you need it to be updated. For example, to close all tickets that belong to a certain customer:
$this->Ticket->updateAll( array(Ticket.status => "closed"), array(Ticket.customer_id => 453) );

By default, updateAll() will automatically join any belongsTo association for databases that support joins. To prevent this, temporarily unbind the associations. Model::saveMany(array $data = null, array $options = array()) Method used to save multiple rows of the same model at once. The following options may be used: validate: Set to false to disable validation, true to validate each record before saving, rst to validate all records before any are saved (default), atomic: If true (default), will attempt to save all records in a single transaction. Should be set to false if database/table does not support transactions. fieldList: Equivalent to the $eldList parameter in Model::save() deep: (since 2.1) If set to true, also associated data is saved, see also saveAssociated counterCache (since 2.4) Boolean to control updating of counter caches (if any) For saving multiple records of single model, $data needs to be a numerically indexed array of records like this:
$data = array( array(title => title 1), array(title => title 2), );

Note: Note that we are passing numerical indices instead of usual $data containing the Article key. When saving multiple records of same model the records arrays should be just numerically indexed without the model key. It is also acceptable to have the data in the following format:
$data = array( array(Article => array(title => title 1)), array(Article => array(title => title 2)), );

To save also associated data with $options[deep] = true (since 2.1), the two above examples would look like:

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$data = array( array(title => title 1, Assoc array(title => title 2), ); $data = array( array(Article => array(title => array(Article => array(title => ); $Model->saveMany($data, array(deep =>

=> array(field => value)),

title 1), Assoc => array(field => value)), title 2)), true));

Keep in mind that if you want to update a record instead of creating a new one you just need to add the primary key index to the data row:

$data = array( array(Article => array(title => New article)), // This creates a new row array(Article => array(id => 2, title => title 2)), // This updates an existing );

Model::saveAssociated(array $data = null, array $options = array()) Method used to save multiple model associations at once. The following options may be used: validate: Set to false to disable validation, true to validate each record before saving, rst to validate all records before any are saved (default), atomic: If true (default), will attempt to save all records in a single transaction. Should be set to false if database/table does not support transactions. fieldList: Equivalent to the $eldList parameter in Model::save() deep: (since 2.1) If set to true, not only directly associated data is saved, but deeper nested associated data as well. Defaults to false. counterCache (since 2.4) Boolean to control updating of counter caches (if any) For saving a record along with its related record having a hasOne or belongsTo association, the data array should be like this:
$data = array( User => array(username => billy), Profile => array(sex => Male, occupation => Programmer), );

For saving a record along with its related records having hasMany association, the data array should be like this:
$data = array( Article => array(title => My first article), Comment => array( array(body => Comment 1, user_id => 1), array(body => Comment 2, user_id => 12), array(body => Comment 3, user_id => 40),

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), );

And for saving a record along with its related records having hasMany with more than two levels deep associations, the data array should be as follow:
$data = array( User => array(email => [email protected]), Cart => array( array( payment_status_id => 2, total_cost => 250, CartItem => array( array( cart_product_id => 3, quantity => 1, cost => 100, ), array( cart_product_id => 5, quantity => 1, cost => 150, ) ) ) ) );

Note: If successful, the foreign key of the main model will be stored in the related models id eld, i.e. $this->RelatedModel->id. Warning: Be careful when checking saveAssociated calls with atomic option set to false. It returns an array instead of boolean. Changed in version 2.1: You can now save deeper associated data as well with setting $options[deep] = true; For saving a record along with its related records having hasMany association and deeper associated Comment belongsTo User data as well, the data array should be like this:

$data = array( Article => array(title => My first article), Comment => array( array(body => Comment 1, user_id => 1), array(body => Save a new user as well, User => array(first => mad, last ), );

And save this data with:

$Article->saveAssociated($data, array(deep => true));

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$this->SomeModel->saveAll($data, array( fieldList => array( SomeModel => array(field_1), AssociatedModel => array(field_2, field_3) ) ));

The eldList will be an array of model aliases as keys and arrays with elds as values. The model names are not nested like in the data to be saved. Model::saveAll(array $data = null, array $options = array()) The saveAll function is just a wrapper around the saveMany and saveAssociated methods. it will inspect the data and determine what type of save it should perform. If data is formatted in a numerical indexed array, saveMany will be called, otherwise saveAssociated is used. This function receives the same options as the former two, and is generally a backwards compatible function. It is recommended using either saveMany or saveAssociated depending on the case. Saving Related Model Data (hasOne, hasMany, belongsTo) When working with associated models, it is important to realize that saving model data should always be done by the corresponding CakePHP model. If you are saving a new Post and its associated Comments, then you would use both Post and Comment models during the save operation. If neither of the associated model records exists in the system yet (for example, you want to save a new User and their related Prole records at the same time), youll need to rst save the primary, or parent model. To get an idea of how this works, lets imagine that we have an action in our UsersController that handles the saving of a new User and a related Prole. The example action shown below will assume that youve POSTed enough data (using the FormHelper) to create a single User and a single Prole:
public function add() { if (!empty($this->request->data)) { // We can save the User data: // it should be in $this->request->data[User] $user = $this->User->save($this->request->data); // If the user was saved, Now we add this information to the data // and save the Profile. if (!empty($user)) { // The ID of the newly created user has been set // as $this->User->id. $this->request->data[Profile][user_id] = $this->User->id; // Because our User hasOne Profile, we can access // the Profile model through the User model: $this->User->Profile->save($this->request->data); }

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} }

As a rule, when working with hasOne, hasMany, and belongsTo associations, its all about keying. The basic idea is to get the key from one model and place it in the foreign key eld on the other. Sometimes this might involve using the $id attribute of the model class after a save(), but other times it might just involve gathering the ID from a hidden input on a form thats just been POSTed to a controller action. To supplement the basic approach used above, CakePHP also offers a very handy method saveAssociated(), which allows you to validate and save multiple models in one shot. In addition, saveAssociated() provides transactional support to ensure data integrity in your database (i.e. if one model fails to save, the other models will not be saved either). Note: For transactions to work correctly in MySQL your tables must use InnoDB engine. Remember that MyISAM tables do not support transactions. Lets see how we can use saveAssociated() to save Company and Account models at the same time. First, you need to build your form for both Company and Account models (well assume that Company hasMany Account):
echo echo echo echo $this->Form->create(Company, array(action => add)); $this->Form->input(Company.name, array(label => Company name)); $this->Form->input(Company.description); $this->Form->input(Company.location);

echo $this->Form->input(Account.0.name, array(label => Account name)); echo $this->Form->input(Account.0.username); echo $this->Form->input(Account.0.email); echo $this->Form->end(Add);

Take a look at the way we named the form elds for the Account model. If Company is our main model, saveAssociated() will expect the related models (Account) data to arrive in a specic format. And having Account.0.fieldName is exactly what we need. Note: The above eld naming is required for a hasMany association. If the association between the models is hasOne, you have to use ModelName.eldName notation for the associated model. Now, in our CompaniesController we can create an add() action:
public function add() { if (!empty($this->request->data)) { // Use the following to avoid validation errors: unset($this->Company->Account->validate[company_id]); $this->Company->saveAssociated($this->request->data); } }

Thats all there is to it. Now our Company and Account models will be validated and saved all at the same

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time. By default saveAssociated will validate all values passed and then try to perform a save for each. Saving hasMany through data Lets see how data stored in a join table for two models is saved. As shown in the hasMany through (The Join Model) section, the join table is associated to each model using a hasMany type of relationship. Our example involves the Head of Cake School asking us to write an application that allows him to log a students attendance on a course with days attended and grade. Take a look at the following code.:
// Controller/CourseMembershipController.php class CourseMembershipsController extends AppController { public $uses = array(CourseMembership); public function index() { $this->set(courseMembershipsList, $this->CourseMembership->find(all)); } public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { if ($this->CourseMembership->saveAssociated($this->request->data)) { $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } } } } // View/CourseMemberships/add.ctp <?php echo $this->Form->create(CourseMembership); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(Student.first_name); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(Student.last_name); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(Course.name); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(CourseMembership.days_attended); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(CourseMembership.grade); ?> <button type="submit">Save</button> <?php echo $this->Form->end(); ?>

The data array will look like this when submitted.:

Array ( [Student] => Array ( [first_name] => Joe [last_name] => Bloggs ) [Course] => Array ( [name] => Cake ) [CourseMembership] => Array

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( [days_attended] => 5 [grade] => A ) )

Cake will happily be able to save the lot together and assign the foreign keys of the Student and Course into CourseMembership with a saveAssociated call with this data structure. If we run the index action of our CourseMembershipsController the data structure received now from a nd(all) is:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [CourseMembership] => Array ( [id] => 1 [student_id] => 1 [course_id] => 1 [days_attended] => 5 [grade] => A ) [Student] => Array ( [id] => 1 [first_name] => Joe [last_name] => Bloggs ) [Course] => Array ( [id] => 1 [name] => Cake ) ) )

There are of course many ways to work with a join model. The version above assumes you want to save everything at-once. There will be cases where you want to create the Student and Course independently and at a later point associate the two together with a CourseMembership. So you might have a form that allows selection of existing students and courses from pick lists or ID entry and then the two meta-elds for the CourseMembership, e.g.:
// View/CourseMemberships/add.ctp

<?php echo $this->Form->create(CourseMembership); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(Student.id, array(type => text, label => Student <?php echo $this->Form->input(Course.id, array(type => text, label => Course I <?php echo $this->Form->input(CourseMembership.days_attended); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(CourseMembership.grade); ?> <button type="submit">Save</button>

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<?php echo $this->Form->end(); ?>

And the resultant POST:

Array ( [Student] => Array ( [id] => 1 ) [Course] => Array ( [id] => 1 ) [CourseMembership] => Array ( [days_attended] => 10 [grade] => 5 ) )

Again Cake is good to us and pulls the Student id and Course id into the CourseMembership with the saveAssociated.
Saving Related Model Data (HABTM)

Saving models that are associated by hasOne, belongsTo, and hasMany is pretty simple: you just populate the foreign key eld with the ID of the associated model. Once thats done, you just call the save() method on the model, and everything gets linked up correctly. An example of the required format for the data array passed to save() for the Tag model is shown below:
Array ( [Recipe] => Array ( [id] => 42 ) [Tag] => Array ( [name] => Italian ) )

You can also use this format to save several records and their HABTM associations with saveAll(), using an array like the following:
Array ( [0] => Array (

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[Recipe] => Array ( [id] => 42 ) [Tag] => Array ( [name] => Italian ) ) [1] => Array ( [Recipe] => Array ( [id] => 42 ) [Tag] => Array ( [name] => Pasta ) ) [2] => Array ( [Recipe] => Array ( [id] => 51 ) [Tag] => Array ( [name] => Mexican ) ) [3] => Array ( [Recipe] => Array ( [id] => 17 ) [Tag] => Array ( [name] => American (new) ) ) )

Passing the above array to saveAll() will create the contained tags, each associated with their respective recipes. As an example, well build a form that creates a new tag and generates the proper data array to associate it on the y with some recipe. The simplest form might look something like this (well assume that $recipe_id is already set to something):

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<?php echo $this->Form->create(Tag); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input( Recipe.id, array(type => hidden, value => $recipe_id) ); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->input(Tag.name); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->end(Add Tag); ?>

In this example, you can see the Recipe.id hidden eld whose value is set to the ID of the recipe we want to link the tag to. When the save() method is invoked within the controller, itll automatically save the HABTM data to the database:
public function add() { // Save the association if ($this->Tag->save($this->request->data)) { // do something on success } }

With the preceding code, our new Tag is created and associated with a Recipe, whose ID was set in $this->request->data[Recipe][id]. Other ways we might want to present our associated data can include a select drop down list. The data can be pulled from the model using the find(list) method and assigned to a view variable of the model name. An input with the same name will automatically pull in this data into a <select>:
// in the controller: $this->set(tags, $this->Recipe->Tag->find(list)); // in the view: $this->Form->input(tags);

A more likely scenario with a HABTM relationship would include a <select> set to allow multiple selections. For example, a Recipe can have multiple Tags assigned to it. In this case, the data is pulled out of the model the same way, but the form input is declared slightly different. The tag name is dened using the ModelName convention:
// in the controller: $this->set(tags, $this->Recipe->Tag->find(list)); // in the view: $this->Form->input(Tag);

Using the preceding code, a multiple select drop down is created, allowing for multiple choices to automatically be saved to the existing Recipe being added or saved to the database. Self HABTM Normally HABTM is used to bring 2 models together but it can also be used with only 1 model, though it requires some extra attention. The key is in the model setup the className. Simply adding a Project HABTM Project relation causes issues saving data. By setting the className to the models name and use the alias as key we avoid 152 Chapter 6. Models

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those issues.:
class Project extends AppModel { public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array( RelatedProject => array( className => Project, foreignKey => projects_a_id, associationForeignKey => projects_b_id, ), ); }

Creating form elements and saving the data works the same as before but you use the alias instead. This:
$this->set(projects, $this->Project->find(list)); $this->Form->input(Project);

Becomes this:
$this->set(relatedProjects, $this->Project->find(list)); $this->Form->input(RelatedProject);

What to do when HABTM becomes complicated? By default when saving a HasAndBelongsToMany relationship, Cake will delete all rows on the join table before saving new ones. For example if you have a Club that has 10 Children associated. You then update the Club with 2 children. The Club will only have 2 Children, not 12. Also note that if you want to add more elds to the join (when it was created or meta information) this is possible with HABTM join tables, but it is important to understand that you have an easy option. HasAndBelongsToMany between two models is in reality shorthand for three models associated through both a hasMany and a belongsTo association. Consider this example:
Child hasAndBelongsToMany Club

Another way to look at this is adding a Membership model:

Child hasMany Membership Membership belongsTo Child, Club Club hasMany Membership.

These two examples are almost the exact same. They use the same amount of named elds in the database and the same amount of models. The important differences are that the join model is named differently and its behavior is more predictable. Tip: When your join table contains extra elds besides two foreign keys, you can prevent losing the extra eld values by setting unique array key to keepExisting. You could think of this similar to unique => true, but without losing data from the extra elds during save operation. See: HABTM association arrays.

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However, in most cases its easier to make a model for the join table and setup hasMany, belongsTo associations as shown in example above instead of using HABTM association. Datatables While CakePHP can have datasources that arent database driven, most of the time, they are. CakePHP is designed to be agnostic and will work with MySQL, MSSQL, PostgreSQL and others. You can create your database tables as you normally would. When you create your Model classes, theyll automatically map to the tables that youve created. Table names are by convention lowercase and pluralized with multi-word table names separated by underscores. For example, a Model name of Ingredient expects the table name ingredients. A Model name of EventRegistration would expect a table name of event_registrations. CakePHP will inspect your tables to determine the data type of each eld and uses this information to automate various features such as outputting form elds in the view. Field names are by convention lowercase and separated by underscores.
Using created and modied

By dening a created and/or modified eld in your database table as datetime elds (default null), CakePHP will recognize those elds and populate them automatically whenever a record is created or saved to the database (unless the data being saved already contains a value for these elds). The created and modified elds will be set to the current date and time when the record is initially added. The modied eld will be updated with the current date and time whenever the existing record is saved. If you have created or modified data in your $this->data (e.g. from a Model::read or Model::set) before a Model::save() then the values will be taken from $this->data and not automagically updated. If you dont want that you can use unset($this->data[Model][modified]), etc. Alternatively you can override the Model::save() to always do it for you:
class AppModel extends Model { public function save($data = null, $validate = true, $fieldList = array()) { // Clear modified field value before each save $this->set($data); if (isset($this->data[$this->alias][modified])) { unset($this->data[$this->alias][modified]); } return parent::save($this->data, $validate, $fieldList); } }

Deleting Data
CakePHPs Model class offers a few ways to delete records from your database.

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delete delete(int $id = null, boolean $cascade = true); Deletes the record identied by $id. By default, also deletes records dependent on the record specied to be deleted. For example, when deleting a User record that is tied to many Recipe records (User hasMany or hasAndBelongsToMany Recipes): if $cascade is set to true, the related Recipe records are also deleted if the models dependent-value is set to true. if $cascade is set to false, the Recipe records will remain after the User has been deleted. If your database supports foreign keys and cascading deletes, its often more efcient to rely on that feature than CakePHPs cascading. The one benet to using the cascade feature of Model::delete() is that it allows you to leverage behaviors and model callbacks:
$this->Comment->delete($this->request->data(Comment.id));

You can hook custom logic into the delete process using the beforeDelete and afterDelete callbacks present in both Models and Behaviors. See Callback Methods for more information. deleteAll deleteAll(mixed $conditions, $cascade = true, $callbacks = false) deleteAll() is similar to delete(), except that deleteAll() will delete all records that match the supplied conditions. The $conditions array should be supplied as a SQL fragment or array. conditions Conditions to match cascade Boolean, Set to true to delete records that depend on this record callbacks Boolean, Run callbacks Return boolean True on success, false on failure. Example:
// Delete with array conditions similar to find() $this->Comment->deleteAll(array(Comment.spam => true), false);

If you delete with either callbacks and/or cascade, rows will be found and then deleted. This will often result in more queries being issued. Note: deleteAll() will return true even if no records are deleted, as the conditions for the delete query were successful and no matching records remain.

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Data Validation
Data validation is an important part of any application, as it helps to make sure that the data in a Model conforms to the business rules of the application. For example, you might want to make sure that passwords are at least eight characters long, or ensure that usernames are unique. Dening validation rules makes form handling much, much easier. There are many different aspects to the validation process. What well cover in this section is the model side of things. Essentially: what happens when you call the save() method of your model. For more information about how to handle the displaying of validation errors, check out FormHelper. The rst step to data validation is creating the validation rules in the Model. Model::validate array in the Model denition, for example:
class User extends AppModel { public $validate = array(); }

To do that, use the

In the example above, the $validate array is added to the User Model, but the array contains no validation rules. Assuming that the users table has login, password, email and born elds, the example below shows some simple validation rules that apply to those elds:
class User extends AppModel { public $validate = array( login => alphaNumeric, email => email, born => date ); }

This last example shows how validation rules can be added to model elds. For the login eld, only letters and numbers will be accepted, the email should be valid, and born should be a valid date. Dening validation rules enables CakePHPs automagic showing of error messages in forms if the data submitted does not follow the dened rules. CakePHP has many validation rules and using them can be quite easy. Some of the built-in rules allow you to verify the formatting of emails, URLs, and credit card numbers but well cover these in detail later on. Here is a more complex validation example that takes advantage of some of these built-in validation rules:
class User extends AppModel { public $validate = array( login => array( alphaNumeric => array( rule => alphaNumeric, required => true, message => Alphabets and numbers only ), between => array( rule => array(between, 5, 15), message => Between 5 to 15 characters ) ), password => array(

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rule => array(minLength, 8), message => Minimum 8 characters long ), email => email, born => array( rule => date, message => Enter a valid date, allowEmpty => true ) ); }

Two validation rules are dened for login: it should contain letters and numbers only, and its length should be between 5 and 15. The password eld should be a minimum of 8 characters long. The email should be a valid email address, and born should be a valid date. Also, notice how you can dene specic error messages that CakePHP will use when these validation rules fail. As the example above shows, a single eld can have multiple validation rules. And if the built-in rules do not match your criteria, you can always add your own validation rules as required. Now that youve seen the big picture on how validation works, lets look at how these rules are dened in the model. There are three different ways that you can dene validation rules: simple arrays, single rule per eld, and multiple rules per eld. Simple Rules As the name suggests, this is the simplest way to dene a validation rule. The general syntax for dening rules this way is:
public $validate = array(fieldName => ruleName);

Where, eldName is the name of the eld the rule is dened for, and ruleName is a pre-dened rule name, such as alphaNumeric, email or isUnique. For example, to ensure that the user is giving a well formatted email address, you could use this rule:
public $validate = array(user_email => email);

One Rule Per Field This denition technique allows for better control of how the validation rules work. But before we discuss that, lets see the general usage pattern adding a rule for a single eld:
public $validate = array( fieldName1 => array( rule => ruleName, // or: array(ruleName, param1, param2 ...) required => true, allowEmpty => false, on => create, // or: update message => Your Error Message

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) );

The rule key is required. If you only set required => true, the form validation will not function correctly. This is because required is not actually a rule. As you can see here, each eld (only one eld shown above) is associated with an array that contains ve keys: rule, required, allowEmpty, on and message. Lets have a closer look at these keys.
rule

The rule key denes the validation method and takes either a single value or an array. The specied rule may be the name of a method in your model, a method of the core Validation class, or a regular expression. For more information on the rules available by default, see Core Validation Rules. If the rule does not require any parameters, rule can be a single value e.g.:
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => alphaNumeric ) );

If the rule requires some parameters (like the max, min or range), rule should be an array:
public $validate = array( password => array( rule => array(minLength, 8) ) );

Remember, the rule key is required for array-based rule denitions.

required

This key accepts either a boolean, or create or update. Setting this key to true will make the eld always required. While setting it to create or update will make the eld required only for update or create operations. If required is evaluated to true, the eld must be present in the data array. For example, if the validation rule has been dened as follows:
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => alphaNumeric, required => true ) );

The data sent to the models save() method must contain data for the login eld. If it doesnt, validation will fail. The default value for this key is boolean false.

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required => true does not mean the same as the validation rule notEmpty(). required => true indicates that the array key must be present - it does not mean it must have a value. Therefore validation will fail if the eld is not present in the dataset, but may (depending on the rule) succeed if the value submitted is empty (). Changed in version 2.1: Support for create and update were added.
allowEmpty

If set to false, the eld value must be nonempty, where nonempty is dened as !empty($value) || is_numeric($value). The numeric check is so that CakePHP does the right thing when $value is zero. The difference between required and allowEmpty can be confusing. required => true means that you cannot save the model without the key for this eld being present in $this->data (the check is performed with isset); whereas, allowEmpty => false makes sure that the current eld value is nonempty, as described above.
on

The on key can be set to either one of the following values: update or create. This provides a mechanism that allows a certain rule to be applied either during the creation of a new record, or during update of a record. If a rule has dened on => create, the rule will only be enforced during the creation of a new record. Likewise, if it is dened as on => update, it will only be enforced during the updating of a record. The default value for on is null. When on is null, the rule will be enforced during both creation and update.
message

The message key allows you to dene a custom validation error message for the rule:
public $validate = array( password => array( rule => array(minLength, 8), message => Password must be at least 8 characters long ) );

Note: Regardless of the rule, validation failure without a dened message defaults to This eld cannot be left blank.

Multiple Rules per Field The technique outlined above gives us much more exibility than simple rules assignment, but theres an extra step we can take in order to gain more ne-grained control of data validation. The next technique well outline allows us to assign multiple validation rules per model eld. More on models 159

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If you would like to assign multiple validation rules to a single eld, this is basically how it should look:
public $validate = array( fieldName => array( ruleName => array( rule => ruleName, // extra keys like on, required, etc. go here... ), ruleName2 => array( rule => ruleName2, // extra keys like on, required, etc. go here... ) ) );

As you can see, this is quite similar to what we did in the previous section. There, for each eld we had only one array of validation parameters. In this case, each eldName consists of an array of rule indices. Each ruleName contains a separate array of validation parameters. This is better explained with a practical example:
public $validate = array( login => array( loginRule-1 => array( rule => alphaNumeric, message => Only alphabets and numbers allowed, ), loginRule-2 => array( rule => array(minLength, 8), message => Minimum length of 8 characters ) ) );

The above example denes two rules for the login eld: loginRule-1 and loginRule-2. As you can see, each rule is identied with an arbitrary name. When using multiple rules per eld the required and allowEmpty keys need to be used only once in the rst rule.
last

In case of multiple rules per eld by default if a particular rule fails error message for that rule is returned and the following rules for that eld are not processed. If you want validation to continue in spite of a rule failing set key last to false for that rule. In the following example even if rule1 fails rule2 will be processed and error messages for both failing rules will be returned if rule2 also fails:
public $validate = array( login => array( rule1 => array( rule => alphaNumeric,

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message => Only alphabets and numbers allowed, last => false ), rule2 => array( rule => array(minLength, 8), message => Minimum length of 8 characters ) ) );

When specifying validation rules in this array form its possible to avoid providing the message key. Consider this example:
public $validate = array( login => array( Only alphabets and numbers allowed => array( rule => alphaNumeric, ), ) );

If the alphaNumeric rules fails the array key for this rule Only alphabets and numbers allowed will be returned as error message since the message key is not set. Custom Validation Rules If you havent found what you need thus far, you can always create your own validation rules. There are two ways you can do this: by dening custom regular expressions, or by creating custom validation methods.
Custom Regular Expression Validation

If the validation technique you need to use can be completed by using regular expression matching, you can dene a custom expression as a eld validation rule:
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => /^[a-z0-9]{3,}$/i, message => Only letters and integers, min 3 characters ) );

The example above checks if the login contains only letters and integers, with a minimum of three characters. The regular expression in the rule must be delimited by slashes. The optional trailing i after the last slash means the reg-exp is case insensitive.
Adding your own Validation Methods

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below:
class User extends AppModel { public $validate = array( promotion_code => array( rule => array(limitDuplicates, 25), message => This code has been used too many times. ) ); public function limitDuplicates($check, $limit) { // $check will have value: array(promotion_code => some-value) // $limit will have value: 25 $existing_promo_count = $this->find(count, array( conditions => $check, recursive => -1 )); return $existing_promo_count < $limit; } }

The current eld to be validated is passed into the function as rst parameter as an associated array with eld name as key and posted data as value. If you want to pass extra parameters to your validation function, add elements onto the rule array, and handle them as extra params (after the main $check param) in your function. Your validation function can be in the model (as in the example above), or in a behavior that the model implements. This includes mapped methods. Model/behavior methods are checked rst, before looking for a method on the Validation class. This means that you can override existing validation methods (such as alphaNumeric()) at an application level (by adding the method to AppModel), or at model level. When writing a validation rule which can be used by multiple elds, take care to extract the eld value from the $check array. The $check array is passed with the form eld name as its key and the eld value as its value. The full record being validated is stored in $this->data member variable:
class Post extends AppModel { public $validate = array( slug => array( rule => alphaNumericDashUnderscore, message => Slug can only be letters, numbers, dash and underscore ) ); public function alphaNumericDashUnderscore($check) { // $data array is passed using the form field name as the key // have to extract the value to make the function generic $value = array_values($check); $value = $value[0];

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return preg_match(|^[0-9a-zA-Z_-]*$|, $value); } }

Note: Your own validation methods must have public visibility. protected and private are not supported.

Validation methods that are

The method should return true if the value is valid. If the validation failed, return false. The other valid return value are strings which will be shown as the error message. Returning a string means the validation failed. The string will overwrite the message set in the $validate array and be shown in the views form as the reason why the eld was not valid. Dynamically change validation rules Using $validate property to declare validation rules is a good ways of dening statically rules for each model. Nevertheless there are cases when you want to dynamically add, change or remove validation rules from the predened set. All validation rules are stored in a ModelValidator object, which holds every rule set for each eld in your model. Dening new validation rules is as easy as telling this object to store new validation methods for the elds you want to.
Adding new validation rules

New in version 2.2. The ModelValidator objects allows several ways for adding new elds to the set. The rst one is using the add method:
// Inside a model class $this->validator()->add(password, required, array( rule => notEmpty, required => create ));

This will add a single rule to the password eld in the model. You can chain multiple calls to add to create as many rules as you like:
// Inside a model class $this->validator() ->add(password, required, array( rule => notEmpty, required => create )) ->add(password, size, array( rule => array(between, 8, 20), message => Password should be at least 8 chars long ));

It is also possible to add multiple rules at once for a single eld:

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$this->validator()->add(password, array( required => array( rule => notEmpty, required => create ), size => array( rule => array(between, 8, 20), message => Password should be at least 8 chars long ) ));

Alternatively, you can use the validator object to set rules directly to elds using the array interface:
$validator = $this->validator(); $validator[username] = array( unique => array( rule => isUnique, required => create ), alphanumeric => array( rule => alphanumeric ) );

Modifying current validation rules

New in version 2.2. Modifying current validation rules is also possible using the validator object, there are several ways in which you can alter current rules, append methods to a eld or completely remove a rule from a eld rule set:
// In a model class $this->validator()->getField(password)->setRule(required, array( rule => required, required => true ));

You can also completely replace all the rules for a eld using a similar method:
// In a model class $this->validator()->getField(password)->setRules(array( required => array(...), otherRule => array(...) ));

If you wish to just modify a single property in a rule you can set properties directly into the CakeValidationRule object:
// In a model class $this->validator()->getField(password) ->getRule(required)->message = This field cannot be left blank;

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Properties in any CakeValidationRule are named as the valid array keys you can use for dening such rules using the $validate property in the model. As with adding new rule to the set, it is also possible to modify existing rules using the array interface:
$validator = $this->validator(); $validator[username][unique] = array( rule => isUnique, required => create ); $validator[username][unique]->last = true; $validator[username][unique]->message = Name already taken;

Removing rules from the set

New in version 2.2. It is possible to both completely remove all rules for a eld and to delete a single rule in a elds rule set:
// Completely remove all rules for a field $this->validator()->remove(username); // Remove required rule from password $this->validator()->remove(password, required);

Optionally, you can use the array interface to delete rules from the set:
$validator = $this->validator(); // Completely remove all rules for a field unset($validator[username]); // Remove required rule from password unset($validator[password][required]);

Core Validation Rules class Validation The Validation class in CakePHP contains many validation rules that can make model data validation much easier. This class contains many oft-used validation techniques you wont need to write on your own. Below, youll nd a complete list of all the rules, along with usage examples. static Validation::alphaNumeric(mixed $check) The data for the eld must only contain letters and numbers.:
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => alphaNumeric, message => Usernames must only contain letters and numbers. ) );

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static Validation::between(string $check, integer $min, integer $max) The length of the data for the eld must fall within the specied numeric range. Both minimum and maximum values must be supplied. Uses = not.:
public $validate = array( password => array( rule => array(between, 5, 15), message => Passwords must be between 5 and 15 characters long. ) );

The length of data is the number of bytes in the string representation of the data. Be careful that it may be larger than the number of characters when handling non-ASCII characters. static Validation::blank(mixed $check) This rule is used to make sure that the eld is left blank or only white space characters are present in its value. White space characters include space, tab, carriage return, and newline.:
public $validate = array( id => array( rule => blank, on => create ) );

static Validation::boolean(string $check) The data for the eld must be a boolean value. Valid values are true or false, integers 0 or 1 or strings 0 or 1.:
public $validate = array( myCheckbox => array( rule => array(boolean), message => Incorrect value for myCheckbox ) );

static Validation::cc(mixed $check, mixed $type = fast, boolean $deep = false, string $regex = null) This rule is used to check whether the data is a valid credit card number. It takes three parameters: type, deep and regex. The type key can be assigned to the values of fast, all or any of the following: amex bankcard diners disc electron enroute jcb 166 Chapter 6. Models

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maestro mc solo switch visa voyager If type is set to fast, it validates the data against the major credit cards numbering formats. Setting type to all will check with all the credit card types. You can also set type to an array of the types you wish to match. The deep key should be set to a boolean value. If it is set to true, the validation will check the Luhn algorithm of the credit card (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luhn_algorithm). It defaults to false. The regex key allows you to supply your own regular expression that will be used to validate the credit card number:
public $validate = array( ccnumber => array( rule => array(cc, array(visa, maestro), false, null), message => The credit card number you supplied was invalid. ) );

static Validation::comparison(mixed $check1, string $operator = null, integer $check2 = null) Comparison is used to compare numeric values. It supports is greater, is less, greater or equal, less or equal, equal to, and not equal. Some examples are shown below:
public $validate = array( age => array( rule => array(comparison, >=, 18), message => Must be at least 18 years old to qualify. ) ); public $validate = array( age => array( rule => array(comparison, greater or equal, 18), message => Must be at least 18 years old to qualify. ) );

static Validation::custom(mixed $check, string $regex = null) Used when a custom regular expression is needed:
public $validate = array( infinite => array( rule => array(custom, \u221E), message => Please enter an infinite number.

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) );

static Validation::date(string $check, mixed $format = ymd, string $regex = null) This rule ensures that data is submitted in valid date formats. A single parameter (which can be an array) can be passed that will be used to check the format of the supplied date. The value of the parameter can be one of the following: dmy e.g. 27-12-2006 or 27-12-06 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) mdy e.g. 12-27-2006 or 12-27-06 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) ymd e.g. 2006-12-27 or 06-12-27 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) dMy e.g. 27 December 2006 or 27 Dec 2006 Mdy e.g. December 27, 2006 or Dec 27, 2006 (comma is optional) My e.g. (December 2006 or Dec 2006) my e.g. 12/2006 or 12/06 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) ym e.g. 2006/12 or 06/12 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) y e.g. 2006 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) If no keys are supplied, the default key that will be used is ymd:
public $validate = array( born => array( rule => array(date, ymd), message => Enter a valid date in YY-MM-DD format., allowEmpty => true ) );

While many data stores require a certain date format, you might consider doing the heavy lifting by accepting a wide-array of date formats and trying to convert them, rather than forcing users to supply a given format. The more work you can do for your users, the better. Changed in version 2.4: The ym and y formats were added. static Validation::datetime(array $check, mixed $dateFormat = ymd, string $regex = null) This rule ensures that the data is a valid datetime format. A parameter (which can be an array) can be passed to specify the format of the date. The value of the parameter can be one or more of the following: dmy e.g. 27-12-2006 or 27-12-06 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) mdy e.g. 12-27-2006 or 12-27-06 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) ymd e.g. 2006-12-27 or 06-12-27 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) dMy e.g. 27 December 2006 or 27 Dec 2006 Mdy e.g. December 27, 2006 or Dec 27, 2006 (comma is optional) My e.g. (December 2006 or Dec 2006) 168 Chapter 6. Models

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my e.g. 12/2006 or 12/06 (separators can be a space, period, dash, forward slash) If no keys are supplied, the default key that will be used is ymd:
public $validate = array( birthday => array( rule => array(datetime, dmy), message => Please enter a valid date and time. ) );

Also a second parameter can be passed to specify a custom regular expression. If this parameter is used, this will be the only validation that will occur. Note that unlike date(), datetime() will validate a date and a time. static Validation::decimal(integer $check, integer $places = null, string $regex = null) This rule ensures that the data is a valid decimal number. A parameter can be passed to specify the number of digits required after the decimal point. If no parameter is passed, the data will be validated as a scientic oat, which will cause validation to fail if no digits are found after the decimal point:
public $validate = array( price => array( rule => array(decimal, 2) ) );

static Validation::email(string $check, boolean $deep = false, string $regex = null) This checks whether the data is a valid email address. Passing a boolean true as the second parameter for this rule will also attempt to verify that the host for the address is valid:
public $validate = array(email => array(rule => email)); public $validate = array( email => array( rule => array(email, true), message => Please supply a valid email address. ) );

static Validation::equalTo(mixed $check, mixed $compareTo) This rule will ensure that the value is equal to, and of the same type as the given value.
public $validate = array( food => array( rule => array(equalTo, cake), message => This value must be the string cake ) );

static Validation::extension(mixed $check, array $extensions = array(gif, jpeg, png, jpg)) This rule checks for valid le extensions like .jpg or .png. Allow multiple extensions by passing them in array form.

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public $validate = array( image => array( rule => array(extension, array(gif, jpeg, png, jpg)), message => Please supply a valid image. ) );

static Validation::fileSize($check, $operator = null, $size = null) This rule allows you to check lesizes. You can use $operator to decide the type of comparison you want to use. All the operators supported by comparison() are supported here as well. This method will automatically handle array values from $_FILES by reading from the tmp_name key if $check is an array an contains that key:
public $validate = array( image => array( rule => array(fileSize, <=, 1MB), message => Image must be less than 1MB ) );

New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3 static Validation::inList(string $check, array $list) This rule will ensure that the value is in a given set. It needs an array of values. The eld is valid if the elds value matches one of the values in the given array. Example:
public $validate = array( function => array( allowedChoice => array( rule => array(inList, array(Foo, Bar)), message => Enter either Foo or Bar. ) ) );

static Validation::ip(string $check, string $type = both) This rule will ensure that a valid IPv4 or IPv6 address has been submitted. Accepts as option both (default), IPv4 or IPv6.
public $validate = array( clientip => array( rule => array(ip, IPv4), // or IPv6 or both (default) message => Please supply a valid IP address. ) );

Model::isUnique() The data for the eld must be unique, it cannot be used by any other rows.
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => isUnique,

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message => This username has already been taken. ) );

static Validation::luhn(string|array $check, boolean $deep = false) The Luhn algorithm: A checksum formula to validate a variety of identication numbers. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luhn_algorithm for more information. static Validation::maxLength(string $check, integer $max) This rule ensures that the data stays within a maximum length requirement.
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => array(maxLength, 15), message => Usernames must be no larger than 15 characters long. ) );

The length here is the number of bytes in the string representation of the data. Be careful that it may be larger than the number of characters when handling non-ASCII characters. static Validation::mimeType(mixed $check, array $mimeTypes) New in version 2.2. This rule checks for valid mimeType
public $validate = array( image => array( rule => array(mimeType, array(image/gif)), message => Invalid mime type. ), );

static Validation::minLength(string $check, integer $min) This rule ensures that the data meets a minimum length requirement.
public $validate = array( login => array( rule => array(minLength, 8), message => Usernames must be at least 8 characters long. ) );

The length here is the number of bytes in the string representation of the data. Be careful that it may be larger than the number of characters when handling non-ASCII characters. static Validation::money(string $check, string $symbolPosition = left) This rule will ensure that the value is in a valid monetary amount. Second parameter denes where symbol is located (left/right).
public $validate = array( salary => array( rule => array(money, left), message => Please supply a valid monetary amount.

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) );

static Validation::multiple(mixed $check, mixed $options = array()) Use this for validating a multiple select input. It supports parameters in, max and min.
public $validate = array( multiple => array( rule => array(multiple, array( in => array(do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti), min => 1, max => 3 )), message => Please select one, two or three options ) );

static Validation::notEmpty(mixed $check) The basic rule to ensure that a eld is not empty.:
public $validate = array( title => array( rule => notEmpty, message => This field cannot be left blank ) );

Do not use this for a multiple select input as it will cause an error. Instead, use multiple. static Validation::numeric(string $check) Checks if the data passed is a valid number.:
public $validate = array( cars => array( rule => numeric, message => Please supply the number of cars. ) );

static Validation::naturalNumber(mixed $check, boolean $allowZero = false) New in version 2.2. This rule checks if the data passed is a valid natural number. If $allowZero is set to true, zero is also accepted as a value.
public $validate = array( wheels => array( rule => naturalNumber, message => Please supply the number of wheels. ), airbags => array( rule => array(naturalNumber, true), message => Please supply the number of airbags. ), );

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static Validation::phone(mixed $check, string $regex = null, string $country = all) Phone validates US phone numbers. If you want to validate non-US phone numbers, you can provide a regular expression as the second parameter to cover additional number formats.
public $validate = array( phone => array( rule => array(phone, null, us) ) );

static Validation::postal(mixed $check, string $regex = null, string $country = us) Postal is used to validate ZIP codes from the U.S. (us), Canada (ca), U.K (uk), Italy (it), Germany (de) and Belgium (be). For other ZIP code formats, you may provide a regular expression as the second parameter.
public $validate = array( zipcode => array( rule => array(postal, null, us) ) );

static Validation::range(string $check, integer $lower = null, integer $upper = null) This rule ensures that the value is in a given range. If no range is supplied, the rule will check to ensure the value is a legal nite on the current platform.
public $validate = array( number => array( rule => array(range, -1, 11), message => Please enter a number between 0 and 10 ) );

The above example will accept any value which is larger than 0 (e.g., 0.01) and less than 10 (e.g., 9.99). Note: The range lower/upper are not inclusive static Validation::ssn(mixed $check, string $regex = null, string $country = null) Ssn validates social security numbers from the U.S. (us), Denmark (dk), and the Netherlands (nl). For other social security number formats, you may provide a regular expression.
public $validate = array( ssn => array( rule => array(ssn, null, us) ) );

static Validation::time(string $check) Time validation, determines if the string passed is a valid time. Validates time as 24hr (HH:MM) or am/pm ([H]H:MM[a|p]m) Does not allow/validate seconds.

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static Validation::uploadError(mixed $check) New in version 2.2. This rule checks if a le upload has an error.
public $validate = array( image => array( rule => uploadError, message => Something went wrong with the upload. ), );

static Validation::url(string $check, boolean $strict = false) This rule checks for valid URL formats. Supports http(s), ftp(s), le, news, and gopher protocols:
public $validate = array( website => array( rule => url ) );

To ensure that a protocol is in the url, strict mode can be enabled like so:
public $validate = array( website => array( rule => array(url, true) ) );

static Validation::userDefined(mixed $check, object $object, string $method, array $args = null) Runs an user-dened validation. static Validation::uuid(string $check) Checks that a value is a valid uuid: http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc4122 Localized Validation The validation rules phone() and postal() will pass off any country prex they do not know how to handle to another class with the appropriate name. For example if you lived in the Netherlands you would create a class like:
class NlValidation { public static function phone($check) { // ... } public static function postal($check) { // ... } }

This le could be placed in APP/Validation/ or App/PluginName/Validation/, but must be imported via App::uses() before attempting to use it. In your model validation you could use your NlValidation class by doing the following:

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public $validate = array( phone_no => array(rule => array(phone, null, nl)), postal_code => array(rule => array(postal, null, nl)), );

When your model data is validated, Validation will see that it cannot handle the nl locale and will attempt to delegate out to NlValidation::postal() and the return of that method will be used as the pass/fail for the validation. This approach allows you to create classes that handle a subset or group of locales, something that a large switch would not have. The usage of the individual validation methods has not changed, the ability to pass off to another validator has been added. Tip: The Localized Plugin already contains a lot of rules ready to use: https://github.com/cakephp/localized Also feel free to contribute with your localized validation rules.

Validating Data from the Controller

While normally you would just use the save method of the model, there may be times where you wish to validate the data without saving it. For example, you may wish to display some additional information to the user before actually saving the data to the database. Validating data requires a slightly different process than just saving the data. First, set the data to the model:
$this->ModelName->set($this->request->data);

Then, to check if the data validates, use the validates method of the model, which will return true if it validates and false if it doesnt:
if ($this->ModelName->validates()) { // it validated logic } else { // didnt validate logic $errors = $this->ModelName->validationErrors; }

It may be desirable to validate your model only using a subset of the validations specied in your model. For example say you had a User model with elds for rst_name, last_name, email and password. In this instance when creating or editing a user you would want to validate all 4 eld rules. Yet when a user logs in you would validate just email and password rules. To do this you can pass an options array specifying the elds to validate:
if ($this->User->validates(array(fieldList => array(email, password)))) { // valid } else { // invalid }

The validates method invokes the invalidFields method which populates the validationErrors property of the model. The invalidFields method also returns that data as the result:

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$errors = $this->ModelName->invalidFields(); // contains validationErrors array

The validation errors list is not cleared between successive calls to invalidFields() So if you are validating in a loop and want each set of errors separately dont use invalidFields(). Instead use validates() and access the validationErrors model property. It is important to note that the data must be set to the model before the data can be validated. This is different from the save method which allows the data to be passed in as a parameter. Also, keep in mind that it is not required to call validates prior to calling save as save will automatically validate the data before actually saving. To validate multiple models, the following approach should be used:
if ($this->ModelName->saveAll($this->request->data, array(validate => only))) { // validates } else { // does not validate }

If you have validated data before save, you can turn off validation to avoid second check:
if ($this->ModelName->saveAll($this->request->data, array(validate => false))) { // saving without validation }

Callback Methods
If you want to sneak in some logic just before or after a CakePHP model operation, use model callbacks. These functions can be dened in model classes (including your AppModel) class. Be sure to note the expected return values for each of these special functions. When using callback methods you should remember that behavior callbacks are red before model callbacks are. beforeFind beforeFind(array $queryData) Called before any nd-related operation. The $queryData passed to this callback contains information about the current query: conditions, elds, etc. If you do not wish the nd operation to begin (possibly based on a decision relating to the $queryData options), return false. Otherwise, return the possibly modied $queryData, or anything you want to get passed to nd and its counterparts. You might use this callback to restrict nd operations based on a users role, or make caching decisions based on the current load.

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afterFind afterFind(array $results, boolean $primary = false) Use this callback to modify results that have been returned from a nd operation, or to perform any other post-nd logic. The $results parameter passed to this callback contains the returned results from the models nd operation, i.e. something like:
$results = array( 0 => array( ModelName => array( field1 => value1, field2 => value2, ), ), );

The return value for this callback should be the (possibly modied) results for the nd operation that triggered this callback. The $primary parameter indicates whether or not the current model was the model that the query originated on or whether or not this model was queried as an association. If a model is queried as an association the format of $results can differ; instead of the result you would normally get from a nd operation, you may get this:
$results = array( field_1 => value1, field_2 => value2 );

Warning: Code expecting $primary to be true will probably get a Cannot use string offset as an array fatal error from PHP if a recursive nd is used. Below is an example of how afternd can be used for date formatting:

public function afterFind($results, $primary = false) { foreach ($results as $key => $val) { if (isset($val[Event][begindate])) { $results[$key][Event][begindate] = $this->dateFormatAfterFind($val[Event] } } return $results; } public function dateFormatAfterFind($dateString) { return date(d-m-Y, strtotime($dateString)); }

beforeValidate beforeValidate(array $options = array())

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Use this callback to modify model data before it is validated, or to modify validation rules if required. This function must also return true, otherwise the current save() execution will abort. beforeSave beforeSave(array $options = array()) Place any pre-save logic in this function. This function executes immediately after model data has been successfully validated, but just before the data is saved. This function should also return true if you want the save operation to continue. This callback is especially handy for any data-massaging logic that needs to happen before your data is stored. If your storage engine needs dates in a specic format, access it at $this->data and modify it. Below is an example of how beforeSave can be used for date conversion. The code in the example is used for an application with a begindate formatted like YYYY-MM-DD in the database and is displayed like DD-MM-YYYY in the application. Of course this can be changed very easily. Use the code below in the appropriate model.

public function beforeSave($options = array()) { if (!empty($this->data[Event][begindate]) && !empty($this->data[Event][enddate] $this->data[Event][begindate] = $this->dateFormatBeforeSave($this->data[Event $this->data[Event][enddate] = $this->dateFormatBeforeSave($this->data[Event][ } return true; } public function dateFormatBeforeSave($dateString) { return date(Y-m-d, strtotime($dateString)); }

Tip: Be sure that beforeSave() returns true, or your save is going to fail.

afterSave afterSave(boolean $created) If you have logic you need to be executed just after every save operation, place it in this callback method. The value of $created will be true if a new record was created (rather than an update). beforeDelete beforeDelete(boolean $cascade = true) Place any pre-deletion logic in this function. This function should return true if you want the deletion to continue, and false if you want to abort. The value of $cascade will be true if records that depend on this record will also be deleted.

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Tip: Be sure that beforeDelete() returns true, or your delete is going to fail.
// using app/Model/ProductCategory.php // In the following example, do not let a product category be deleted if it still contains // A call of $this->Product->delete($id) from ProductsController.php has set $this->id . // Assuming ProductCategory hasMany Product, we can access $this->Product in the model. public function beforeDelete($cascade = true) { $count = $this->Product->find("count", array( "conditions" => array("product_category_id" => $this->id) )); if ($count == 0) { return true; } else { return false; } }

afterDelete afterDelete() Place any logic that you want to be executed after every deletion in this callback method. onError onError() Called if any problems occur.

Behaviors
Model behaviors are a way to organize some of the functionality dened in CakePHP models. They allow us to separate and reuse logic that creates a type of behavior, and they do this without requiring inheritance. For example creating tree structures. By providing a simple yet powerful way to enhance models, behaviors allow us to attach functionality to models by dening a simple class variable. Thats how behaviors allow models to get rid of all the extra weight that might not be part of the business contract they are modeling, or that is also needed in different models and can then be extrapolated. As an example, consider a model that gives us access to a database table which stores structural information about a tree. Removing, adding, and migrating nodes in the tree is not as simple as deleting, inserting, and editing rows in the table. Many records may need to be updated as things move around. Rather than creating those tree-manipulation methods on a per model basis (for every model that needs that functionality), we could simply tell our model to use the TreeBehavior, or in more formal terms, we tell our model to behave as a Tree. This is known as attaching a behavior to a model. With just one line of code, our CakePHP model takes on a whole new set of methods that allow it to interact with the underlying structure.

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CakePHP already includes behaviors for tree structures, translated content, access control list interaction, not to mention the community-contributed behaviors already available in the CakePHP Bakery (http://bakery.cakephp.org). In this section, well cover the basic usage pattern for adding behaviors to models, how to use CakePHPs built-in behaviors, and how to create our own. In essence, Behaviors are Mixins (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixin) with callbacks. Using Behaviors Behaviors are attached to models through the $actsAs model class variable:
class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Tree); }

This example shows how a Category model could be managed in a tree structure using the TreeBehavior. Once a behavior has been specied, use the methods added by the behavior as if they always existed as part of the original model:
// Set ID $this->Category->id = 42; // Use behavior method, children(): $kids = $this->Category->children();

Some behaviors may require or allow settings to be dened when the behavior is attached to the model. Here, we tell our TreeBehavior the names of the left and right elds in the underlying database table:
class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Tree => array( left => left_node, right => right_node )); }

We can also attach several behaviors to a model. Theres no reason why, for example, our Category model should only behave as a tree, it may also need internationalization support:
class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Tree => array( left => left_node, right => right_node ), Translate ); }

So far we have been adding behaviors to models using a model class variable. That means that our behaviors will be attached to our models throughout the models lifetime. However, we may need to detach behaviors from our models at runtime. Lets say that on our previous Category model, which is acting as a Tree and a Translate model, we need for some reason to force it to stop acting as a Translate model:

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// Detach a behavior from our model: $this->Category->Behaviors->unload(Translate);

That will make our Category model stop behaving as a Translate model from thereon. We may need, instead, to just disable the Translate behavior from acting upon our normal model operations: our nds, our saves, etc. In fact, we are looking to disable the behavior from acting upon our CakePHP model callbacks. Instead of detaching the behavior, we then tell our model to stop informing of these callbacks to the Translate behavior:
// Stop letting the behavior handle our model callbacks $this->Category->Behaviors->disable(Translate);

We may also need to nd out if our behavior is handling those model callbacks, and if not we then restore its ability to react to them:
// If our behavior is not handling model callbacks if (!$this->Category->Behaviors->enabled(Translate)) { // Tell it to start doing so $this->Category->Behaviors->enable(Translate); }

Just as we could completely detach a behavior from a model at runtime, we can also attach new behaviors. Say that our familiar Category model needs to start behaving as a Christmas model, but only on Christmas day:
// If today is Dec 25 if (date(m/d) === 12/25) { // Our model needs to behave as a Christmas model $this->Category->Behaviors->load(Christmas); }

We can also use the load method to override behavior settings:

// We will change one setting from our already attached behavior $this->Category->Behaviors->load(Tree, array(left => new_left_node));

Theres also a method to obtain the list of behaviors a model has attached. If we pass the name of a behavior to the method, it will tell us if that behavior is attached to the model, otherwise it will give us the list of attached behaviors:
// If the Translate behavior is not attached if (!$this->Category->Behaviors->loaded(Translate)) { // Get the list of all behaviors the model has attached $behaviors = $this->Category->Behaviors->loaded(); }

Creating Behaviors Behaviors that are attached to Models get their callbacks called automatically. The callbacks are similar to those found in Models: beforeFind, afterFind, beforeSave, afterSave, beforeDelete, afterDelete and onError - see Callback Methods.

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Your behaviors should be placed in app/Model/Behavior. They are named in CamelCase and postxed by Behavior, ex. NameBehavior.php. Its often helpful to use a core behavior as a template when creating your own. Find them in lib/Cake/Model/Behavior/. Every callback and behavior method takes a reference to the model it is being called from as the rst parameter. Besides implementing the callbacks, you can add settings per behavior and/or model behavior attachment. Information about specifying settings can be found in the chapters about core behaviors and their conguration. A quick example that illustrates how behavior settings can be passed from the model to the behavior:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( YourBehavior => array( option1_key => option1_value ) ); }

Since behaviors are shared across all the model instances that use them, its a good practice to store the settings per alias/model name that is using the behavior. When created behaviors will have their setup() method called:
public function setup(Model $Model, $settings = array()) { if (!isset($this->settings[$Model->alias])) { $this->settings[$Model->alias] = array( option1_key => option1_default_value, option2_key => option2_default_value, option3_key => option3_default_value, ); } $this->settings[$Model->alias] = array_merge( $this->settings[$Model->alias], (array)$settings); }

Creating behavior methods Behavior methods are automatically available on any model acting as the behavior. For example if you had:
class Duck extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Flying); }

You would be able to call FlyingBehavior methods as if they were methods on your Duck model. When creating behavior methods you automatically get passed a reference of the calling model as the rst parameter. All other supplied parameters are shifted one place to the right. For example:
$this->Duck->fly(toronto, montreal);

Although this method takes two parameters, the method signature should look like:

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public function fly(Model $Model, $from, $to) { // Do some flying. }

Keep in mind that methods called in a $this->doIt() fashion from inside a behavior method will not get the $model parameter automatically appended.
Mapped methods

In addition to providing mixin methods, behaviors can also provide pattern matching methods. Behaviors can also dene mapped methods. Mapped methods use pattern matching for method invocation. This allows you to create methods similar to Model::findAllByXXX methods on your behaviors. Mapped methods need to be declared in your behaviors $mapMethods array. The method signature for a mapped method is slightly different than a normal behavior mixin method:
class MyBehavior extends ModelBehavior { public $mapMethods = array(/do(\w+)/ => doSomething); public function doSomething(Model $model, $method, $arg1, $arg2) { debug(func_get_args()); //do something } }

The above will map every doXXX() method call to the behavior. As you can see, the model is still the rst parameter, but the called method name will be the 2nd parameter. This allows you to munge the method name for additional information, much like Model::findAllByXX. If the above behavior was attached to a model the following would happen:
$model->doReleaseTheHounds(homer, lenny); // would output ReleaseTheHounds, homer, lenny

Behavior callbacks Model Behaviors can dene a number of callbacks that are triggered before the model callbacks of the same name. Behavior callbacks allow your behaviors to capture events in attached models and augment the parameters or splice in additional behavior. All behavior callbacks are red before the model/behavior callbacks are: beforeValidate beforeFind afterFind beforeSave afterSave

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beforeDelete afterDelete
Creating a behavior callback

class ModelBehavior Model behavior callbacks are dened as simple methods in your behavior class. Much like regular behavior methods, they receive a $Model parameter as the rst argument. This parameter is the model that the behavior method was invoked on. ModelBehavior::setup(Model $Model, array $settings = array()) Called when a behavior is attached to a model. The settings come from the attached models $actsAs property. ModelBehavior::cleanup(Model $Model) Called when a behavior is detached from a model. The base method removes model settings based on $model->alias. You can override this method and provide custom cleanup functionality. ModelBehavior::beforeFind(Model $Model, array $query) If a behaviors beforeFind returns false it will abort the nd(). Returning an array will augment the query parameters used for the nd operation. ModelBehavior::afterFind(Model $Model, mixed $results, boolean $primary) You can use the afterFind to augment the results of a nd. The return value will be passed on as the results to either the next behavior in the chain or the models afterFind. ModelBehavior::beforeDelete(Model $Model, boolean $cascade = true) You can return false from a behaviors beforeDelete to abort the delete. Return true to allow it continue. ModelBehavior::afterDelete(Model $Model) You can use afterDelete to perform clean up operations related to your behavior. ModelBehavior::beforeSave(Model $Model) You can return false from a behaviors beforeSave to abort the save. Return true to allow it continue. ModelBehavior::afterSave(Model $Model, boolean $created) You can use afterSave to perform clean up operations related to your behavior. $created will be true when a record is created, and false when a record is updated. ModelBehavior::beforeValidate(Model $Model) You can use beforeValidate to modify a models validate array or handle any other pre-validation logic. Returning false from a beforeValidate callback will abort the validation and cause it to fail.

DataSources
DataSources are the link between models and the source of data that models represent. In many cases, the data is retrieved from a relational database such as MySQL, PostgreSQL or MSSQL. CakePHP is distributed with several database-specic datasources (see the class les in

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lib/Cake/Model/Datasource/Database), a summary of which is listed here for your convenience: MySql Postgres Sqlite Sqlserver Note: You can nd additional community contributed datasources in the CakePHP DataSources repository at github (https://github.com/cakephp/datasources/tree/2.0). When specifying a database connection conguration in app/Config/database.php, CakePHP transparently uses the corresponding database datasource for all model operations. So, even though you might not have known about datasources, youve been using them all along. All of the above sources derive from a base DboSource class, which aggregates some logic that is common to most relational databases. If you decide to write a RDBMS datasource, working from one of these (e.g. Mysql, or Sqlite is your best bet.) Most people, however, are interested in writing datasources for external sources of data, such as remote REST APIs or even an LDAP server. So thats what were going to look at now. Basic API For DataSources A datasource can, and should implement at least one of the following methods: create, read, update and/or delete (the actual method signatures & implementation details are not important for the moment, and will be described later). You need not implement more of the methods listed above than necessary - if you need a read-only datasource, theres no reason to implement create, update, and delete. Methods that must be implemented for all CRUD methods: describe($model) listSources($data = null) calculate($model, $func, $params) At least one of: create(Model $model, $fields = null, $values = null) read(Model $model, $queryData = array(), $recursive = null) update(Model $model, $fields = null, $values = null, $conditions = null) delete(Model $model, $id = null) It is also possible (and sometimes quite useful) to dene the $_schema class attribute inside the datasource itself, instead of in the model.

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And thats pretty much all there is to it. By coupling this datasource to a model, you are then able to use Model::find()/save()/delete() as you would normally, and the appropriate data and/or parameters used to call those methods will be passed on to the datasource itself, where you can decide to implement whichever features you need (e.g. Model::nd options such as conditions parsing, limit or even your own custom parameters). An Example A common reason you would want to write your own datasource is when you would like to access a 3rd party API using the usual Model::find()/save()/delete() methods. Lets write a datasource that will access a ctitious remote JSON based API. Well call it FarAwaySource and well put it in app/Model/Datasource/FarAwaySource.php:
App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); class FarAwaySource extends DataSource { /** * An optional description of your datasource */ public $description = A far away datasource; /** * Our default config options. These options will be customized in our * app/Config/database.php and will be merged in the __construct(). */ public $config = array( apiKey => , ); /** * If we want to create() or update() we need to specify the fields * available. We use the same array keys as we do with CakeSchema, eg. * fixtures and schema migrations. */ protected $_schema = array( id => array( type => integer, null => false, key => primary, length => 11, ), name => array( type => string, null => true, length => 255, ), message => array( type => text, null => true, ), );

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/** * Create our HttpSocket and handle any config tweaks. */ public function __construct($config) { parent::__construct($config); $this->Http = new HttpSocket(); } /** * Since datasources normally connect to a database there are a few things * we must change to get them to work without a database. */ /** * listSources() is for caching. Youll likely want to implement caching in * your own way with a custom datasource. So just return null. */ public function listSources($data = null) { return null; } /** * describe() tells the model your schema for Model::save(). * * You may want a different schema for each model but still use a single * datasource. If this is your case then set a schema property on your * models and simply return $model->schema here instead. */ public function describe($model) { return $this->_schema; } /** * calculate() is for determining how we will count the records and is * required to get update() and delete() to work. * * We dont count the records here but return a string to be passed to * read() which will do the actual counting. The easiest way is to just * return the string COUNT and check for it in read() where * $data[fields] === COUNT. */ public function calculate(Model $model, $func, $params = array()) { return COUNT; } /** * Implement the R in CRUD. Calls to Model::find() arrive here. */ public function read(Model $model, $queryData = array(), $recursive = null) { /** * Here we do the actual count as instructed by our calculate() * method above. We could either check the remote source or some * other way to get the record count. Here well simply return 1 so

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* update() and delete() will assume the record exists. */ if ($queryData[fields] === COUNT) { return array(array(array(count => 1))); } /** * Now we get, decode and return the remote data. */ $queryData[conditions][apiKey] = $this->config[apiKey]; $json = $this->Http->get(http://example.com/api/list.json, $queryData[conditions $res = json_decode($json, true); if (is_null($res)) { $error = json_last_error(); throw new CakeException($error); } return array($model->alias => $res); } /** * Implement the C in CRUD. Calls to Model::save() without $model->id * set arrive here. */ public function create(Model $model, $fields = null, $values = null) { $data = array_combine($fields, $values); $data[apiKey] = $this->config[apiKey]; $json = $this->Http->post(http://example.com/api/set.json, $data); $res = json_decode($json, true); if (is_null($res)) { $error = json_last_error(); throw new CakeException($error); } return true; }

/** * Implement the U in CRUD. Calls to Model::save() with $Model->id * set arrive here. Depending on the remote source you can just call * $this->create(). */ public function update(Model $model, $fields = null, $values = null, $conditions = null return $this->create($model, $fields, $values); } /** * Implement the D in CRUD. Calls to Model::delete() arrive here. */ public function delete(Model $model, $id = null) { $json = $this->Http->get(http://example.com/api/remove.json, array( id => $id[$model->alias . .id], apiKey => $this->config[apiKey], )); $res = json_decode($json, true); if (is_null($res)) {

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$error = json_last_error(); throw new CakeException($error); } return true; } }

We can then congure the datasource in our app/Config/database.php le by adding something like this:
public $faraway = array( datasource => FarAwaySource, apiKey => 1234abcd, );

Then use the database cong in our models like this:

class MyModel extends AppModel { public $useDbConfig = faraway; }

We can retrieve data from our remote source using the familiar model methods:
// Get all messages from Some Person $messages = $this->MyModel->find(all, array( conditions => array(name => Some Person), ));

Similarly we can save a new message:

$this->MyModel->save(array( name => Some Person, message => New Message, ));

Update the previous message:

$this->MyModel->id = 42; $this->MyModel->save(array( message => Updated message, ));

And delete the message:

$this->MyModel->delete(42);

Plugin DataSources You can also package Datasources into plugins. Simply place your datasource le into Plugin/[YourPlugin]/Model/Datasource/[YourSource].php and refer to it using the plugin notation: More on models 189

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public $faraway = array( datasource => MyPlugin.FarAwaySource, apiKey => abcd1234, );

Model Attributes
Model attributes allow you to set properties that can override the default model behavior. For a complete list of model attributes and their descriptions visit the CakePHP API. Check out http://api20.cakephp.org/class/model. useDbCong The useDbConfig property is a string that species the name of the database connection to use to bind your model class to the related database table. You can set it to any of the database connections dened within your database conguration le. The database conguration le is stored in /app/Cong/database.php. The useDbConfig property is defaulted to the default database connection. Example usage:
class Example extends AppModel { public $useDbConfig = alternate; }

useTable The useTable property species the database table name. By default, the model uses the lowercase, plural form of the models class name. Set this attribute to the name of an alternate table, or set it to false if you wish the model to use no database table. Example usage:
class Example extends AppModel { public $useTable = false; // This model does not use a database table }

Alternatively:
class Example extends AppModel { public $useTable = exmp; // This model uses a database table exmp }

tablePrex The name of the table prex used for the model. The table prex is initially set in the database connection le at /app/Cong/database.php. The default is no prex. You can override the default by setting the 190 Chapter 6. Models

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tablePrefix attribute in the model. Example usage:

class Example extends AppModel { public $tablePrefix = alternate_; // will look for alternate_examples }

primaryKey Each table normally has a primary key, id. You may change which eld name the model uses as its primary key. This is common when setting CakePHP to use an existing database table. Example usage:
class Example extends AppModel { public $primaryKey = example_id; // example_id is the field name in the database }

displayField The displayField attribute species which database eld should be used as a label for the record. The label is used in scaffolding and in find(list) calls. The model will use name or title, by default. For example, to use the username eld:
class User extends AppModel { public $displayField = username; }

Multiple eld names cannot be combined into a single display eld. For example, you cannot specify, array(first_name, last_name) as the display eld. Instead create a virtual eld with the Model attribute virtualFields recursive The recursive property denes how deep CakePHP should go to fetch associated model data via find(), and read() methods. Imagine your application features Groups which belong to a domain and have many Users which in turn have many Articles. You can set $recursive to different values based on the amount of data you want back from a $this->Group->nd() call: -1 Cake fetches Group data only, no joins. 0 Cake fetches Group data and its domain 1 Cake fetches a Group, its domain and its associated Users 2 Cake fetches a Group, its domain, its associated Users, and the Users associated Articles

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Set it no higher than you need. Having CakePHP fetch data you arent going to use slows your app unnecessarily. Also note that the default recursive level is 1. Note: If you want to combine $recursive with the fields functionality, you will have to add the columns containing the required foreign keys to the fields array manually. In the example above, this could mean adding domain_id.

Tip: The recommended recursive level for your application should be -1. This avoids retrieving related data where that is unnecessary or even unwanted. This is most likely the case for most of your nd() calls. Raise it only when needed or use Containable behavior. You can achieve that by adding it to the AppModel:
public $recursive = -1;

order The default ordering of data for any nd operation. Possible values include:
$order $order $order $order $order $order = = = = = = "field" "Model.field"; "Model.field asc"; "Model.field ASC"; "Model.field DESC"; array("Model.field" => "asc", "Model.field2" => "DESC");

data The container for the models fetched data. While data returned from a model class is normally used as returned from a nd() call, you may need to access information stored in $data inside of model callbacks. _schema Contains metadata describing the models database table elds. Each eld is described by: name type (integer, string, datetime, etc.) null default value length Example Usage:

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public $_schema = array( first_name => array( type => string, length => 30 ), last_name => array( type => string, length => 30 ), email => array( type => string, length => 30 ), message => array(type => text) );

validate This attribute holds rules that allow the model to make data validation decisions before saving. Keys named after elds hold regex values allowing the model to try to make matches. Note: It is not necessary to call validate() before save() as save() will automatically validate your data before actually saving. For more information on validation, see the Data Validation later on in this manual. virtualFields Array of virtual elds this model has. Virtual elds are aliased SQL expressions. Fields added to this property will be read as other elds in a model but will not be saveable. Example usage for MySQL:
public $virtualFields = array( name => "CONCAT(User.first_name, , User.last_name)" );

In subsequent nd operations, your User results would contain a name key with the result of the concatenation. It is not advisable to create virtual elds with the same names as columns on the database, this can cause SQL errors. For more information on the virtualFields property, its proper usage, as well as limitations, see Virtual elds. name Name of the model. If you do not specify it in your model le it will be set to the class name by constructor.

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Example usage:
class Example extends AppModel { public $name = Example; }

cacheQueries If set to true, data fetched by the model during a single request is cached. This caching is in-memory only, and only lasts for the duration of the request. Any duplicate requests for the same data is handled by the cache.

Additional Methods and Properties

While CakePHPs model functions should get you where you need to go, dont forget that model classes are just that: classes that allow you to write your own methods or dene your own properties. Any operation that handles the saving and fetching of data is best housed in your model classes. This concept is often referred to as the fat model.

class Example extends AppModel { public function getRecent() { $conditions = array( created BETWEEN (curdate() - interval 7 day) and (curdate() - interval 0 day)) ); return $this->find(all, compact(conditions)); } }

This getRecent() method can now be used within the controller.

$recent = $this->Example->getRecent();

Model::associations() Get associations:

$result = $this->Example->associations(); // $result equals array(belongsTo, hasOne, hasMany, hasAndBelongsToMany)

Model::buildQuery(string $type = first, array $query = array()) Builds the query array that is used by the data source to generate the query to fetch the data. Model::deconstruct(string $field, mixed $data) Deconstructs a complex data type (array or object) into a single eld value. 194 Chapter 6. Models

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Model::escapeField(string $field = null, string $alias = null) Escapes the eld name and prepends the model name. Escaping is done according to the current database drivers rules. Model::exists($id) Returns true if a record with the particular ID exists. If ID is not provided it calls Model::getID() to obtain the current record ID to verify, and then performs a Model::find(count) on the currently congured datasource to ascertain the existence of the record in persistent storage. Note: Parameter $id was added in 2.1. Prior to that it does not take any parameter.
$this->Example->id = 9; if ($this->Example->exists()) { // ... } $exists = $this->Foo->exists(2);

Model::getAffectedRows() Returns the number of rows affected by the last query. Model::getAssociated(string $type = null) Gets all the models with which this model is associated. Model::getColumnType(string $column) Returns the column type of a column in the model. Model::getColumnTypes() Returns an associative array of eld names and column types. Model::getID(integer $list = 0) Returns the current records ID.

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Model::getInsertID() Returns the ID of the last record this model inserted. Model::getLastInsertID() Alias to getInsertID().

Virtual elds
Virtual elds allow you to create arbitrary SQL expressions and assign them as elds in a Model. These elds cannot be saved, but will be treated like other model elds for read operations. They will be indexed under the models key alongside other model elds. Creating virtual elds Creating virtual elds is easy. In each model you can dene a $virtualFields property that contains an array of eld => expressions. An example of a virtual eld denition using MySQL would be:
public $virtualFields = array( name => CONCAT(User.first_name, " ", User.last_name) );

And with PostgreSQL:

public $virtualFields = array( name => User.first_name || \ \ || User.last_name );

In subsequent nd operations, your User results would contain a name key with the result of the concatenation. It is not advisable to create virtual elds with the same names as columns on the database, this can cause SQL errors. It is not always useful to have User.rst_name fully qualied. If you do not follow the convention (i.e. you have multiple relations to other tables) this would result in an error. In this case it may be better to just use first_name || \ \ || last_name without the Model Name. Using virtual elds Creating virtual elds is straightforward and easy, interacting with virtual elds can be done through a few different methods.
Model::hasField()

Model::hasField() will return true if the model has a concrete eld passed by the rst parameter. By setting the second parameter of hasField() to true, virtualFields will also be checked when checking if a model has a eld. Using the example eld above: 196 Chapter 6. Models

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$this->User->hasField(name); // Will return false, as there is no concrete field called n $this->User->hasField(name, true); // Will return true as there is a virtual field called

Model::isVirtualField()

This method can be used to check if a eld/column is a virtual eld or a concrete eld. Will return true if the column is virtual:
$this->User->isVirtualField(name); //true $this->User->isVirtualField(first_name); //false

Model::getVirtualField()

This method can be used to access the SQL expression that comprises a virtual eld. If no argument is supplied it will return all virtual elds in a Model:

$this->User->getVirtualField(name); //returns CONCAT(User.first_name, , User.last_nam

Model::nd() and virtual elds

As stated earlier Model::find() will treat virtual elds much like any other eld in a model. The value of a virtual eld will be placed under the models key in the resultset:
$results = $this->User->find(first); // results contains the following array( User => array( first_name => Mark, last_name => Story, name => Mark Story, //more fields. ) );

Pagination and virtual elds

Since virtual elds behave much like regular elds when doing nds, Controller::paginate() will be able to sort by virtual elds too. Virtual elds and model aliases When you are using virtualFields and models with aliases that are not the same as their name, you can run into problems as virtualFields do not update to reect the bound alias. If you are using virtualFields in models that have more than one alias it is best to dene the virtualFields in your models constructor: More on models 197

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public function __construct($id = false, $table = null, $ds = null) { parent::__construct($id, $table, $ds); $this->virtualFields[name] = sprintf(CONCAT(%s.first_name, " ", %s.last_name), $thi }

This will allow your virtualFields to work for any alias you give a model. Virtual elds in SQL queries Using functions in direct SQL queries will prevent data from being returned in the same array as your models data. For example this:

$this->Timelog->query("SELECT project_id, SUM(id) as TotalHours FROM timelogs AS Timelog GR

would return something like this:

Array ( [0] => Array ( [Timelog] => Array ( [project_id] => 1234 ) [0] => Array ( [TotalHours] => 25.5 ) ) )

If we want to group TotalHours into our Timelog array we should specify a virtual eld for our aggregate column. We can add this new virtual eld on the y rather than permanently declaring it in the model. We will provide a default value of 0 in case another query attempts to use this virtual eld. If that were to occur, 0 would be returned in the TotalHours column:
$this->Timelog->virtualFields[TotalHours] = 0;

In addition to adding the virtual eld we also need to alias our column using the form of MyModel__MyField like this:

$this->Timelog->query("SELECT project_id, SUM(id) as Timelog__TotalHours FROM timelogs AS T

Running the query again after specifying the virtual eld should result in a cleaner grouping of values:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [Timelog] => Array ( [project_id] => 1234

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[TotalHours] => 25.5 ) ) )

Limitations of virtualFields The implementation of virtualFields has a few limitations. First you cannot use virtualFields on associated models for conditions, order, or elds arrays. Doing so will generally result in an SQL error as the elds are not replaced by the ORM. This is because it difcult to estimate the depth at which an associated model might be found. A common workaround for this implementation issue is to copy virtualFields from one model to another at runtime when you need to access them:
$this->virtualFields[name] = $this->Author->virtualFields[name];

or:
$this->virtualFields += $this->Author->virtualFields;

Transactions
To perform a transaction, a models tables must be of a type that supports transactions. All transaction methods must be performed on a models DataSource object. To get a models DataSource from within the model, use:
$dataSource = $this->getDataSource();

You can then use the data source to start, commit, or roll back transactions.
$dataSource->begin(); // Perform some tasks if (/*alls well*/) { $dataSource->commit(); } else { $dataSource->rollback(); }

Nested Transactions It is possible to start a transaction several times using the Datasource::begin() method. The transaction will nish only when the number of commit and rollback match with begins.

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$dataSource->begin(); // Perform some tasks $dataSource->begin(); // More few tasks if (/*latest task ok*/) { $dataSource->commit(); } else { $dataSource->rollback(); // Change something in main task } $dataSource->commit();

This will perform the real nested transaction if your database supports it and it is enabled in the datasource. The methods will always return true when in transaction mode and the nested is not supported or disabled. If you want to use multiple begins but not use the nested transaction from database, disable it using $dataSource->useNestedTransactions = false;. It will use only the global transaction. The real nested transaction is disabled by $dataSource->useNestedTransactions = true;. default. Enable it using

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CHAPTER 7

Core Libraries

CakePHP comes with a plethora of built-in functions and classes. These classes and functions try to cover some of the most common features required in web applications.

General Purpose
General purpose libraries are available and reused in many places across CakePHP.

General Purpose
Global Constants and Functions While most of your day-to-day work in CakePHP will be utilizing core classes and methods, CakePHP features a number of global convenience functions that may come in handy. Many of these functions are for use with CakePHP classes (loading model or component classes), but many others make working with arrays or strings a little easier. Well also cover some of the constants available in CakePHP applications. Using these constants will help make upgrades more smooth, but are also convenient ways to point to certain les or directories in your CakePHP application.
Global Functions

Here are CakePHPs globally available functions. Most of them are just convenience wrappers for other CakePHP functionality, such as debugging and translating content. __(string $string_id[, $formatArgs ]) This function handles localization in CakePHP applications. The $string_id identies the ID for a translation. Strings used for translations are treated as format strings for sprintf(). You can supply additional arguments to replace placeholders in your string:

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__(You have %s unread messages, $number);

Note: Check out the Internationalization & Localization section for more information. __c(string $msg, integer $category, mixed $args = null) Note that the category must be specied with a numeric value, instead of the constant name. The values are: 0 - LC_ALL 1 - LC_COLLATE 2 - LC_CTYPE 3 - LC_MONETARY 4 - LC_NUMERIC 5 - LC_TIME 6 - LC_MESSAGES __d(string $domain, string $msg, mixed $args = null) Allows you to override the current domain for a single message lookup. Useful when internationalizing a plugin: plugin); echo __d(PluginName, This is my

__dc(string $domain, string $msg, integer $category, mixed $args = null) Allows you to override the current domain for a single message lookup. It also allows you to specify a category. Note that the category must be specied with a numeric value, instead of the constant name. The values are: 0 - LC_ALL 1 - LC_COLLATE 2 - LC_CTYPE 3 - LC_MONETARY 4 - LC_NUMERIC 5 - LC_TIME 6 - LC_MESSAGES __dcn(string $domain, string $singular, string $plural, integer $count, integer $category, mixed $args = null) Allows you to override the current domain for a single plural message lookup. It also allows you to specify a category. Returns correct plural form of message identied by $singular and $plural for count $count from domain $domain.

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Note that the category must be specied with a numeric value, instead of the constant name. The values are: 0 - LC_ALL 1 - LC_COLLATE 2 - LC_CTYPE 3 - LC_MONETARY 4 - LC_NUMERIC 5 - LC_TIME 6 - LC_MESSAGES __dn(string $domain, string $singular, string $plural, integer $count, mixed $args = null) Allows you to override the current domain for a single plural message lookup. Returns correct plural form of message identied by $singular and $plural for count $count from domain $domain. __n(string $singular, string $plural, integer $count, mixed $args = null) Returns correct plural form of message identied by $singular and $plural for count $count. Some languages have more than one form for plural messages dependent on the count. am(array $one, $two, $three...) Merges all the arrays passed as parameters and returns the merged array. config() Can be used to load les from your application config-folder via include_once. Function checks for existence before include and returns boolean. Takes an optional number of arguments. Example: config(some_file, myconfig); convertSlash(string $string) Converts forward slashes to underscores and removes the rst and last underscores in a string. Returns the converted string. debug(mixed $var, boolean $showHtml = null, $showFrom = true) If the applications DEBUG level is non-zero, $var is printed out. If $showHTML is true or left as null, the data is rendered to be browser-friendly. If $showFrom is not set to false, the debug output will start with the line from which it was called Also see Debugging env(string $key) Gets an environment variable from available sources. Used as a backup if $_SERVER or $_ENV are disabled. This function also emulates PHP_SELF and DOCUMENT_ROOT on unsupporting servers. In fact, its a good idea to always use env() instead of $_SERVER or getenv() (especially if you plan to distribute the code), since its a full emulation wrapper. fileExistsInPath(string $le) Checks to make sure that the supplied le is within the current PHP include_path. Returns a boolean result. h(string $text, boolean $double = true, string $charset = null) Convenience wrapper for htmlspecialchars(). General Purpose 203

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LogError(string $message) Shortcut to Log::write(). pluginSplit(string $name, boolean $dotAppend = false, string $plugin = null) Splits a dot syntax plugin name into its plugin and classname. If $name does not have a dot, then index 0 will be null. Commonly used like list($plugin, $name) = pluginSplit(Users.User); pr(mixed $var) Convenience wrapper for print_r(), with the addition of wrapping <pre> tags around the output. sortByKey(array &$array, string $sortby, SORT_NUMERIC) Sorts given $array by key $sortby. string $order = asc, integer $type =

stripslashes_deep(array $value) Recursively strips slashes from the supplied $value. Returns the modied array.
Core Denition Constants

Most of the following constants refer to paths in your application. constant APP Path to the applications directory. constant APP_DIR Equals app or the name of your application directory. constant APPLIBS Path to the applications Lib directory. constant CACHE Path to the cache les directory. It can be shared between hosts in a multi-server setup. constant CAKE Path to the cake directory. constant CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH Path to the root lib directory. constant CORE_PATH Path to the root directory with ending directory slash. constant CSS Path to the public CSS directory. constant CSS_URL Web path to the CSS les directory. constant DS Short for PHPs DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR, which is / on Linux and \ on windows.

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constant FULL_BASE_URL Full url prex. Such as https://example.com Deprecated since version 2.4: This constant is deprecated, you should use Router::baseUrl() instead. constant IMAGES Path to the public images directory. constant IMAGES_URL Web path to the public images directory. constant JS Path to the public JavaScript directory. constant JS_URL Web path to the js les directory. constant LOGS Path to the logs directory. constant ROOT Path to the root directory. constant TESTS Path to the tests directory. constant TMP Path to the temporary les directory. constant VENDORS Path to the vendors directory. constant WEBROOT_DIR Equals webroot or the name of your webroot directory. constant WWW_ROOT Full path to the webroot.
Timing Denition Constants

constant TIME_START Unix timestamp in microseconds as a oat from when the application started. constant SECOND Equals 1 constant MINUTE Equals 60 constant HOUR Equals 3600 constant DAY Equals 86400

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constant WEEK Equals 604800 constant MONTH Equals 2592000 constant YEAR Equals 31536000 App Class class App The app class is responsible for path management, class location and class loading. Make sure you follow the File and Classname Conventions.
Packages

CakePHP is organized around the idea of packages, each class belongs to a package or folder where other classes reside. You can congure each package location in your application using App::build(APackage/SubPackage, $paths) to inform the framework where should each class be loaded. Almost every class in the CakePHP framework can be swapped with your own compatible implementation. If you wish to use you own class instead of the classes the framework provides, just add the class to your libs folder emulating the directory location of where CakePHP expects to nd it. For instance if youd like to use your own HttpSocket class, put it under:
app/Lib/Network/Http/HttpSocket.php

Once youve done this App will load your override le instead of the le inside CakePHP.
Loading classes

static App::uses(string $class, string $package) Return type void Classes are lazily loaded in CakePHP, however before the autoloader can nd your classes you need to tell App, where it can nd the les. By telling App which package a class can be found in, it can properly locate the le and load it the rst time a class is used. Some examples for common types of classes are: Controller App::uses(PostsController, Controller); Component App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component); Model App::uses(MyModel, Model); Behaviors App::uses(TreeBehavior, Model/Behavior); Views App::uses(ThemeView, View); 206 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Helpers App::uses(HtmlHelper, View/Helper); Libs App::uses(PaymentProcessor, Lib); Vendors App::uses(Textile, Vendor); Utility App::uses(String, Utility); So basically the second param should simply match the folder path of the class le in core or app. Note: Loading vendors usually means you are loading packages that do not follow conventions. For most vendor packages using App::import() is recommended.

Loading les from plugins Loading classes in plugins works much the same as loading app and core classes except you must specify the plugin you are loading from:
// Load the class Comment in app/Plugin/PluginName/Model/Comment.php App::uses(Comment, PluginName.Model);

// Load the class CommentComponent in app/Plugin/PluginName/Controller/Component/CommentCom App::uses(CommentComponent, PluginName.Controller/Component);

Finding paths to packages using App::path()

static App::path(string $package, string $plugin = null) Return type array Used to read information stored path:
// return the model paths in your application App::path(Model);

This can be done for all packages that are apart of your application. You can also fetch paths for a plugin:
// return the component paths in DebugKit App::path(Component, DebugKit);

static App::paths() Return type array Get all the currently loaded paths from App. Useful for inspecting or storing all paths App knows about. For a paths to a specic package use App::path() static App::core(string $package) Return type array Used for nding the path to a package inside CakePHP:

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// Get the path to Cache engines. App::core(Cache/Engine);

static App::location(string $className) Return type string Returns the package name where a class was dened to be located at.
Adding paths for App to nd packages in

static App::build(array $paths = array(), mixed $mode = App::PREPEND) Return type void Sets up each package location on the le system. You can congure multiple search paths for each package, those will be used to look for les one folder at a time in the specied order. All paths should be terminated with a directory separator. Adding additional controller paths for example would alter where CakePHP looks for controllers. This allows you to split your application up across the lesystem. Usage:
//will setup a new search path for the Model package App::build(array(Model => array(/a/full/path/to/models/))); //will setup the path as the only valid path for searching models App::build(array(Model => array(/path/to/models/)), App::RESET); //will setup multiple search paths for helpers App::build(array(View/Helper => array(/path/to/helpers/, /another/path/)));

If reset is set to true, all loaded plugins will be forgotten and they will be needed to be loaded again. Examples:
App::build(array(controllers => array(/full/path/to/controllers))); //becomes App::build(array(Controller => array(/full/path/to/Controller))); App::build(array(helpers => array(/full/path/to/views/helpers))); //becomes App::build(array(View/Helper => array(/full/path/to/View/Helper)));

Changed in version 2.0: App::build() will not merge app paths with core paths anymore. Add new packages to an application App::build() can be used to add new package locations. This is useful when you want to add new top level packages or, sub-packages to your application:
App::build(array( Service => array(%s . Service . DS) ), App::REGISTER);

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The %s in newly registered packages will be replaced with the APP path. You must include a trailing / in registered packages. Once packages are registered, you can use App::build() to append/prepend/reset paths like any other package. Changed in version 2.1: Registering packages was added in 2.1
Finding which objects CakePHP knows about

static App::objects(string $type, mixed $path = null, boolean $cache = true) Return type mixed Returns an array of objects of the given type or false if incorrect. You can nd out which objects App knows about using App::objects(Controller) for example to nd which application controllers App knows about. Example usage:
//returns array(DebugKit, Blog, User); App::objects(plugin); //returns array(PagesController, BlogController); App::objects(Controller);

You can also search only within a plugins objects by using the plugin dot syntax.:
// returns array(MyPluginPost, MyPluginComment); App::objects(MyPlugin.Model);

Changed in version 2.0. 1.Returns array() instead of false for empty results or invalid types 2.Does not return core objects anymore, App::objects(core) will return array(). 3.Returns the complete class name
Locating plugins

static App::pluginPath(string $plugin) Return type string Plugins can be located with App as well. Using App::pluginPath(DebugKit); for example, will give you the full path to the DebugKit plugin:
$path = App::pluginPath(DebugKit);

Locating themes

static App::themePath(string $theme) Return type string

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Themes can be found App::themePath(purple);, would give the full path to the purple theme.
Including les with App::import()

static App::import(mixed $type = null, string $name = null, mixed $parent = true, array $search = array(), string $le = null, boolean $return = false) Return type boolean At rst glance App::import seems complex, however in most use cases only 2 arguments are required. Note: This method is equivalent to requireing the le. It is important to realize that the class subsequently needs to be initialized.
// The same as require(Controller/UsersController.php); App::import(Controller, Users); // We need to load the class $Users = new UsersController(); // If we want the model associations, components, etc to be loaded $Users->constructClasses();

All classes that were loaded in the past using App::import(Core, $class) will need to be loaded using App::uses() referring to the correct package. This change has provided large performance gains to the framework. Changed in version 2.0. The method no longer looks for classes recursively, it strictly uses the values for the paths dened in App::build() It will not be able to load App::import(Component, Component) use App::uses(Component, Controller);. Using App::import(Lib, CoreClass); to load core classes is no longer possible. Importing a non-existent le, supplying a wrong type or package name, or null values for $name and $file parameters will result in a false return value. App::import(Core, CoreClass) is no longer supported, use App::uses() instead and let the class autoloading do the rest. Loading Vendor les does not look recursively in the vendors folder, it will also not convert the le to underscored anymore as it did in the past.
Overriding classes in CakePHP

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To override the Dispatcher class, create app/Lib/Routing/Dispatcher.php To override the CakeRoute class, create app/Lib/Routing/Route/CakeRoute.php To override the Model class, create app/Lib/Model/Model.php When you load the replaced les, the app/Lib les will be loaded instead of the built-in core classes.
Loading Vendor Files

You can use App::uses() to load classes in vendors directories. It follows the same conventions as loading other les:
// Load the class Geshi in app/Vendor/Geshi.php App::uses(Geshi, Vendor);

To load classes in subdirectories, youll need to add those paths with App::build():
// Load the class ClassInSomePackage in app/Vendor/SomePackage/ClassInSomePackage.php App::build(array(Vendor => array(APP . Vendor . DS . SomePackage))); App::uses(ClassInSomePackage, Vendor);

Your vendor les may not follow conventions, have a class that differs from the le name or does not contain classes. You can load those les using App::import(). The following examples illustrate how to load vendor les from a number of path structures. These vendor les could be located in any of the vendor folders. To load app/Vendor/geshi.php:
App::import(Vendor, geshi);

Note: The geshi le must be a lower-case le name as Cake will not nd it otherwise. To load app/Vendor/ickr/ickr.php:
App::import(Vendor, flickr/flickr);

To load app/Vendor/some.name.php:
App::import(Vendor, SomeName, array(file => some.name.php));

To load app/Vendor/services/well.named.php:
App::import(Vendor, WellNamed, array(file => services . DS . well.named.php));

It wouldnt make a difference if your vendor les are inside your /vendors directory. Cake will automatically nd it. To load vendors/vendorName/libFile.php:

App::import(Vendor, aUniqueIdentifier, array(file => vendorName . DS . libFile.php

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App Init/Load/Shutdown Methods

static App::init() Return type void Initializes the cache for App, registers a shutdown function. static App::load(string $className) Return type boolean Method to handle the automatic class loading. It will look for each class package dened using App::uses() and with this information it will resolve the package name to a full path to load the class from. File name for each class should follow the class name. For instance, if a class is name MyCustomClass the le name should be MyCustomClass.php static App::shutdown() Return type void Object destructor. Writes cache le if changes have been made to the $_map. Events System New in version 2.1. Creating maintainable applications is both a science and an art. It is well-known that a key for having good quality code is making your objects loosely coupled and strongly cohesive at the same time. Cohesion means that all methods and properties for a class are strongly related to the class itself and it is not trying to do the job other objects should be doing, while loosely coupling is the measure of how little a class is wired to external objects, and how much that class is depending on them. While most of the CakePHP structure and default libraries will help you achieve this goal, there are certain cases where you need to cleanly communicate with other parts in the system without having to hard code those dependencies, thus losing cohesion and increasing class coupling. A very successful design pattern in software engineering is the Observer pattern, where objects can generate events and notify possibly anonymous listeners about changes in the internal state. Listeners in the observer pattern can subscribe to such events and choose to act upon them, modify the subject state or simply log stuff. If you have used javascript in the past, the chances are that you are already familiar with event driven programming. CakePHP emulates several aspects of how events are triggered and managed in popular javascript frameworks such as jQuery, while remaining loyal to its object oriented design. In this implementation, an event object is carried across all listeners holding the information and the ability to stop the event propagation at any point. Listeners can register themselves or can delegate this task to other objects and have the chance to alter the state and the event itself for the rest of the callbacks.
Interacting with the event managers

Lets suppose you are building a Cart plugin, but you dont really want to mess with shipping logic, emailing the user or decrementing the item from the stock, it is your wish to handle those things separately in another

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plugin or in app code. Typically, when not directly using the observer pattern you would do this by attaching behaviors on the y to your models, and perhaps some components to the controllers. Doing so represents a challenge most of the time, since you would have to come up with the code for externally loading those behaviors or attaching hooks to your plugin controllers. Prior to CakePHP 2.1 some developers chose to implement generic event systems to solve this problem, and some of those system were offered as plugins. Now, you can benet from a standard general purpose event system that will let you cleanly separate the concerns of your plugins and application code with the built in events manager. Dispatching events So back to our example, we would have an Order model that will manage the buying logic, and probably a place method to save the order details and do any other logic:
// Cart/Model/Order.php class Order extends AppModel { public function place($order) { if ($this->save($order)) { $this->Cart->remove($order); $this->sendNotificationEmail(); $this->decrementFromStock(); $this->updateUserStatistics(); // ... return true; } return false; } }

Well, that does not look right at all. A plugin should not make any assumption about sending emails, and may not even have the inventory data to decrement the item from it, and denitely tracking usage statistics is not the best place to do it. So we need another solution, lets rewrite that using the event manager:
// Cart/Model/Order.php App::uses(CakeEvent, Event); class Order extends AppModel {

public function place($order) { if ($this->save($order)) { $this->Cart->remove($order); $this->getEventManager()->dispatch(new CakeEvent(Model.Order.afterPlace, $thi order => $order ))); return true; } return false; } }

That looks a lot cleaner, at gives us the opportunity to introduce the event classes and methods. The rst thing you may notice is the call to getEventManager() this is a method that is available by default in all Models, Controller and Views. This method will not return the same manager instance across models, and it is not shared between controllers and models, but they are between controllers and views, nevertheless. We General Purpose 213

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will review later how to overcome this implementation detail. The getEventManager method returns an instance of CakeEventManager, and to dispatch events you use CakeEventManager::dispatch() which receives an instance of the CakeEvent class. Lets dissect now the process of dispatching an event:
new CakeEvent(Model.Order.afterPlace, $this, array( order => $order ));

CakeEvent receives 3 arguments in its constructor. The rst one is the event name, you should try to keep this name as unique as possible, while making it readable. We suggest a convention as follows: Layer.eventName for general events happening at a layer level (e.g. Controller.startup, View.beforeRender) and Layer.Class.eventName for events happening in specic classes on a layer, for example Model.User.afterRegister or Controller.Courses.invalidAccess. The second argument is the subject, meaning the object associated to the event, usually when it is the same class triggering events about itself, using $this will be the most common case. Although a Component could trigger controller events too. The subject class is important because listeners will get immediate access to the object properties and have the chance to inspect or change them on the y. Finally, the third argument is the events params. This can be any data you consider useful to pass around so listeners can act upon it. While this can be an argument of any type, we recommend passing an associative array, to make inspection easier. CakeEventManager::dispatch() method accepts the event object as argument and noties all listener and callbacks passing this object along. So the listeners will handle all the extra logic around the afterPlace event, you can log the time, send emails, update user statistics possibly in separate objects and even delegating it to ofine tasks if you have the need. Registering callbacks How do we register callbacks or observers to our new afterPlace event? This is subject to a wide variety of different implementations, but they all have to call the CakeEventManager::attach() method to register new actors. For simplicitys sake, lets imagine we know in the plugin what the callbacks are available in the controller, and say this controller is responsible for attaching them. The possible code would look like this:

// Listeners configured somewhere else, maybe a config file: Configure::write(Order.afterPlace, array( email-sending => EmailSender::sendBuyEmail, inventory => array($this->InventoryManager, decrement), logger => function($event) { // Anonymous function are only available in PHP 5.3+ CakeLog::write(info, A new order was placed with id: . $event->subject()->id); } )); // Cart/Controller/OrdersController.php class OrdersController extends AppController { public function finish() { foreach (Configure::read(Order.afterPlace) as $l) { $this->Order->getEventManager()->attach($l, Model.Order.afterPlace);

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} if ($this->Order->place($this->Cart->items())) { // ... } } }

This may not be the cleanest way to do it, so you can come up with your own ways for attaching listeners to an objects event manager. This simple way of dening them using the Congure class is intended for didactic purposes only. This little example allows us to showcase what type of callbacks can be attached to the manager. As you may already have gured out, the attach method takes any valid PHP callback type, this is a string representing a static function call, an array having a class instance and a method, an anonymous function if you use PHP 5.3, etc. Attached callbacks will all receive the event object as rst argument CakeEventManager::attach() Accepts three arguments. The leftmost one is the callback itself, anything that PHP can treat as a callable function. The second argument is the event name, and the callback will only get red if the CakeEvent object dispatched has a matching name. The last argument is an array of options to congure the callback priority, and the preference of arguments to be passed. Registering listeners Listeners are an alternative, and often cleaner way of registering callbacks for an event. This is done by implementing the CakeEventListener interface in any class you wish to register some callbacks. Classes implementing it need to provide the implementedEvents() method and return an associative array with all event names that the class will handle. To keep up with our previous example, lets imagine we have a UserStatistic class responsible for calculating useful information and compiling into the global site statistics. It would be natural to pass an instance of this class as a callback, instead of implementing a custom static function or converting any other workaround to trigger methods in this class. A listener is created as follows:
App::uses(CakeEventListener, Event); class UserStatistic implements CakeEventListener { public function implementedEvents() { return array( Model.Order.afterPlace => updateBuyStatistic, ); } public function updateBuyStatistic($event) { // Code to update statistics } } // Attach the UserStatistic object to the Orders event manager $statistics = new UserStatistic(); $this->Order->getEventManager()->attach($statistics);

As you can see in the above code, the attach function can handle instances of the CakeEventListener interface. Internally, the event manager will read the array returned by implementedEvents method and wire the callbacks accordingly.

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Establishing priorities In some cases youd want to run a callback and make sure it gets executed before, or after all the other callbacks have been run. For instance, think again about our user statistics example. It would make sense to run this method only when we can make sure the event was not cancelled, there were no errors and the other callbacks did not change the state of the order itself. For those cases you use priorities. Priorities are handled using a number associated to the callback itself. The higher the number, the later the method will be red. Default priority for all callbacks and listener methods are set to 10. If you need your method to be run before, then using any value below this default will help you do it, even setting the priority to 1 or a negative value should work. On the other hand if you desire to run the callback after the others, using a number above 10 will do. If two callbacks happen to be allocated in the same priority queue, they will be executed with a FIFO policy, the rst listener method to be attached is called rst and so on. You set priorities using the attach method for callbacks, and declaring it in the implementedEvents function for event listeners:

// Setting priority for a callback $callback = array($this, doSomething); $this->getEventManager()->attach($callback, Model.Order.afterPlace, array(priority => 2

// Setting priority for a listener class UserStatistic implements CakeEventListener { public function implementedEvents() { return array( Model.Order.afterPlace => array(callable => updateBuyStatistic, priority ); } }

As you see, the main difference for CakeEventListener objects is that you need to use an array for specifying the callable method and the priority preference. The callable key is an special array entry that the manager will read to know what function in the class it should be calling. Getting event data as function params Some developers might prefer having the event data passed as function parameters instead of receiving the event object. While this is an odd preference and using the event object is a lot more powerful, this was needed to provide backwards compatibility with the previous event system and to offer seasoned developers an alternative to what they were used to. In order to toggle this option you have to add the passParams option to the third argument of the attach method, or declare it in the implementedEvents returned array similar to what you do with priorities:

// Setting priority for a callback $callback = array($this, doSomething); $this->getEventManager()->attach($callback, Model.Order.afterPlace, array(passParams =>

// Setting priority for a listener class UserStatistic implements CakeEventListener { public function implementedEvents() { return array( Model.Order.afterPlace => array(callable => updateBuyStatistic, passPara ); }

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public function updateBuyStatistic($orderData) { // ... } }

In the above code the doSomething function and updateBuyStatistic method will receive $orderData instead of the $event object. This is so, because in our previous example we trigger the Model.Order.afterPlace event with some data:
$this->getEventManager()->dispatch(new CakeEvent(Model.Order.afterPlace, $this, array( order => $order )));

Note: The params can only be passed as function arguments if the event data is an array. Any other data type cannot be converted to function parameters, thus not using this option is often the most adequate choice.

Stopping events There are circumstances where you will need to stop events so the operation that started it is cancelled. You see examples of this in the model callbacks (e.g. beforeSave) in which it is possible to stop the saving operation if the code detects it cannot proceed any further. In order to stop events you can either return false in your callbacks or call the stopPropagation method on the event object:
public function doSomething($event) { // ... return false; // stops the event } public function updateBuyStatistic($event) { // ... $event->stopPropagation(); }

Stopping an event can have two different effects. The rst one can always be expected: any callback after the event was stopped will not be called. The second consequence is optional and it depends on the code triggering the event, for instance, in our afterPlace example it would not make any sense to cancel the operation since the data was already saved and the cart emptied. Nevertheless, if we had a beforePlace stopping the event would have a valid meaning. To check if an event was stopped, you call the isStopped() method in the event object:
public function place($order) { $event = new CakeEvent(Model.Order.beforePlace, $this, array(order => $order)); $this->getEventManager()->dispatch($event); if ($event->isStopped()) { return false; } if ($this->Order->save($order)) { // ... }

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// ... }

In the previous example the order would not get saved if the event is stopped during the beforePlace process. Getting event results Every time a callback returns a value, it gets stored in the $result property of the event object. This is useful in some cases where letting callbacks modify the main process params enhances the ability of altering the execution aspect of any process. Lets take again our beforePlace example and let callbacks modify the $order data. Event results can be altered either using the event object result property directly or returning the value in the callback itself:
// A listener callback public function doSomething($event) { // ... $alteredData = $event->data[order] + $moreData; return $alteredData; } // Another listener callback public function doSomethingElse($event) { // ... $event->result[order] = $alteredData; } // Using the event result public function place($order) { $event = new CakeEvent(Model.Order.beforePlace, $this, array(order => $order)); $this->getEventManager()->dispatch($event); if (!empty($event->result[order])) { $order = $event->result[order]; } if ($this->Order->save($order)) { // ... } // ... }

As you also may have noticed it is possible to alter any event object property and be sure that this new data will get passed to the next callback. In most of the cases, providing objects as event data or result and directly altering the object is the best solution as the reference is kept the same and modications are shared across all callback calls. Removing callbacks and listeners If for any reason you want to remove any callback from the event manager just call the CakeEventManager::detach() method using as arguments the rst two params you used for attaching it:
// Attaching a function $this->getEventManager()->attach(array($this, doSomething), My.event);

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// Detaching the function $this->getEventManager()->detach(array($this, doSomething), My.event); // Attaching an anonymous function (PHP 5.3+ only); $myFunction = function($event) { ... }; $this->getEventManager()->attach($myFunction, My.event); // Detaching the anonymous function $this->getEventManager()->detach($myFunction, My.event); // Attaching a CakeEventListener $listener = new MyCakeEventLister(); $this->getEventManager()->attach($listener); // Detaching a single event key from a listener $this->getEventManager()->detach($listener, My.event); // Detaching all callbacks implemented by a listener $this->getEventManager()->detach($listener);

The global event manager

As previously noted, it might get hard to attach observers to a particular event manager in an object. There are certain cases where having the ability to attach callbacks for an event is needed without having access to the object instance that will trigger it. Also, to prevent people from implementing each of them a different mechanism for loading callbacks into managers based on conguration, CakePHP provides the concept of the global event manager. The global manager is a singleton instance of a CakeEventManager class that receives every event that any event manager in the app dispatches. This is both powerful and exible, but if you use it you need to take more precautions when dealing with events. To set the concept right once again, and using our beforePlace example lets recall that we were using the local event manager that is returned by the getEventManager function. Internally this local event manager dispatches the event into the global one before it triggers the internal attached callbacks. The priority for each manager is independent, the global callbacks will re in their own priority queue and then the local callbacks will get called in the respective priority order. Accessing the global event manager is as easy as calling a static function, the following example will attach a global event to the beforePlace event:
// In any configuration file or piece of code that executes before the event App::uses(CakeEventManager, Event); CakeEventManager::instance()->attach($aCallback, Model.Order.beforePlace);

As you can see, we just change how we get access to an event manager instance, and we can apply the same concepts we learned before about triggering, attaching, detaching, stopping events, etc. One important thing you should consider is that there are events that will be triggered having the same name but different subjects, so checking it in the event object is usually required in any function that gets attached globally in order to prevent some bugs. Remember that extreme exibility implies extreme complexity. General Purpose 219

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Consider this callback that wants to listen for all Model beforeFinds but in reality, it cannot do its logic if the model is the Cart:
App::uses(CakeEventManager, Event); CakeEventManager::instance()->attach(myCallback, Model.beforeFind); public function myCallback($event) { if ($event->subject() instanceof Cart) { return; } return array(conditions => ...); }

Conclusion

Events are a great way of separating concerns in your application and make classes both cohesive and decoupled from each other, nevertheless using events is not the solution to all problems. Most applications actually wont need this feature at all, we recommend looking into other options when it comes to implementing callbacks such as using behaviors, components or helpers. Keep in mind that with great power comes great responsibility, decoupling your classes this way also means that you need to perform more and better integration testing on your code. Abusing this tool wont make your apps have a better architecture, quite the opposite, it will make the code harder to read. Whereas in contrast, if you use it wisely, only for the stuff your really need, it will make you code easier to work with, test and integrate.
Additional Reading

Collections Components, Helpers, Behaviors and Tasks all share a similar structure and set of behaviors. For 2.0, they were given a unied API for interacting with collections of similar objects. The collection objects in CakePHP, give you a uniform way to interact with several different kinds of objects in your application. While the examples below, will use Components, the same behavior can be expected for Helpers, Behaviors, and Tasks in addition to Components. Loading and unloading objects Loading objects on every kind of collection can be done using the load() method:
$this->Prg = $this->Components->load(Prg); $this->Prg->process();

When loading a component, if the component is not currently loaded into the collection, a new instance will be created. If the component is already loaded, another instance will not be created. When loading components, you can also provide additional conguration for them:
$this->Cookie = $this->Components->load(Cookie, array(name => sweet));

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Any keys & values provided will be passed to the Components constructor. The one exception to this rule is className. ClassName is a special key that is used to alias objects in a collection. This allows you to have component names that do not reect the classnames, which can be helpful when extending core components:
$this->Auth = $this->Components->load(Auth, array(className => MyCustomAuth)); $this->Auth->user(); // Actually using MyCustomAuth::user();

The inverse of loading an object, is unloading it. Unloaded objects are removed from memory, and will not have additional callbacks triggered on them:
$this->Components->unload(Cookie); $this->Cookie->read(); // Fatal error.

Triggering callbacks Callbacks are supported by collection objects. When a collection has a callback triggered, that method will be called on all enabled objects in the collection. You can pass parameters to the callback loop as well:
$this->Behaviors->trigger(afterFind, array($this, $results, $primary));

In the above $viewFile would be passed as the rst argument to every helpers beforeRender method. There are several options that can be used to control how callbacks are red: breakOn Set to the value or values you want the callback propagation to stop on. Can either be a scalar value, or an array of values to break on. Defaults to false. break Set to true to enabled breaking. When a trigger is broken, the last returned value will be returned. If used in combination with collectReturn the collected results will be returned. Defaults to false. collectReturn Set to true to collect the return of each object into an array. This array of return values will be returned from the trigger() call. Defaults to false. triggerDisabled Will trigger the callback on all objects in the collection even the non-enabled objects. Defaults to false. modParams Allows each object the callback gets called on to modify the parameters to the next object. Setting modParams to an integer value will allow you to modify the parameter with that index. Any non-null value will modify the parameter index indicated. Defaults to false. Canceling a callback loop Using the break and breakOn options you can cancel a callback loop midway similar to stopping event propagation in JavaScript:
$this->Behaviors->trigger( beforeFind, array($this, $query), array(break => true, breakOn => false), );

In the above example, if any behavior returns false from its beforeFind method, no further callbacks will be called. In addition, the return of trigger() will be false.

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Enabling and disabling objects Once an object is loaded into a collection you may need to disable it. Disabling an object in a collection prevents future callbacks from being red on that object unless the triggerDisabled option is used:
// Disable the HtmlHelper $this->Helpers->disable(Html); // Re-enable the helper later on $this->Helpers->enable(Html);

Disabled objects can still have their normal methods and properties used. The primary difference between an enabled and disabled object is with regards to callbacks. You can interrogate a collection about the enabled objects, or check if a specic object is still enabled using enabled():
// Check whether or not a specific helper is enabled. $this->Helpers->enabled(Html); // $enabled will contain an array of helper currently enabled. $enabled = $this->Helpers->enabled();

Object callback priorities You can prioritize the triggering object callbacks similar to event callbacks. The handling of priority values and order of triggering is the same as explained here. Heres how you can specify priority at declaration time:
class SomeController { public $components = array( Foo, //Foo gets default priority 10 Bar => array(priority => 9) //Bars callbacks are triggered before Foos ); public $helpers = array( Cache => array(priority => 12), //Caches callbacks will be triggered last Asset, Utility //Utility has priority 10 same as Asset and its callbacks are trigger //after Assets ); }

class Post { public $actsAs = array( DoFirst => array(priority => 1), Media ); }

When dynamically loading objects to a collection you can specify the priority like this:
$this->MyComponent = $this->Components->load(MyComponent, array(priority => 9));

You can also change priorities at run time using the ObjectCollection::setPriority() function:

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//For a single object $this->Components->setPriority(Foo, 2); //For multiple objects $this->Behaviors->setPriority(array(Object1 => 8, Object2 => 9));

Behaviors Model behaviors are a way to organize some of the functionality dened in CakePHP models. They allow us to separate and reuse logic that creates a type of behavior, and they do this without requiring inheritance. For example creating tree structures. By providing a simple yet powerful way to enhance models, behaviors allow us to attach functionality to models by dening a simple class variable. Thats how behaviors allow models to get rid of all the extra weight that might not be part of the business contract they are modeling, or that is also needed in different models and can then be extrapolated. As an example, consider a model that gives us access to a database table which stores structural information about a tree. Removing, adding, and migrating nodes in the tree is not as simple as deleting, inserting, and editing rows in the table. Many records may need to be updated as things move around. Rather than creating those tree-manipulation methods on a per model basis (for every model that needs that functionality), we could simply tell our model to use the TreeBehavior, or in more formal terms, we tell our model to behave as a Tree. This is known as attaching a behavior to a model. With just one line of code, our CakePHP model takes on a whole new set of methods that allow it to interact with the underlying structure. CakePHP already includes behaviors for tree structures, translated content, access control list interaction, not to mention the community-contributed behaviors already available in the CakePHP Bakery (http://bakery.cakephp.org). In this section, well cover the basic usage pattern for adding behaviors to models, how to use CakePHPs built-in behaviors, and how to create our own. In essence, Behaviors are Mixins (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixin) with callbacks. Using Behaviors Behaviors are attached to models through the $actsAs model class variable:
class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Tree); }

This example shows how a Category model could be managed in a tree structure using the TreeBehavior. Once a behavior has been specied, use the methods added by the behavior as if they always existed as part of the original model:
// Set ID $this->Category->id = 42; // Use behavior method, children(): $kids = $this->Category->children();

Some behaviors may require or allow settings to be dened when the behavior is attached to the model. Here, we tell our TreeBehavior the names of the left and right elds in the underlying database table:
class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Tree => array( left => left_node,

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right => right_node )); }

We can also attach several behaviors to a model. Theres no reason why, for example, our Category model should only behave as a tree, it may also need internationalization support:
class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Tree => array( left => left_node, right => right_node ), Translate ); }

So far we have been adding behaviors to models using a model class variable. That means that our behaviors will be attached to our models throughout the models lifetime. However, we may need to detach behaviors from our models at runtime. Lets say that on our previous Category model, which is acting as a Tree and a Translate model, we need for some reason to force it to stop acting as a Translate model:
// Detach a behavior from our model: $this->Category->Behaviors->unload(Translate);

That will make our Category model stop behaving as a Translate model from thereon. We may need, instead, to just disable the Translate behavior from acting upon our normal model operations: our nds, our saves, etc. In fact, we are looking to disable the behavior from acting upon our CakePHP model callbacks. Instead of detaching the behavior, we then tell our model to stop informing of these callbacks to the Translate behavior:
// Stop letting the behavior handle our model callbacks $this->Category->Behaviors->disable(Translate);

We may also need to nd out if our behavior is handling those model callbacks, and if not we then restore its ability to react to them:
// If our behavior is not handling model callbacks if (!$this->Category->Behaviors->enabled(Translate)) { // Tell it to start doing so $this->Category->Behaviors->enable(Translate); }

Just as we could completely detach a behavior from a model at runtime, we can also attach new behaviors. Say that our familiar Category model needs to start behaving as a Christmas model, but only on Christmas day:
// If today is Dec 25 if (date(m/d) === 12/25) { // Our model needs to behave as a Christmas model $this->Category->Behaviors->load(Christmas); }

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We can also use the load method to override behavior settings:

// We will change one setting from our already attached behavior $this->Category->Behaviors->load(Tree, array(left => new_left_node));

Theres also a method to obtain the list of behaviors a model has attached. If we pass the name of a behavior to the method, it will tell us if that behavior is attached to the model, otherwise it will give us the list of attached behaviors:
// If the Translate behavior is not attached if (!$this->Category->Behaviors->loaded(Translate)) { // Get the list of all behaviors the model has attached $behaviors = $this->Category->Behaviors->loaded(); }

Creating Behaviors Behaviors that are attached to Models get their callbacks called automatically. The callbacks are similar to those found in Models: beforeFind, afterFind, beforeSave, afterSave, beforeDelete, afterDelete and onError - see Callback Methods. Your behaviors should be placed in app/Model/Behavior. They are named in CamelCase and postxed by Behavior, ex. NameBehavior.php. Its often helpful to use a core behavior as a template when creating your own. Find them in lib/Cake/Model/Behavior/. Every callback and behavior method takes a reference to the model it is being called from as the rst parameter. Besides implementing the callbacks, you can add settings per behavior and/or model behavior attachment. Information about specifying settings can be found in the chapters about core behaviors and their conguration. A quick example that illustrates how behavior settings can be passed from the model to the behavior:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( YourBehavior => array( option1_key => option1_value ) ); }

Since behaviors are shared across all the model instances that use them, its a good practice to store the settings per alias/model name that is using the behavior. When created behaviors will have their setup() method called:
public function setup(Model $Model, $settings = array()) { if (!isset($this->settings[$Model->alias])) { $this->settings[$Model->alias] = array( option1_key => option1_default_value, option2_key => option2_default_value, option3_key => option3_default_value, ); } $this->settings[$Model->alias] = array_merge(

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$this->settings[$Model->alias], (array)$settings); }

Creating behavior methods Behavior methods are automatically available on any model acting as the behavior. For example if you had:
class Duck extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Flying); }

You would be able to call FlyingBehavior methods as if they were methods on your Duck model. When creating behavior methods you automatically get passed a reference of the calling model as the rst parameter. All other supplied parameters are shifted one place to the right. For example:
$this->Duck->fly(toronto, montreal);

Although this method takes two parameters, the method signature should look like:
public function fly(Model $Model, $from, $to) { // Do some flying. }

Keep in mind that methods called in a $this->doIt() fashion from inside a behavior method will not get the $model parameter automatically appended. Mapped methods In addition to providing mixin methods, behaviors can also provide pattern matching methods. Behaviors can also dene mapped methods. Mapped methods use pattern matching for method invocation. This allows you to create methods similar to Model::findAllByXXX methods on your behaviors. Mapped methods need to be declared in your behaviors $mapMethods array. The method signature for a mapped method is slightly different than a normal behavior mixin method:
class MyBehavior extends ModelBehavior { public $mapMethods = array(/do(\w+)/ => doSomething); public function doSomething(Model $model, $method, $arg1, $arg2) { debug(func_get_args()); //do something } }

The above will map every doXXX() method call to the behavior. As you can see, the model is still the rst parameter, but the called method name will be the 2nd parameter. This allows you to munge the method name for additional information, much like Model::findAllByXX. If the above behavior was attached to a model the following would happen:
$model->doReleaseTheHounds(homer, lenny); // would output ReleaseTheHounds, homer, lenny

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Behavior callbacks Model Behaviors can dene a number of callbacks that are triggered before the model callbacks of the same name. Behavior callbacks allow your behaviors to capture events in attached models and augment the parameters or splice in additional behavior. All behavior callbacks are red before the model/behavior callbacks are: beforeValidate beforeFind afterFind beforeSave afterSave beforeDelete afterDelete Creating a behavior callback class ModelBehavior Model behavior callbacks are dened as simple methods in your behavior class. Much like regular behavior methods, they receive a $Model parameter as the rst argument. This parameter is the model that the behavior method was invoked on. ModelBehavior::setup(Model $Model, array $settings = array()) Called when a behavior is attached to a model. The settings come from the attached models $actsAs property. ModelBehavior::cleanup(Model $Model) Called when a behavior is detached from a model. The base method removes model settings based on $model->alias. You can override this method and provide custom cleanup functionality. ModelBehavior::beforeFind(Model $Model, array $query) If a behaviors beforeFind returns false it will abort the nd(). Returning an array will augment the query parameters used for the nd operation. ModelBehavior::afterFind(Model $Model, mixed $results, boolean $primary) You can use the afterFind to augment the results of a nd. The return value will be passed on as the results to either the next behavior in the chain or the models afterFind. ModelBehavior::beforeDelete(Model $Model, boolean $cascade = true) You can return false from a behaviors beforeDelete to abort the delete. Return true to allow it continue. ModelBehavior::afterDelete(Model $Model) You can use afterDelete to perform clean up operations related to your behavior. ModelBehavior::beforeSave(Model $Model) You can return false from a behaviors beforeSave to abort the save. Return true to allow it continue. ModelBehavior::afterSave(Model $Model, boolean $created) You can use afterSave to perform clean up operations related to your behavior. $created will be true when a record is created, and false when a record is updated. General Purpose 227

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ModelBehavior::beforeValidate(Model $Model) You can use beforeValidate to modify a models validate array or handle any other pre-validation logic. Returning false from a beforeValidate callback will abort the validation and cause it to fail. Components Components are packages of logic that are shared between controllers. If you nd yourself wanting to copy and paste things between controllers, you might consider wrapping some functionality in a component. CakePHP also comes with a fantastic set of core components you can use to aid in: Security Sessions Access control lists Emails Cookies Authentication Request handling Pagination Each of these core components are detailed in their own chapters. For now, well show you how to create your own components. Creating components keeps controller code clean and allows you to reuse code between projects. Conguring Components Many of the core components require conguration. Some examples of components requiring conguration are Authentication, Cookie and EmailComponent. Conguration for these components, and for components in general, is usually done in the $components array or your controllers beforeFilter() method:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array( Auth => array( authorize => array(controller), loginAction => array(controller => users, action => login) ), Cookie => array(name => CookieMonster) );

Would be an example of conguring a component with the $components array. All core components allow their conguration settings to be set in this way. In addition you can congure components in your controllers beforeFilter() method. This is useful when you need to assign the results of a function to a component property. The above could also be expressed as:
public function beforeFilter() { $this->Auth->authorize = array(controller); $this->Auth->loginAction = array(controller => users, action => login);

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$this->Cookie->name = CookieMonster; }

Its possible, however, that a component requires certain conguration options to be set before the controllers beforeFilter() is run. To this end, some components allow conguration options be set in the $components array:
public $components = array( DebugKit.Toolbar => array(panels => array(history, session)) );

Consult the relevant documentation to determine what conguration options each component provides. One common setting to use is the className option, which allows you to alias components. This feature is useful when you want to replace $this->Auth or another common Component reference with a custom implementation:
// app/Controller/PostsController.php class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array( Auth => array( className => MyAuth ) ); } // app/Controller/Component/MyAuthComponent.php App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component); class MyAuthComponent extends AuthComponent { // Add your code to override the core AuthComponent }

The above would alias MyAuthComponent to $this->Auth in your controllers. Note: Aliasing a component replaces that instance anywhere that component is used, including inside other Components.

Using Components Once youve included some components in your controller, using them is pretty simple. Each component you use is exposed as a property on your controller. If you had loaded up the SessionComponent and the CookieComponent in your controller, you could access them like so:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array(Session, Cookie); public function delete() { if ($this->Post->delete($this->request->data(Post.id)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Post deleted.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } }

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Note: Since both Models and Components are added to Controllers as properties they share the same namespace. Be sure to not give a component and a model the same name.

Loading components on the y You might not need all of your components available on every controller action. In situations like this you can load a component at runtime using the Component Collection. From inside a controllers method you can do the following:
$this->OneTimer = $this->Components->load(OneTimer); $this->OneTimer->getTime();

Note: Keep in mind that loading a component on the y will not call its initialize method. If the component you are calling has this method you will need to call it manually after load.

Component Callbacks Components also offer a few request life-cycle callbacks that allow them to augment the request cycle. See the base Component API for more information on the callbacks components offer. Creating a Component Suppose our online application needs to perform a complex mathematical operation in many different parts of the application. We could create a component to house this shared logic for use in many different controllers. The rst step is to create a new component le and class. Create the le in /app/Controller/Component/MathComponent.php. The basic structure for the component would look something like this:
App::uses(Component, Controller); class MathComponent extends Component { public function doComplexOperation($amount1, $amount2) { return $amount1 + $amount2; } }

Note: All components must extend Component. Failing to do this will trigger an exception.

Including your component in your controllers Once our component is nished, we can use it in the applications controllers by placing the components name (minus the Component part) in the controllers $components array. The controller will automatically be given a new attribute named after the component, through which we can access an instance of it:
/* Make the new component available at $this->Math, as well as the standard $this->Session */ public $components = array(Math, Session);

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Components declared in AppController will be merged with those in your other controllers. So there is no need to re-declare the same component twice. When including Components in a Controller you can also declare a set of parameters that will be passed on to the Components constructor. These parameters can then be handled by the Component:
public $components = array( Math => array( precision => 2, randomGenerator => srand ), Session, Auth );

The above would pass the array containing precision and randomGenerator to MathComponent::__construct() as the second parameter. By convention, any settings that have been passed that are also public properties on your component will have the values set based on the settings. Using other Components in your Component Sometimes one of your components may need to use another component. In this case you can include other components in your component the exact same way you include them in controllers - using the $components var:
// app/Controller/Component/CustomComponent.php App::uses(Component, Controller); class CustomComponent extends Component { // the other component your component uses public $components = array(Existing); public function initialize(Controller $controller) { $this->Existing->foo(); } public function bar() { // ... } } // app/Controller/Component/ExistingComponent.php App::uses(Component, Controller); class ExistingComponent extends Component { public function foo() { // ... } }

Note that in contrast to a component included in a controller no callbacks will be triggered on an components component. Component API

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class Component The base Component class offers a few methods for lazily loading other Components through ComponentCollection as well as dealing with common handling of settings. It also provides prototypes for all the component callbacks. Component::__construct(ComponentCollection $collection, $settings = array()) Constructor for the base component class. All $settings that are also public properties will have their values changed to the matching value in $settings. Callbacks Component::initialize(Controller $controller) The initialize method is called before the controllers beforeFilter method. Component::startup(Controller $controller) The startup method is called after the controllers beforeFilter method but before the controller executes the current action handler. Component::beforeRender(Controller $controller) The beforeRender method is called after the controller executes the requested actions logic but before the controllers renders views and layout. Component::shutdown(Controller $controller) The shutdown method is called before output is sent to browser. Component::beforeRedirect(Controller $controller, $url, $status=null, $exit=true) The beforeRedirect method is invoked when the controllers redirect method is called but before any further action. If this method returns false the controller will not continue on to redirect the request. The $url, $status and $exit variables have same meaning as for the controllers method. You can also return a string which will be interpreted as the url to redirect to or return associative array with key url and optionally status and exit. Helpers Helpers are the component-like classes for the presentation layer of your application. They contain presentational logic that is shared between many views, elements, or layouts. This chapter will show you how to create your own helpers, and outline the basic tasks CakePHPs core helpers can help you accomplish. CakePHP features a number of helpers that aid in view creation. They assist in creating well-formed markup (including forms), aid in formatting text, times and numbers, and can even speed up Ajax functionality. For more information on the helpers included in CakePHP, check out Helpers. Using and Conguring Helpers You enable helpers in CakePHP by making a controller aware of them. Each controller has a $helpers property that lists the helpers to be made available in the view. To enable a helper in your view, add the name of the helper to the controllers $helpers array:
class BakeriesController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Form, Html, Js, Time); }

Adding helpers from plugins uses the plugin syntax used elsewhere in CakePHP:

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class BakeriesController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Blog.Comment); }

You can also add helpers from within an action, so they will only be available to that action and not the other actions in the controller. This saves processing power for the other actions that do not use the helper as well as help keep the controller better organized:
class BakeriesController extends AppController { public function bake { $this->helpers[] = Time; } public function mix { // The Time helper is not loaded here and thus not available } }

If you need to enable a helper for all controllers add the name of the helper to the $helpers array in /app/Controller/AppController.php (or create if not present). Remember to include the default Html and Form helpers:
class AppController extends Controller { public $helpers = array(Form, Html, Js, Time); }

You can pass options to helpers. These options can be used to set attribute values or modify behavior of a helper:
class AwesomeHelper extends AppHelper { public function __construct(View $view, $settings = array()) { parent::__construct($view, $settings); debug($settings); } } class AwesomeController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Awesome => array(option1 => value1)); }

As of 2.3 the options are merged with the Helper::$settings property of the helper. One common setting to use is the className option, which allows you to create aliased helpers in your views. This feature is useful when you want to replace $this->Html or another common Helper reference with a custom implementation:
// app/Controller/PostsController.php class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array( Html => array( className => MyHtml ) ); }

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// app/View/Helper/MyHtmlHelper.php App::uses(HtmlHelper, View/Helper); class MyHtmlHelper extends HtmlHelper { // Add your code to override the core HtmlHelper }

The above would alias MyHtmlHelper to $this->Html in your views. Note: Aliasing a helper replaces that instance anywhere that helper is used, including inside other Helpers.

Tip: Aliasing the Html or Session Helper while using the core PagesController will not work. It is better to copy lib/Cake/Controller/PagesController.php into your app/Controller/ folder. Using helper settings allows you to declaratively congure your helpers and keep conguration logic out of your controller actions. If you have conguration options that cannot be included as part of a class declaration, you can set those in your controllers beforeRender callback:
class PostsController extends AppController { public function beforeRender() { parent::beforeRender(); $this->helpers[CustomStuff] = $this->_getCustomStuffSettings(); } }

Using Helpers Once youve congured which helpers you want to use in your controller, each helper is exposed as a public property in the view. For example, if you were using the HtmlHelper you would be able to access it by doing the following:
echo $this->Html->css(styles);

The above would call the css method on the HtmlHelper. You can access any loaded helper using $this->{$helperName}. There may come a time where you need to dynamically load a helper from inside a view. You can use the views HelperCollection to do this:
$mediaHelper = $this->Helpers->load(Media, $mediaSettings);

The HelperCollection is a collection and supports the collection API used elsewhere in CakePHP. Callback methods Helpers feature several callbacks that allow you to augment the view rendering process. See the Helper API and the Collections documentation for more information. Creating Helpers If a core helper (or one showcased on github or the Bakery) doesnt t your needs, helpers are easy to create. Lets say we wanted to create a helper that could be used to output a specically crafted CSS-styled link you needed many different places in your application. In order to t your logic in to CakePHPs existing helper

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structure, youll need to create a new class in /app/View/Helper. Lets call our helper LinkHelper. The actual PHP class le would look something like this:
/* /app/View/Helper/LinkHelper.php */ App::uses(AppHelper, View/Helper); class LinkHelper extends AppHelper { public function makeEdit($title, $url) { // Logic to create specially formatted link goes here... } }

Note: Helpers must extend either AppHelper or Helper or implement all the callbacks in the Helper API .

Including other Helpers You may wish to use some functionality already existing in another helper. To do so, you can specify helpers you wish to use with a $helpers array, formatted just as you would in a controller:
/* /app/View/Helper/LinkHelper.php (using other helpers) */ App::uses(AppHelper, View/Helper); class LinkHelper extends AppHelper { public $helpers = array(Html); public function makeEdit($title, $url) { // Use the HTML helper to output // formatted data: $link = $this->Html->link($title, $url, array(class => edit)); return <div class="editOuter"> . $link . </div>; } }

Using your Helper Once youve created your helper and placed it in /app/View/Helper/, youll be able to include it in your controllers using the special variable $helpers:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Link); }

Once your controller has been made aware of this new class, you can use it in your views by accessing an object named after the helper:
<!-- make a link using the new helper --> <?php echo $this->Link->makeEdit(Change this Recipe, /recipes/edit/5); ?>

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Creating Functionality for All Helpers All helpers extend a special class, AppHelper (just like models extend AppModel and controllers extend AppController). To create functionality that would be available to all helpers, create /app/View/Helper/AppHelper.php:
App::uses(Helper, View); class AppHelper extends Helper { public function customMethod() { } }

Helper API class Helper The base class for Helpers. It provides a number of utility methods and features for loading other helpers. Helper::webroot($le) Resolve a le name to the webroot of the application. If a theme is active and the le exists in the current themes webroot, the path to the themed le will be returned. Helper::url($url, $full = false) Generates an HTML escaped URL, delegates to Router::url(). Helper::value($options = array(), $eld = null, $key = value) Get the value for a given input name. Helper::domId($options = null, $id = id) Generate a CamelCased id value for the currently selected eld. Overriding this method in your AppHelper will allow you to change how CakePHP generates ID attributes. Callbacks Helper::beforeRenderFile($viewFile) Is called before each view le is rendered. This includes elements, views, parent views and layouts. Helper::afterRenderFile($viewFile, $content) Is called after each view le is rendered. This includes elements, views, parent views and layouts. A callback can modify and return $content to change how the rendered content will be displayed in the browser. Helper::beforeRender($viewFile) The beforeRender method is called after the controllers beforeRender method but before the controller renders view and layout. Receives the le being rendered as an argument. Helper::afterRender($viewFile) Is called after the view has been rendered but before layout rendering has started. Helper::beforeLayout($layoutFile) Is called before layout rendering starts. Receives the layout lename as an argument. Helper::afterLayout($layoutFile) Is called after layout rendering is complete. Receives the layout lename as an argument.

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Core Helpers CacheHelper Used by the core to cache view content. FormHelper Creates HTML forms and form elements that self populate and handle validation problems. HtmlHelper Convenience methods for crafting well-formed markup. Images, links, tables, header tags and more. JsHelper Used to create Javascript compatible with various Javascript libraries. NumberHelper Number and currency formatting. Paginator Model data pagination and sorting. RSS Convenience methods for outputting RSS feed XML data. SessionHelper Access for reading session values in views. TextHelper Smart linking, highlighting, word smart truncation. TimeHelper Proximity detection (is this next year?), nice string formatting(Today, 10:30 am) and time zone conversion. Collections Components, Helpers, Behaviors and Tasks all share a similar structure and set of behaviors. For 2.0, they were given a unied API for interacting with collections of similar objects. The collection objects in CakePHP, give you a uniform way to interact with several different kinds of objects in your application. While the examples below, will use Components, the same behavior can be expected for Helpers, Behaviors, and Tasks in addition to Components.
Loading and unloading objects

Loading objects on every kind of collection can be done using the load() method:
$this->Prg = $this->Components->load(Prg); $this->Prg->process();

When loading a component, if the component is not currently loaded into the collection, a new instance will be created. If the component is already loaded, another instance will not be created. When loading components, you can also provide additional conguration for them:
$this->Cookie = $this->Components->load(Cookie, array(name => sweet));

Any keys & values provided will be passed to the Components constructor. The one exception to this rule is className. ClassName is a special key that is used to alias objects in a collection. This allows you to have component names that do not reect the classnames, which can be helpful when extending core components:
$this->Auth = $this->Components->load(Auth, array(className => MyCustomAuth)); $this->Auth->user(); // Actually using MyCustomAuth::user();

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The inverse of loading an object, is unloading it. Unloaded objects are removed from memory, and will not have additional callbacks triggered on them:
$this->Components->unload(Cookie); $this->Cookie->read(); // Fatal error.

Triggering callbacks

Callbacks are supported by collection objects. When a collection has a callback triggered, that method will be called on all enabled objects in the collection. You can pass parameters to the callback loop as well:
$this->Behaviors->trigger(afterFind, array($this, $results, $primary));

In the above $viewFile would be passed as the rst argument to every helpers beforeRender method. There are several options that can be used to control how callbacks are red: breakOn Set to the value or values you want the callback propagation to stop on. Can either be a scalar value, or an array of values to break on. Defaults to false. break Set to true to enabled breaking. When a trigger is broken, the last returned value will be returned. If used in combination with collectReturn the collected results will be returned. Defaults to false. collectReturn Set to true to collect the return of each object into an array. This array of return values will be returned from the trigger() call. Defaults to false. triggerDisabled Will trigger the callback on all objects in the collection even the non-enabled objects. Defaults to false. modParams Allows each object the callback gets called on to modify the parameters to the next object. Setting modParams to an integer value will allow you to modify the parameter with that index. Any non-null value will modify the parameter index indicated. Defaults to false. Canceling a callback loop Using the break and breakOn options you can cancel a callback loop midway similar to stopping event propagation in JavaScript:
$this->Behaviors->trigger( beforeFind, array($this, $query), array(break => true, breakOn => false), );

In the above example, if any behavior returns false from its beforeFind method, no further callbacks will be called. In addition, the return of trigger() will be false.
Enabling and disabling objects

Once an object is loaded into a collection you may need to disable it. Disabling an object in a collection prevents future callbacks from being red on that object unless the triggerDisabled option is used:

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// Disable the HtmlHelper $this->Helpers->disable(Html); // Re-enable the helper later on $this->Helpers->enable(Html);

Disabled objects can still have their normal methods and properties used. The primary difference between an enabled and disabled object is with regards to callbacks. You can interrogate a collection about the enabled objects, or check if a specic object is still enabled using enabled():
// Check whether or not a specific helper is enabled. $this->Helpers->enabled(Html); // $enabled will contain an array of helper currently enabled. $enabled = $this->Helpers->enabled();

Object callback priorities

You can prioritize the triggering object callbacks similar to event callbacks. The handling of priority values and order of triggering is the same as explained here. Heres how you can specify priority at declaration time:
class SomeController { public $components = array( Foo, //Foo gets default priority 10 Bar => array(priority => 9) //Bars callbacks are triggered before Foos ); public $helpers = array( Cache => array(priority => 12), //Caches callbacks will be triggered last Asset, Utility //Utility has priority 10 same as Asset and its callbacks are trigger //after Assets ); }

class Post { public $actsAs = array( DoFirst => array(priority => 1), Media ); }

When dynamically loading objects to a collection you can specify the priority like this:
$this->MyComponent = $this->Components->load(MyComponent, array(priority => 9));

You can also change priorities at run time using the ObjectCollection::setPriority() function:

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//For a single object $this->Components->setPriority(Foo, 2); //For multiple objects $this->Behaviors->setPriority(array(Object1 => 8, Object2 => 9));

Behaviors
Behaviors add extra functionality to your models. CakePHP comes with a number of built-in behaviors such as TreeBehavior and ContainableBehavior. To learn about creating and using behaviors, read the section on Behaviors.

Behaviors
ACL class AclBehavior The Acl behavior provides a way to seamlessly integrate a model with your ACL system. It can create both AROs or ACOs transparently. To use the new behavior, you can add it to the $actsAs property of your model. When adding it to the actsAs array you choose to make the related Acl entry an ARO or an ACO. The default is to create ACOs:
class User extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Acl => array(type => requester)); }

This would attach the Acl behavior in ARO mode. To join the ACL behavior in ACO mode use:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Acl => array(type => controlled)); }

For User and Group models it is common to have both ACO and ARO nodes, to achieve this use:
class User extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Acl => array(type => both)); }

You can also attach the behavior on the y like so:

$this->Post->Behaviors->load(Acl, array(type => controlled));

Changed in version 2.1: You can now safely attach AclBehavior to AppModel. Aco, Aro and AclNode now extend Model instead of AppModel, which would cause an innite loop. If your application depends on having those models to extend AppModel for some reason, then copy AclNode to your application and have it extend AppModel again.

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Using the AclBehavior

Most of the AclBehavior works transparently on your Models afterSave(). However, using it requires that your Model has a parentNode() method dened. This is used by the AclBehavior to determine parent->child relationships. A models parentNode() method must return null or return a parent Model reference:
public function parentNode() { return null; }

If you want to set an ACO or ARO node as the parent for your Model, parentNode() must return the alias of the ACO or ARO node:
public function parentNode() { return root_node; }

A more complete example. Using an example User Model, where User belongsTo Group:
public function parentNode() { if (!$this->id && empty($this->data)) { return null; } $data = $this->data; if (empty($this->data)) { $data = $this->read(); } if (!$data[User][group_id]) { return null; } else { return array(Group => array(id => $data[User][group_id])); } }

In the above example the return is an array that looks similar to the results of a model nd. It is important to have the id value set or the parentNode relation will fail. The AclBehavior uses this data to construct its tree structure.
node()

The AclBehavior also allows you to retrieve the Acl node associated with a model record. After setting $model->id. You can use $model->node() to retrieve the associated Acl node. You can also retrieve the Acl Node for any row, by passing in a data array:
$this->User->id = 1; $node = $this->User->node(); $user = array(User => array( id => 1 )); $node = $this->User->node($user);

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Will both return the same Acl Node information. If you had setup AclBehavior to create both ACO and ARO nodes, you need to specify which node type you want:
$this->User->id = 1; $node = $this->User->node(null, Aro); $user = array(User => array( id => 1 )); $node = $this->User->node($user, Aro);

Containable class ContainableBehavior A new addition to the CakePHP 1.2 core is the ContainableBehavior. This model behavior allows you to lter and limit model nd operations. Using Containable will help you cut down on needless wear and tear on your database, increasing the speed and overall performance of your application. The class will also help you search and lter your data for your users in a clean and consistent way. Containable allows you to streamline and simplify operations on your model bindings. It works by temporarily or permanently altering the associations of your models. It does this by using supplied the containments to generate a series of bindModel and unbindModel calls. Since Containable only modies existing relationships it will not allow you to restrict results by distant associations. Instead you should refer to Joining tables. To use the new behavior, you can add it to the $actsAs property of your model:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Containable); }

You can also attach the behavior on the y:

$this->Post->Behaviors->load(Containable);

Using Containable

To see how Containable works, lets look at a few examples. First, well start off with a nd() call on a model named Post. Lets say that Post hasMany Comment, and Post hasAndBelongsToMany Tag. The amount of data fetched in a normal nd() call is rather extensive:
debug($this->Post->find(all)); [0] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1

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[title] => First article [content] => aaa [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) [Comment] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 1 [post_id] => 1 [author] => Daniel [email] => [email protected] [website] => http://example.com [comment] => First comment [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 2 [post_id] => 1 [author] => Sam [email] => [email protected] [website] => http://example.net [comment] => Second comment [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) ) [Tag] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 1 [name] => Awesome ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 2 [name] => Baking ) ) ) [1] => Array ( [Post] => Array (...

For some interfaces in your application, you may not need that much information from the Post model. One thing the ContainableBehavior does is help you cut down on what nd() returns. For example, to get only the post-related information, you can do the following:
$this->Post->contain(); $this->Post->find(all);

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You can also invoke Containables magic from inside the nd() call:
$this->Post->find(all, array(contain => false));

Having done that, you end up with something a lot more concise:
[0] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => First article [content] => aaa [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) ) [1] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 2 [title] => Second article [content] => bbb [created] => 2008-05-19 00:00:00 ) )

This sort of help isnt new: in fact, you can do that without the ContainableBehavior doing something like this:
$this->Post->recursive = -1; $this->Post->find(all);

Containable really shines when you have complex associations, and you want to pare down things that sit at the same level. The models $recursive property is helpful if you want to hack off an entire level of recursion, but not when you want to pick and choose what to keep at each level. Lets see how it works by using the contain() method. The contain methods rst argument accepts the name, or an array of names, of the models to keep in the nd operation. If we wanted to fetch all posts and their related tags (without any comment information), wed try something like this:
$this->Post->contain(Tag); $this->Post->find(all);

Again, we can use the contain key inside a nd() call:

$this->Post->find(all, array(contain => Tag));

Without Containable, youd end up needing to use the unbindModel() method of the model, multiple times if youre paring off multiple models. Containable creates a cleaner way to accomplish this same task.

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Containing deeper associations

Containable also goes a step deeper: you can lter the data of the associated models. If you look at the results of the original nd() call, notice the author eld in the Comment model. If you are interested in the posts and the names of the comment authors and nothing else you could do something like the following:
$this->Post->contain(Comment.author); $this->Post->find(all); // or.. $this->Post->find(all, array(contain => Comment.author));

Here, weve told Containable to give us our post information, and just the author eld of the associated Comment model. The output of the nd call might look something like this:
[0] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => First article [content] => aaa [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) [Comment] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [author] => Daniel [post_id] => 1 ) [1] => Array ( [author] => Sam [post_id] => 1 ) ) ) [1] => Array (...

As you can see, the Comment arrays only contain the author eld (plus the post_id which is needed by CakePHP to map the results). You can also lter the associated Comment data by specifying a condition:
$this->Post->contain(Comment.author = "Daniel"); $this->Post->find(all); //or...

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$this->Post->find(all, array(contain => Comment.author = "Daniel"));

This gives us a result that gives us posts with comments authored by Daniel:
[0] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => First article [content] => aaa [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) [Comment] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 1 [post_id] => 1 [author] => Daniel [email] => [email protected] [website] => http://example.com [comment] => First comment [created] => 2008-05-18 00:00:00 ) ) )

Additional ltering can be performed by supplying the standard nd options:

$this->Post->find(all, array(contain => array( Comment => array( conditions => array(Comment.author = => "Daniel"), order => Comment.created DESC ) )));

Heres an example of using the ContainableBehavior when youve got deep and complex model relationships. Lets consider the following model associations:
User->Profile User->Account->AccountSummary User->Post->PostAttachment->PostAttachmentHistory->HistoryNotes User->Post->Tag

This is how we retrieve the above associations with Containable:

$this->User->find(all, array( contain => array( Profile, Account => array( AccountSummary

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), Post => array( PostAttachment => array( fields => array(id, name), PostAttachmentHistory => array( HistoryNotes => array( fields => array(id, note) ) ) ), Tag => array( conditions => array(Tag.name LIKE => %happy%) ) ) ) ));

Keep in mind that contain key is only used once in the main model, you dont need to use contain again for related models Note: When using elds and contain options - be careful to include all foreign keys that your query directly or indirectly requires. Please also note that because Containable must to be attached to all models used in containment, you may consider attaching it to your AppModel.

ContainableBehavior options

The ContainableBehavior has a number of options that can be set when the Behavior is attached to a model. The settings allow you to ne tune the behavior of Containable and work with other behaviors more easily. recursive (boolean, optional) set to true to allow containable to automatically determine the recursiveness level needed to fetch specied models, and set the model recursiveness to this level. setting it to false disables this feature. The default value is true. notices (boolean, optional) issues E_NOTICES for bindings referenced in a containable call that are not valid. The default value is true. autoFields: (boolean, optional) auto-add needed elds to fetch requested bindings. The default value is true. You can change ContainableBehavior settings at run time by reattaching the behavior as seen in Behaviors (Using Behaviors). ContainableBehavior can sometimes cause issues with other behaviors or queries that use aggregate functions and/or GROUP BY statements. If you get invalid SQL errors due to mixing of aggregate and nonaggregate elds, try disabling the autoFields setting.:
$this->Post->Behaviors->load(Containable, array(autoFields => false));

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Using Containable with pagination By including the contain parameter in the $paginate property it will apply to both the nd(count) and the nd(all) done on the model. See the section Using Containable for further details. Heres an example of how to contain associations when paginating:
$this->paginate[User] = array( contain => array(Profile, Account), order => User.username ); $users = $this->paginate(User);

Translate class TranslateBehavior TranslateBehavior is actually quite easy to setup and works out of the box with very little conguration. In this section, you will learn how to add and setup the behavior to use in any model. If you are using TranslateBehavior in alongside containable issue, be sure to set the elds key for your queries. Otherwise you could end up with invalid SQL generated.
Initializing the i18n Database Tables

You can either use the CakePHP console or you can manually create it. It is advised to use the console for this, because it might happen that the layout changes in future versions of CakePHP. Sticking to the console will make sure that you have the correct layout.:
./cake i18n

Select [I] which will run the i18n database initialization script. You will be asked if you want to drop any existing and if you want to create it. Answer with yes if you are sure there is no i18n table already, and answer with yes again to create the table.
Attaching the Translate Behavior to your Models

Add it to your model by using the $actsAs property like in the following example.:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate ); }

This will do nothing yet, because it expects a couple of options before it begins to work. You need to dene which elds of the current model should be tracked in the translation table weve created in the rst step.

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Dening the Fields

You can set the elds by simply extending the Translate value with another array, like so:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate => array( fieldOne, fieldTwo, and_so_on ) ); }

After you have done that (for example putting title as one of the elds) you already nished the basic setup. Great! According to our current example the model should now look something like this:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate => array( title ) ); }

When dening elds for TranslateBehavior to translate, be sure to omit those elds from the translated models schema. If you leave the elds in, there can be issues when retrieving data with fallback locales.
Conclusion

From now on each record update/creation will cause TranslateBehavior to copy the value of title to the translation table (default: i18n) along with the current locale. A locale is the identier of the language, so to speak.
Reading translated content

By default the TranslateBehavior will automatically fetch and add in data based on the current locale. The current locale is read from Configure::read(Config.language) which is assigned by the L10n class. You can override this default on the y using $Model->locale. Retrieve translated elds in a specic locale By setting $Model->locale you can read translations for a specic locale:
// Read the spanish locale data. $this->Post->locale = es; $results = $this->Post->find(first, array( conditions => array(Post.id => $id) )); // $results will contain the spanish translation.

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Retrieve all translation records for a eld If you want to have all translation records attached to the current model record you simply extend the eld array in your behavior setup as shown below. The naming is completely up to you.:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate => array( title => titleTranslation ) ); }

With this setup the result of $this->Post->find() should look something like this:
Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => Beispiel Eintrag [body] => lorem ipsum... [locale] => de_de ) [titleTranslation] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 1 [locale] => en_us [model] => Post [foreign_key] => 1 [field] => title [content] => Example entry ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 2 [locale] => de_de [model] => Post [foreign_key] => 1 [field] => title [content] => Beispiel Eintrag ) ) )

Note: The model record contains a virtual eld called locale. It indicates which locale is used in this result. Note that only elds of the model you are directly doing nd on will be translated. Models attached via as250 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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sociations wont be translated because triggering callbacks on associated models is currently not supported. Using the bindTranslation method You can also retrieve all translations, only when you need them, using the bindTranslation method TranslateBehavior::bindTranslation($elds, $reset) $fields is a named-key array of eld and association name, where the key is the translatable eld and the value is the fake association name.:

$this->Post->bindTranslation(array(title => titleTranslation)); $this->Post->find(all, array(recursive => 1)); // need at least recursive 1 for this to

With this setup the result of your nd() should look something like this:
Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => Beispiel Eintrag [body] => lorem ipsum... [locale] => de_de ) [titleTranslation] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 1 [locale] => en_us [model] => Post [foreign_key] => 1 [field] => title [content] => Example entry ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 2 [locale] => de_de [model] => Post [foreign_key] => 1 [field] => title [content] => Beispiel Eintrag ) ) )

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Saving in another language

You can force the model which is using the TranslateBehavior to save in a language other than the on detected. To tell a model in what language the content is going to be you simply change the value of the $locale property on the model before you save the data to the database. You can do that either in your controller or you can dene it directly in the model. Example A: In your controller:
class PostsController extends AppController { public function add() { if (!empty($this->request->data)) { $this->Post->locale = de_de; // we are going to save the german version $this->Post->create(); if ($this->Post->save($this->request->data)) { $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } } } }

Example B: In your model:

class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate => array( title ) ); // Option 1) just define the property directly public $locale = en_us; // Option 2) create a simple method public function setLanguage($locale) { $this->locale = $locale; } }

Multiple Translation Tables

If you expect a lot entries you probably wonder how to deal with a rapidly growing database table. There are two properties introduced by TranslateBehavior that allow to specify which Model to bind as the model containing the translations. These are $translateModel and $translateTable. Lets say we want to save our translations for all posts in the table post_i18ns instead of the default i18n table. To do so you need to setup your model like this:

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class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate => array( title ) ); // Use a different model (and table) public $translateModel = PostI18n; }

Note: It is important that you to pluralize the table. It is now a usual model and can be treated as such and thus comes with the conventions involved. The table schema itself must be identical with the one generated by the CakePHP console script. To make sure it ts one could just initialize a empty i18n table using the console and rename the table afterwards.

Create the TranslateModel For this to work you need to create the actual model le in your models folder. Reason is that there is no property to set the displayField directly in the model using this behavior yet. Make sure that you change the $displayField to field.:
class PostI18n extends AppModel { public $displayField = field; // important } // filename: PostI18n.php

Thats all it takes. You can also add all other model stuff here like $useTable. But for better consistency we could do that in the model which actually uses this translation model. This is where the optional $translateTable comes into play. Changing the Table If you want to change the name of the table you simply dene $translateTable in your model, like so:
class Post extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array( Translate => array( title ) ); // Use a different model public $translateModel = PostI18n; // Use a different table for translateModel public $translateTable = post_translations; }

Please note that you cant use $translateTable alone.

If you dont intend to use a custom

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$translateModel then leave this property untouched. Reason is that it would break your setup and show you a Missing Table message for the default I18n model which is created in runtime. Tree class TreeBehavior Its fairly common to want to store hierarchical data in a database table. Examples of such data might be categories with unlimited subcategories, data related to a multilevel menu system or a literal representation of hierarchy such as is used to store access control objects with ACL logic. For small trees of data, or where the data is only a few levels deep it is simple to add a parent_id eld to your database table and use this to keep track of which item is the parent of what. Bundled with cake however, is a powerful behavior which allows you to use the benets of MPTT logic (http://www.sitepoint.com/hierarchical-data-database-2/) without worrying about any of the intricacies of the technique - unless you want to ;).
Requirements

To use the tree behavior, your database table needs 3 elds as listed below (all are ints): parent - default eldname is parent_id, to store the id of the parent object left - default eldname is lft, to store the lft value of the current row. right - default eldname is rght, to store the rght value of the current row. If you are familiar with MPTT logic you may wonder why a parent eld exists - quite simply its easier to do certain tasks if a direct parent link is stored on the database - such as nding direct children. Note: The parent eld must be able to have a NULL value! It might seem to work if you just give the top elements a parent value of zero, but reordering the tree (and possible other operations) will fail.

Basic Usage

The tree behavior has a lot packed into it, but lets start with a simple example - create the following database table and put some data in it:
CREATE TABLE categories ( id INTEGER(10) UNSIGNED NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, parent_id INTEGER(10) DEFAULT NULL, lft INTEGER(10) DEFAULT NULL, rght INTEGER(10) DEFAULT NULL, name VARCHAR(255) DEFAULT , PRIMARY KEY (id) );

INSERT INTO categories (id, name, parent_id, lft, rght) VALUES(1, My Categorie INSERT INTO categories (id, name, parent_id, lft, rght) VALUES(2, Fun, 1, 2,

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INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT INSERT

INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO INTO

categories categories categories categories categories categories categories categories categories categories categories categories categories

(id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id, (id,

name, name, name, name, name, name, name, name, name, name, name, name, name,

parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id, parent_id,

lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft, lft,

rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght) rght)

VALUES(3, Sport, 2, 3 VALUES(4, Surfing, 3, VALUES(5, Extreme knit VALUES(6, Friends, 2, VALUES(7, Gerald, 6, VALUES(8, Gwendolyn, VALUES(9, Work, 1, 16 VALUES(10, Reports, 9 VALUES(11, Annual, 10 VALUES(12, Status, 10 VALUES(13, Trips, 9, VALUES(14, National, VALUES(15, Internation

For the purpose of checking that everything is setup correctly, we can create a test method and output the contents of our category tree to see what it looks like. With a simple controller:
class CategoriesController extends AppController { public function index() { $data = $this->Category->generateTreeList(null, null, null, &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;); debug($data); die; } }

and an even simpler model denition:

// app/Model/Category.php class Category extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Tree); }

We can check what our category tree data looks like by visiting /categories You should see something like this: My Categories Fun * Sport Surng Extreme knitting * Friends Gerald Gwendolyn Work * Reports Annual

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Status * Trips National International Adding data In the previous section, we used existing data and checked that it looked hierarchal via the method generateTreeList. However, usually you would add your data in exactly the same way as you would for any model. For example:
// pseudo controller code $data[Category][parent_id] = 3; $data[Category][name] = Skating; $this->Category->save($data);

When using the tree behavior its not necessary to do any more than set the parent_id, and the tree behavior will take care of the rest. If you dont set the parent_id, the tree behavior will add to the tree making your new addition a new top level entry:
// pseudo controller code $data = array(); $data[Category][name] = Other People\s Categories; $this->Category->save($data);

Running the above two code snippets would alter your tree as follows: My Categories Fun * Sport Surng Extreme knitting Skating New * Friends Gerald Gwendolyn Work * Reports Annual Status * Trips National

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International Other Peoples Categories New Modifying data Modifying data is as transparent as adding new data. If you modify something, but do not change the parent_id eld - the structure of your data will remain unchanged. For example:
// pseudo controller code $this->Category->id = 5; // id of Extreme knitting $this->Category->save(array(name => Extreme fishing));

The above code did not affect the parent_id eld - even if the parent_id is included in the data that is passed to save if the value doesnt change, neither does the data structure. Therefore the tree of data would now look like: My Categories Fun Sport Surng Extreme shing Updated Skating Friends Gerald Gwendolyn Work Reports Annual Status Trips National International Other Peoples Categories Moving data around in your tree is also a simple affair. Lets say that Extreme shing does not belong under Sport, but instead should be located under Other Peoples Categories. With the following code:

// pseudo controller code $this->Category->id = 5; // id of Extreme fishing $newParentId = $this->Category->field(id, array(name => Other People\s Categories)); $this->Category->save(array(parent_id => $newParentId));

As would be expected the structure would be modied to:

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My Categories Fun Sport * Surng * Skating Friends * Gerald * Gwendolyn Work Reports * Annual * Status Trips * National * International Other Peoples Categories Extreme shing Moved Deleting data The tree behavior provides a number of ways to manage deleting data. To start with the simplest example; lets say that the reports category is no longer useful. To remove it and any children it may have just call delete as you would for any model. For example with the following code:
// pseudo controller code $this->Category->id = 10; $this->Category->delete();

The category tree would be modied as follows: My Categories Fun Sport * Surng * Skating Friends * Gerald * Gwendolyn

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Work Trips * National * International Other Peoples Categories Extreme shing Querying and using your data Using and manipulating hierarchical data can be a tricky business. In addition to the core nd methods, with the tree behavior there are a few more tree-orientated permutations at your disposal. Note: Most tree behavior methods return and rely on data being sorted by the lft eld. If you call find() and do not order by lft, or call a tree behavior method and pass a sort order, you may get undesirable results. class TreeBehavior children($id = null, $direct = false, $elds = null, $order = null, $limit = null, $page = 1, $recursive = null) Parameters $id The ID of the record to look up $direct Set to true to return only the direct descendants $elds Single string eld name or array of elds to include in the return $order SQL string of ORDER BY conditions $limit SQL LIMIT statement $page for accessing paged results $recursive Number of levels deep for recursive associated Models The children method takes the primary key value (the id) of a row and returns the children, by default in the order they appear in the tree. The second optional parameter denes whether or not only direct children should be returned. Using the example data from the previous section:
$allChildren = $this->Category->children(1); // a flat array with 11 items // -- or -$this->Category->id = 1; $allChildren = $this->Category->children(); // a flat array with 11 items // Only return direct children $directChildren = $this->Category->children(1, true); // a flat array with 2 items

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Note: If you want a recursive array use find(threaded) childCount($id = null, $direct = false) As with the method children, childCount takes the primary key value (the id) of a row and returns how many children it has. The second optional parameter denes whether or not only direct children are counted. Using the example data from the previous section:
$totalChildren = $this->Category->childCount(1); // will output 11 // -- or -$this->Category->id = 1; $directChildren = $this->Category->childCount(); // will output 11 // Only counts the direct descendants of this category $numChildren = $this->Category->childCount(1, true); // will output 2

generateTreeList($conditions=null, $keyPath=null, $valuePath=null, $spacer= _, $recursive=null) Parameters $conditions Uses the same conditional options as nd(). $keyPath Path to the eld to use for the key. $valuePath Path to the eld to use for the label. $spacer The string to use in front of each item to indicate depth. $recursive The number of levels deep to fetch associated records This method will return data similar to nd(list), with an indented prex to show the structure of your data. Below is an example of what you can expect this method to return:
$treelist = $this->Category->generateTreeList();

Output:
array( [1] => [2] => [3] => [4] => [16] => [6] => [7] => [8] => [9] => [13] => [14] => [15] => [17] => "My Categories", "_Fun", "__Sport", "___Surfing", "___Skating", "__Friends", "___Gerald", "___Gwendolyn", "_Work", "__Trips", "___National", "___International", "Other Peoples Categories",

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[5] => )

"_Extreme fishing"

getParentNode() This convenience function will, as the name suggests, return the parent node for any node, or false if the node has no parent (its the root node). For example:
$parent = $this->Category->getParentNode(2); //<- id for fun // $parent contains All categories

getPath($id = null, $elds = null, $recursive = null) The path when referring to hierarchal data is how you get from where you are to the top. So for example the path from the category International is: My Categories ... Work Trips *... *International Using the id of International getPath will return each of the parents in turn (starting from the top).:
$parents = $this->Category->getPath(15); // contents array( [0] => [1] => [2] => [3] => ) of $parents array(Category array(Category array(Category array(Category => => => => array(id array(id array(id array(id => => => => 1, name => My Categories, ..)), 9, name => Work, ..)), 13, name => Trips, ..)), 15, name => International, ..)),

Advanced Usage

The tree behavior doesnt only work in the background, there are a number of specic methods dened in the behavior to cater for all your hierarchical data needs, and any unexpected problems that might arise in the process. TreeBehavior::moveDown() Used to move a single node down the tree. You need to provide the ID of the element to be moved and a positive number of how many positions the node should be moved down. All child nodes for the specied node will also be moved. Here is an example of a controller action (in a controller named Categories) that moves a specied node down the tree: Behaviors 261

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public function movedown($id = null, $delta = null) { $this->Category->id = $id; if (!$this->Category->exists()) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid category)); }

if ($delta > 0) { $this->Category->moveDown($this->Category->id, abs($delta)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Please provide the number of positions the field sho } $this->redirect(array(action => index), null, true); }

For example, if youd like to move the Sport ( id of 3 ) category one position down, you would request: /categories/movedown/3/1. TreeBehavior::moveUp() Used to move a single node up the tree. You need to provide the ID of the element to be moved and a positive number of how many positions the node should be moved up. All child nodes will also be moved. Heres an example of a controller action (in a controller named Categories) that moves a node up the tree:
public function moveup($id = null, $delta = null) { $this->Category->id = $id; if (!$this->Category->exists()) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid category)); }

if ($delta > 0) { $this->Category->moveUp($this->Category->id, abs($delta)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Please provide a number of positions the category sh } $this->redirect(array(action => index), null, true); }

For example, if you would like to move the category Gwendolyn ( id of 8 ) up one position you would request /categories/moveup/8/1. Now the order of Friends will be Gwendolyn, Gerald. TreeBehavior::removeFromTree($id = null, $delete = false) Using this method will either delete or move a node but retain its sub-tree, which will be reparented one level higher. It offers more control than delete, which for a model using the tree behavior will remove the specied node and all of its children. Taking the following tree as a starting point: My Categories

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Fun * Sport Surng Extreme knitting Skating Running the following code with the id for Sport:
$this->Node->removeFromTree($id);

The Sport node will be become a top level node: My Categories Fun * Surng * Extreme knitting * Skating Sport Moved This demonstrates the default behavior of removeFromTree of moving the node to have no parent, and re-parenting all children. If however the following code snippet was used with the id for Sport:
$this->Node->removeFromTree($id, true);

The tree would become My Categories Fun * Surng * Extreme knitting * Skating This demonstrates the alternate use for removeFromTree, the children have been reparented and Sport has been deleted. TreeBehavior::reorder(array(id => null, eld => $Model->displayField, order => ASC, verify => true)) Reorders the nodes (and child nodes) of the tree according to the eld and direction specied in the parameters. This method does not change the parent of any node.:

$model->reorder(array( id => , //id of record to use as top node for reordering, default: $Model->id field => , //which field to use in reordering, default: $Model->displayField order => , //direction to order, default: ASC

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verify => ));

//whether or not to verify the tree before reorder, default: true

Note: If you have saved your data or made other operations on the model, you might want to set $model->id = null before calling reorder. Otherwise only the current node and its children will be reordered.

Data Integrity

Due to the nature of complex self referential data structures such as trees and linked lists, they can occasionally become broken by a careless call. Take heart, for all is not lost! The Tree Behavior contains several previously undocumented features designed to recover from such situations. TreeBehavior::recover($mode = parent, $missingParentAction = null) The mode parameter is used to specify the source of info that is valid/correct. The opposite source of data will be populated based upon that source of info. E.g. if the MPTT elds are corrupt or empty, with the $mode parent the values of the parent_id eld will be used to populate the left and right elds. The missingParentAction parameter only applies to parent mode and determines what to do if the parent eld contains an id that is not present. Available $mode options: parent - use the existing parent_ids to update the lft and rght elds tree - use the existing lft and rght elds to update parent_id Available missingParentActions options when using mode=parent: null - do nothing and carry on return - do nothing and return delete - delete the node int - set the parent_id to this id Example:
// Rebuild all the left and right fields based on the parent_id $this->Category->recover(); // or $this->Category->recover(parent); // Rebuild all the parent_ids based on the lft and rght fields $this->Category->recover(tree);

TreeBehavior::reorder($options = array()) Reorders the nodes (and child nodes) of the tree according to the eld and direction specied in the parameters. This method does not change the parent of any node.

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Reordering affects all nodes in the tree by default, however the following options can affect the process: id - only reorder nodes below this node. field - eld to use for sorting, default is the displayField for the model. order - ASC for ascending, DESC for descending sort. verify - whether or not to verify the tree prior to resorting. $options is used to pass all extra parameters, and has the following possible keys by default, all of which are optional:
array( id => null, field => $model->displayField, order => ASC, verify => true )

TreeBehavior::verify() Returns true if the tree is valid otherwise an array of errors, with elds for type, incorrect index and message. Each record in the output array is an array of the form (type, id, message) type is either index or node id is the id of the erroneous node. message depends on the error Example Use:
$this->Category->verify();

Example output:
Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => [1] => [2] => ) [1] => Array ( [0] => [1] => [2] => ) [10] => Array ( [0] =>

node 3 left and right values identical

node 2 The parent node 999 doesn t exist

index

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[1] => 123 [2] => missing ) [99] => Array ( [0] => node [1] => 163 [2] => left greater than right ) )

Components
CakePHP has a selection of components to help take care of basic tasks in your controllers. See the section on Components for how to congure and use components.

Components
Access Control Lists class AclComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) CakePHPs access control list functionality is one of the most oft-discussed, most likely because it is the most sought after, but also because it can be the most confusing. If youre looking for a good way to get started with ACLs in general, read on. Be brave and stick with it, even if the going gets rough. Once you get the hang of it, its an extremely powerful tool to have on hand when developing your application.
Understanding How ACL Works

Powerful things require access control. Access control lists are a way to manage application permissions in a ne-grained, yet easily maintainable and manageable way. Access control lists, or ACL, handle two main things: things that want stuff, and things that are wanted. In ACL lingo, things (most often users) that want to use stuff are called access request objects, or AROs. Things in the system that are wanted (most often actions or data) are called access control objects, or ACOs. The entities are called objects because sometimes the requesting object isnt a person - sometimes you might want to limit the access certain Cake controllers have to initiate logic in other parts of your application. ACOs could be anything you want to control, from a controller action, to a web service, to a line on your grandmas online diary. To review: ACO - Access Control Object - Something that is wanted ARO - Access Request Object - Something that wants something

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Essentially, ACL is what is used to decide when an ARO can have access to an ACO. In order to help you understand how everything works together, lets use a semi-practical example. Imagine, for a moment, a computer system used by a familiar group of fantasy novel adventurers from the Lord of the Rings. The leader of the group, Gandalf, wants to manage the partys assets while maintaining a healthy amount of privacy and security for the other members of the party. The rst thing he needs to do is create a list of the AROs involved: Gandalf Aragorn Bilbo Frodo Gollum Legolas Gimli Pippin Merry Note: Realize that ACL is not the same as authentication. ACL is what happens after a user has been authenticated. Although the two are usually used in concert, its important to realize the difference between knowing who someone is (authentication) and knowing what they can do (ACL). The next thing Gandalf needs to do is make an initial list of things, or ACOs, the system will handle. His list might look something like: Weapons The One Ring Salted Pork Diplomacy Ale Traditionally, systems were managed using a sort of matrix, that showed a basic set of users and permissions relating to objects. If this information were stored in a table, it might look like the following table:

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x Gandalf Aragorn Bilbo Frodo Gollum Legolas Gimli Pippin Merry

Weapons Allow

The Ring

Salted Pork Allow Allow

Diplomacy Allow Allow

Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow

Ale Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow Allow

At rst glance, it seems that this sort of system could work rather well. Assignments can be made to protect security (only Frodo can access the ring) and protect against accidents (keeping the hobbits out of the salted pork and weapons). It seems ne grained enough, and easy enough to read, right? For a small system like this, maybe a matrix setup would work. But for a growing system, or a system with a large amount of resources (ACOs) and users (AROs), a table can become unwieldy rather quickly. Imagine trying to control access to the hundreds of war encampments and trying to manage them by unit. Another drawback to matrices is that you cant really logically group sections of users or make cascading permissions changes to groups of users based on those logical groupings. For example, it would sure be nice to automatically allow the hobbits access to the ale and pork once the battle is over: Doing it on an individual user basis would be tedious and error prone. Making a cascading permissions change to all hobbits would be easy. ACL is most usually implemented in a tree structure. There is usually a tree of AROs and a tree of ACOs. By organizing your objects in trees, permissions can still be dealt out in a granular fashion, while still maintaining a good grip on the big picture. Being the wise leader he is, Gandalf elects to use ACL in his new system, and organizes his objects along the following lines: Fellowship of the Ring Warriors * Aragorn * Legolas * Gimli Wizards * Gandalf Hobbits * Frodo * Bilbo * Merry * Pippin Visitors * Gollum 268 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Using a tree structure for AROs allows Gandalf to dene permissions that apply to entire groups of users at once. So, using our ARO tree, Gandalf can tack on a few group-based permissions: Fellowship of the Ring (Deny: all) Warriors (Allow: Weapons, Ale, Elven Rations, Salted Pork) * Aragorn * Legolas * Gimli Wizards (Allow: Salted Pork, Diplomacy, Ale) * Gandalf Hobbits (Allow: Ale) * Frodo * Bilbo * Merry * Pippin Visitors (Allow: Salted Pork) * Gollum If we wanted to use ACL to see if the Pippin was allowed to access the ale, wed rst get his path in the tree, which is Fellowship->Hobbits->Pippin. Then we see the different permissions that reside at each of those points, and use the most specic permission relating to Pippin and the Ale. ARO Node Fellowship of the Ring Hobbits Pippin Permission Info Deny all Allow ale Result Denying access to ale. Allowing access to ale! Still allowing ale!

Note: Since the Pippin node in the ACL tree doesnt specically deny access to the ale ACO, the nal result is that we allow access to that ACO. The tree also allows us to make ner adjustments for more granular control - while still keeping the ability to make sweeping changes to groups of AROs: Fellowship of the Ring (Deny: all) Warriors (Allow: Weapons, Ale, Elven Rations, Salted Pork) * Aragorn (Allow: Diplomacy) * Legolas * Gimli Wizards (Allow: Salted Pork, Diplomacy, Ale) * Gandalf Components 269

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Hobbits (Allow: Ale) * Frodo (Allow: Ring) * Bilbo * Merry (Deny: Ale) * Pippin (Allow: Diplomacy) Visitors (Allow: Salted Pork) * Gollum This approach allows us both the ability to make wide-reaching permissions changes, but also ne-grained adjustments. This allows us to say that all hobbits can have access to ale, with one exceptionMerry. To see if Merry can access the Ale, wed nd his path in the tree: Fellowship->Hobbits->Merry and work our way down, keeping track of ale-related permissions: ARO Node Fellowship of the Ring Hobbits Merry Permission Info Deny all Allow ale Deny Ale Result Denying access to ale. Allowing access to ale! Denying ale.

Dening Permissions: Cakes INI-based ACL

Cakes rst ACL implementation was based on INI les stored in the Cake installation. While its useful and stable, we recommend that you use the database backed ACL solution, mostly because of its ability to create new ACOs and AROs on the y. We meant it for usage in simple applications - and especially for those folks who might not be using a database for some reason. By default, CakePHPs ACL is database-driven. To enable INI-based ACL, youll need to tell CakePHP what system youre using by updating the following lines in app/Cong/core.php
// Change these lines: Configure::write(Acl.classname, DbAcl); Configure::write(Acl.database, default); // To look like this: Configure::write(Acl.classname, IniAcl); //Configure::write(Acl.database, default);

ARO/ACO permissions are specied in /app/Cong/acl.ini.php. The basic idea is that AROs are specied in an INI section that has three properties: groups, allow, and deny. groups: names of ARO groups this ARO is a member of. allow: names of ACOs this ARO has access to deny: names of ACOs this ARO should be denied access to ACOs are specied in INI sections that only include the allow and deny properties. As an example, lets see how the Fellowship ARO structure weve been crafting would look like in INI syntax: 270 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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;------------------------------------; AROs ;------------------------------------[aragorn] groups = warriors allow = diplomacy [legolas] groups = warriors [gimli] groups = warriors [gandalf] groups = wizards [frodo] groups = hobbits allow = ring [bilbo] groups = hobbits [merry] groups = hobbits deny = ale [pippin] groups = hobbits [gollum] groups = visitors ;------------------------------------; ARO Groups ;------------------------------------[warriors] allow = weapons, ale, salted_pork [wizards] allow = salted_pork, diplomacy, ale [hobbits] allow = ale [visitors] allow = salted_pork

Now that youve got your permissions dened, you can skip along to the section on checking permissions using the ACL component.

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Dening Permissions: Cakes Database ACL

Now that weve covered INI-based ACL permissions, lets move on to the (more commonly used) database ACL. Getting Started The default ACL permissions implementation is database powered. Cakes database ACL consists of a set of core models, and a console application that comes with your Cake installation. The models are used by Cake to interact with your database in order to store and retrieve nodes in tree format. The console application is used to initialize your database and interact with your ACO and ARO trees. To get started, rst youll need to make sure your /app/Config/database.php is present and correctly congured. See section 4.1 for more information on database conguration. Once youve done that, use the CakePHP console to create your ACL database tables:
$ cake schema create DbAcl

Running this command will drop and re-create the tables necessary to store ACO and ARO information in tree format. The output of the console application should look something like the following:
--------------------------------------------------------------Cake Schema Shell --------------------------------------------------------------The following tables will be dropped. acos aros aros_acos Are you sure you want to drop the tables? (y/n) [n] > y Dropping tables. acos updated. aros updated. aros_acos updated. The following tables will be created. acos aros aros_acos Are you sure you want to create the tables? (y/n) [y] > y Creating tables. acos updated. aros updated. aros_acos updated. End create.

Note: This replaces an older deprecated command, initdb.

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You can also use the SQL le found in app/Config/Schema/db_acl.sql, but thats nowhere near as fun. When nished, you should have three new database tables in your system: acos, aros, and aros_acos (the join table to create permissions information between the two trees). Note: If youre curious about how Cake stores tree information in these tables, read up on modied database tree traversal. The ACL component uses CakePHPs Tree to manage the trees inheritances. The model class les for ACL can be found in lib/Cake/Model/. Now that were all set up, lets work on creating some ARO and ACO trees. Creating Access Request Objects (AROs) and Access Control Objects (ACOs) In creating new ACL objects (ACOs and AROs), realize that there are two main ways to name and access nodes. The rst method is to link an ACL object directly to a record in your database by specifying a model name and foreign key value. The second method can be used when an object has no direct relation to a record in your database you can provide a textual alias for the object. Note: In general, when youre creating a group or higher level object, use an alias. If youre managing access to a specic item or record in the database, use the model/foreign key method. You create new ACL objects using the core CakePHP ACL models. In doing so, there are a number of elds youll want to use when saving data: model, foreign_key, alias, and parent_id. The model and foreign_key elds for an ACL object allows you to link up the object to its corresponding model record (if there is one). For example, many AROs will have corresponding User records in the database. Setting an AROs foreign_key to the Users ID will allow you to link up ARO and User information with a single User model nd() call if youve set up the correct model associations. Conversely, if you want to manage edit operation on a specic blog post or recipe listing, you may choose to link an ACO to that specic model record. The alias for an ACL object is just a human-readable label you can use to identify an ACL object that has no direct model record correlation. Aliases are usually useful in naming user groups or ACO collections. The parent_id for an ACL object allows you to ll out the tree structure. Supply the ID of the parent node in the tree to create a new child. Before we can create new ACL objects, well need to load up their respective classes. The easiest way to do this is to include Cakes ACL Component in your controllers $components array:
public $components = array(Acl);

Once weve got that done, lets see what some examples of creating these objects might look like. The following code could be placed in a controller action somewhere: Note: While the examples here focus on ARO creation, the same techniques can be used to create an ACO tree.

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Keeping with our Fellowship setup, lets rst create our ARO groups. Because our groups wont really have specic records tied to them, well use aliases to create these ACL objects. What were doing here is from the perspective of a controller action, but could be done elsewhere. What well cover here is a bit of an articial approach, but you should feel comfortable using these techniques to build AROs and ACOs on the y. This shouldnt be anything drastically new - were just using models to save data like we always do:
public function any_action() { $aro = $this->Acl->Aro; // Heres all of our group info in an array we can iterate through $groups = array( 0 => array( alias => warriors ), 1 => array( alias => wizards ), 2 => array( alias => hobbits ), 3 => array( alias => visitors ), ); // Iterate and create ARO groups foreach ($groups as $data) { // Remember to call create() when saving in loops... $aro->create(); // Save data $aro->save($data); } // Other action logic goes here... }

Once weve got them in there, we can use the ACL console application to verify the tree structure.
$ cake acl view aro Aro tree: --------------------------------------------------------------[1]warriors [2]wizards [3]hobbits [4]visitors ---------------------------------------------------------------

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I suppose its not much of a tree at this point, but at least weve got some verication that weve got four top-level nodes. Lets add some children to those ARO nodes by adding our specic user AROs under these groups. Every good citizen of Middle Earth has an account in our new system, so well tie these ARO records to specic model records in our database. Note: When adding child nodes to a tree, make sure to use the ACL node ID, rather than a foreign_key value.
public function any_action() { $aro = new Aro(); // Here are our user records, ready to be linked up to new ARO records // This data could come from a model and modified, but were using static // arrays here for demonstration purposes. $users = array( 0 => array( alias => Aragorn, parent_id => 1, model => User, foreign_key => 2356, ), 1 => array( alias => Legolas, parent_id => 1, model => User, foreign_key => 6342, ), 2 => array( alias => Gimli, parent_id => 1, model => User, foreign_key => 1564, ), 3 => array( alias => Gandalf, parent_id => 2, model => User, foreign_key => 7419, ), 4 => array( alias => Frodo, parent_id => 3, model => User, foreign_key => 7451, ), 5 => array( alias => Bilbo, parent_id => 3, model => User, foreign_key => 5126, ),

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6 => array( alias => Merry, parent_id => 3, model => User, foreign_key => 5144, ), 7 => array( alias => Pippin, parent_id => 3, model => User, foreign_key => 1211, ), 8 => array( alias => Gollum, parent_id => 4, model => User, foreign_key => 1337, ), ); // Iterate and create AROs (as children) foreach ($users as $data) { // Remember to call create() when saving in loops... $aro->create(); //Save data $aro->save($data); } // Other action logic goes here... }

Note: Typically you wont supply both an alias and a model/foreign_key, but were using both here to make the structure of the tree easier to read for demonstration purposes. The output of that console application command should now be a little more interesting. Lets give it a try:
$ cake acl view aro Aro tree: --------------------------------------------------------------[1]warriors [5]Aragorn [6]Legolas [7]Gimli [2]wizards

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[8]Gandalf [3]hobbits [9]Frodo [10]Bilbo [11]Merry [12]Pippin [4]visitors [13]Gollum ---------------------------------------------------------------

Now that weve got our ARO tree setup properly, lets discuss a possible approach for structuring an ACO tree. While we can structure more of an abstract representation of our ACOs, its often more practical to model an ACO tree after Cakes Controller/Action setup. Weve got ve main objects were handling in this Fellowship scenario, and the natural setup for that in a Cake application is a group of models, and ultimately the controllers that manipulate them. Past the controllers themselves, well want to control access to specic actions in those controllers. Based on that idea, lets set up an ACO tree that will mimic a Cake app setup. Since we have ve ACOs, well create an ACO tree that should end up looking something like the following: Weapons Rings PorkChops DiplomaticEfforts Ales One nice thing about a Cake ACL setup is that each ACO automatically contains four properties related to CRUD (create, read, update, and delete) actions. You can create children nodes under each of these ve main ACOs, but using Cakes built in action management covers basic CRUD operations on a given object. Keeping this in mind will make your ACO trees smaller and easier to maintain. Well see how these are used later on when we discuss how to assign permissions. Since youre now a pro at adding AROs, use those same techniques to create this ACO tree. Create these upper level groups using the core Aco model. Assigning Permissions After creating our ACOs and AROs, we can nally assign permissions between the two groups. This is done using Cakes core Acl component. Lets continue on with our example. Here well work in the context of a controller action. We do that because permissions are managed by the Acl Component.

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class SomethingsController extends AppController { // You might want to place this in the AppController // instead, but here works great too. public $components = array(Acl); }

Lets set up some basic permissions using the AclComponent in an action inside this controller.
public function index() { // Allow warriors complete access to weapons // Both these examples use the alias syntax $this->Acl->allow(warriors, Weapons); // Though the King may not want to let everyone // have unfettered access $this->Acl->deny(warriors/Legolas, Weapons, delete); $this->Acl->deny(warriors/Gimli, Weapons, delete); die(print_r(done, 1)); }

The rst call we make to the AclComponent allows any user under the warriors ARO group full access to anything under the Weapons ACO group. Here were just addressing ACOs and AROs by their aliases. Notice the usage of the third parameter? Thats where we use those handy actions that are in-built for all Cake ACOs. The default options for that parameter are create, read, update, and delete but you can add a column in the aros_acos database table (prexed with _ - for example _admin) and use it alongside the defaults. The second set of calls is an attempt to make a more ne-grained permission decision. We want Aragorn to keep his full-access privileges, but deny other warriors in the group the ability to delete Weapons records. Were using the alias syntax to address the AROs above, but you might want to use the model/foreign key syntax yourself. What we have above is equivalent to this:
// 6342 = Legolas // 1564 = Gimli $this->Acl->deny(array(model => User, foreign_key => 6342), Weapons, delete); $this->Acl->deny(array(model => User, foreign_key => 1564), Weapons, delete);

Note: Addressing a node using the alias syntax uses a slash-delimited string (/users/employees/developers). Addressing a node using model/foreign key syntax uses an array with two parameters: array(model => User, foreign_key => 8282). The next section will help us validate our setup by using the AclComponent to check the permissions weve just set up. Checking Permissions: The ACL Component Lets use the AclComponent to make sure dwarves and elves cant remove things from the armory. At this point, we should be able to use the AclComponent to 278 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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make a check between the ACOs and AROs weve created. The basic syntax for making a permissions check is:
$this->Acl->check($aro, $aco, $action = *);

Lets give it a try inside a controller action:

public function index() { // These all return true: $this->Acl->check(warriors/Aragorn, $this->Acl->check(warriors/Aragorn, $this->Acl->check(warriors/Aragorn, $this->Acl->check(warriors/Aragorn, $this->Acl->check(warriors/Aragorn,

Weapons); Weapons, create); Weapons, read); Weapons, update); Weapons, delete);

// Remember, we can use the model/id syntax // for our user AROs $this->Acl->check(array(User => array(id => 2356)), Weapons); // These also return true: $result = $this->Acl->check(warriors/Legolas, Weapons, create); $result = $this->Acl->check(warriors/Gimli, Weapons, read); // But these return false: $result = $this->Acl->check(warriors/Legolas, Weapons, delete); $result = $this->Acl->check(warriors/Gimli, Weapons, delete); }

The usage here is demonstrational, but hopefully you can see how checking like this can be used to decide whether or not to allow something to happen, show an error message, or redirect the user to a login. Authentication class AuthComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) Identifying, authenticating and authorizing users is a common part of almost every web application. In CakePHP AuthComponent provides a pluggable way to do these tasks. AuthComponent allows you to combine authentication objects, and authorization objects to create exible ways of identifying and checking user authorization.
Authentication

Authentication is the process of identifying users by provided credentials and ensuring that users are who they say they are. Generally this is done through a username and password, that are checked against a known list of users. In CakePHP, there are several built in ways of authenticating users stored in your application. FormAuthenticate allows you to authenticate users based on form POST data. Usually this is a login form that users enter information into. BasicAuthenticate allows you to authenticate users using Basic HTTP authentication. DigestAuthenticate allows you to authenticate users using Digest HTTP authentication. Components 279

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By default AuthComponent uses FormAuthenticate. Choosing an Authentication type Generally youll want to offer form based authentication. It is the easiest for users using a web-browser to use. If you are building an API or webservice, you may want to consider basic authentication or digest authentication. The key differences between digest and basic authentication are mostly related to how passwords are handled. In basic authentication, the username and password are transmitted as plain-text to the server. This makes basic authentication un-suitable for applications without SSL, as you would end up exposing sensitive passwords. Digest authentication uses a digest hash of the username, password, and a few other details. This makes digest authentication more appropriate for applications without SSL encryption. You can also use authentication systems like openid as well, however openid is not part of CakePHP core. Conguring Authentication handlers You congure authentication handlers using $this->Auth->authenticate. You can congure one or many handlers for authentication. Using multiple handlers allows you to support different ways of logging users in. When logging users in, authentication handlers are checked in the order they are declared. Once one handler is able to identify the user, no other handlers will be checked. Conversely you can halt all authentication by throwing an exception. You will need to catch any thrown exceptions, and handle them as needed. You can congure authentication handlers in your controllers beforeFilter or, in the $components array. You can pass conguration information into each authentication object, using an array:
// Basic setup $this->Auth->authenticate = array(Form); // Pass settings in $this->Auth->authenticate = array( Basic => array(userModel => Member), Form => array(userModel => Member) );

In the second example youll notice that we had to declare the userModel key twice. To help you keep your code DRY, you can use the all key. This special key allows you to set settings that are passed to every attached object. The all key is also exposed as AuthComponent::ALL:
// Pass settings in using all $this->Auth->authenticate = array( AuthComponent::ALL => array(userModel => Member), Basic, Form );

In the above example, both Form and Basic will get the settings dened for the all key. Any settings passed to a specic authentication object will override the matching key in the all key. The core authentication objects support the following conguration keys. fields The elds to use to identify a user by. userModel The model name of the User, defaults to User.

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scope Additional conditions to use when looking up and authenticating users, array(User.is_active => 1). contain Containable options for when the user record is loaded. New in version 2.2. passwordHasher Password hasher class. Defaults to Simple. New in version 2.4. To congure different elds for user in $components array:
// Pass settings in $components array public $components = array( Auth => array( authenticate => array( Form => array( fields => array(username => email) ) ) ) );

i.e.

Do not put other Auth conguration keys (like authError, loginAction etc) within the authenticate or Form element. They should be at the same level as the authenticate key. The setup above with other Auth conguration should look like:
// Pass settings in $components array public $components = array( Auth => array( loginAction => array( controller => users, action => login, plugin => users ), authError => Did you really think you are allowed to see that?, authenticate => array( Form => array( fields => array(username => email) ) ) ) );

In addition to the common conguration, Basic authentication supports the following keys: realm The realm being authenticated. Defaults to env(SERVER_NAME). In addition to the common conguration Digest authentication supports the following keys: realm The realm authentication is for, Defaults to the servername. nonce A nonce used for authentication. Defaults to uniqid(). qop Defaults to auth, no other values are supported at this time. opaque A string that must md5($settings[realm]) be returned unchanged by clients. Defaults to

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Identifying users and logging them in In the past AuthComponent auto-magically logged users in. This was confusing for many people, and made using AuthComponent a bit difcult at times. For 2.0, youll need to manually call $this->Auth->login() to log a user in. When authenticating users, attached authentication objects are checked in the order they are attached. Once one of the objects can identify the user, no other objects are checked. A sample login function for working with a login form could look like:

public function login() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { if ($this->Auth->login()) { return $this->redirect($this->Auth->redirectUrl()); // Prior to 2.3 use return $this->redirect($this->Auth->redirect()); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(__(Username or password is incorrect), default, ar } } }

The above code (without any data passed to the login method), will attempt to log a user in using the POST data, and if successful redirect the user to either the last page they were visiting, or AuthComponent::$loginRedirect. If the login is unsuccessful, a ash message is set. Warning: In 2.x $this->Auth->login($this->request->data) will log the user in with whatever data is posted, whereas in 1.3 $this->Auth->login($this->data) would try to identify the user rst and only log in when successful.

Using Digest and Basic Authentication for logging in Because basic and digest authentication dont require an initial POST or a form so if using only basic / digest authenticators you dont require a login action in your controller. Also you can set AuthComponent::$sessionKey to false to ensure AuthComponent doesnt try to read user info from session. Stateless authentication will re-verify the users credentials on each request, this creates a small amount of additional overhead, but allows clients that to login in without using cookies. Note: Prior to 2.4 you still need the login action as you are redirected to login when an unauthenticated user tries to access a protected page even when using only basic or digest auth. Also setting AuthComponent::$sessionKey to false will cause an error prior to 2.4.

Creating Custom Authentication objects Because authentication objects are pluggable, you can create custom authentication objects in your application or plugins. If for example you wanted to create an OpenID authentication object. In app/Controller/Component/Auth/OpenidAuthenticate.php you could put the following:
App::uses(BaseAuthenticate, Controller/Component/Auth); class OpenidAuthenticate extends BaseAuthenticate { public function authenticate(CakeRequest $request, CakeResponse $response) { // Do things for OpenID here.

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// Return an array of user if they could authenticate the user, // return false if not } }

Authentication objects should return false if they cannot identify the user. And an array of user information if they can. Its not required that you extend BaseAuthenticate, only that your authentication object implements an authenticate() method. The BaseAuthenticate class provides a number of helpful methods that are commonly used. You can also implement a getUser() method if your authentication object needs to support stateless or cookie-less authentication. See the sections on basic and digest authentication below for more information. Using custom authentication objects Once youve created your custom authentication object, you can use them by including them in AuthComponents authenticate array:
$this->Auth->authenticate = array( Openid, // app authentication object. AuthBag.Combo, // plugin authentication object. );

Creating stateless authentication systems Authentication objects can implement a getUser() method that can be used to support user login systems that dont rely on cookies. A typical getUser method looks at the request/environment and uses the information there to conrm the identity of the user. HTTP Basic authentication for example uses $_SERVER[PHP_AUTH_USER] and $_SERVER[PHP_AUTH_PW] for the username and password elds. On each request, these values are used to re-identify the user and ensure they are valid user. As with authentication objects authenticate() method the getUser() method should return an array of user information on success or false on failure.:
public function getUser($request) { $username = env(PHP_AUTH_USER); $pass = env(PHP_AUTH_PW); if (empty($username) || empty($pass)) { return false; } return $this->_findUser($username, $pass); }

The above is how you could implement getUser method for HTTP basic authentication. The _findUser() method is part of BaseAuthenticate and identies a user based on a username and password. Handling unauthenticated requests When an unauthenticated user tries to access a protected page rst the unauthenticated() method of the last authenticator in the chain is called. The authenticate object can handle sending response or redirection as appropriate and return true to indicate no further action is necessary. Due to this the order in which you specify the authenticate object in AuthComponent::$authenticate property matters.

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If authenticator returns null, AuthComponent redirects user to login action. If its an ajax request and AuthComponent::$ajaxLogin is specied that element is rendered else a 403 http status code is returned. Note: Prior to 2.4 the authenticate objects do not provide an unauthenticated() method.

Displaying auth related ash messages In order to display the session error messages that Auth generates, you need to add the following code to your layout. Add the following two lines to the app/View/Layouts/default.ctp le in the body section preferable before the content_for_layout line.:
echo $this->Session->flash(); echo $this->Session->flash(auth);

You can customize the error messages, and ash settings AuthComponent uses. Using $this->Auth->flash you can congure the parameters AuthComponent uses for setting ash messages. The available keys are element - The element to use, defaults to default. key - The key to use, defaults to auth params - The array of additional params to use, defaults to array() In addition to the ash message settings you can customize other error messages AuthComponent uses. In your controllers beforeFilter, or component settings you can use authError to customize the error used for when authorization fails:

$this->Auth->authError = "This error shows up with the user tries to access a part of the w

Changed in version 2.4: Sometimes, you want to display the authorization error only after the user has already logged-in. You can suppress this message by setting its value to boolean false In your controllers beforeFilter(), or component settings:
if (!$this->Auth->loggedIn()) { $this->Auth->authError = false; }

Hashing passwords AuthComponent no longer automatically hashes every password it can nd. This was removed because it made a number of common tasks like validation difcult. You should never store plain text passwords, and before saving a user record you should always hash the password. As of 2.4 the generation and checking of password hashes has been delegated to password hasher classes. Authenticating objects use a new setting passwordHasher which species the password hasher class to use. It can be a string specifying class name or an array with key className stating the class name and any extra keys will be passed to password hasher constructor as cong. The default hasher class Simple can be used for sha1, sha256, md5 hashing. By default the hash type set in Security class will be used. You can use specic hash type like this:

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public $components = array( Auth => array( authenticate => array( Form => array( passwordHasher => array( className => Simple, hashType => sha256 ) ) ) ) );

When creating new user records you can hash a password in the beforeSave callback of your model using appropriate password hasher class:
App::uses(SimplePasswordHasher, Controller/Component/Auth);

class User extends AppModel { public function beforeSave($options = array()) { if (!$this->id) { $passwordHasher = new SimplePasswordHasher(); $this->data[User][password] = $passwordHasher->hash($this->data[User][pa } return true; } }

You dont need to hash passwords before calling $this->Auth->login(). The various authentication objects will hash passwords individually. Using bcrypt for passwords In CakePHP 2.3 the BlowfishAuthenticate class was introduced to allow using bcrypt (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bcrypt) a.k.a Blowsh for hash passwords. Bcrypt hashes are much harder to brute force than passwords stored with sha1. But BlowfishAuthenticate has been deprecated in 2.4 and instead BlowfishPasswordHasher has been added. A blowsh password hasher can be used with any authentication class. All you have to do with specify passwordHasher setting for the authenticating object:
public $components = array( Auth => array( authenticate => array( Form => array( passwordHasher => Blowfish ) ) ) );

Hashing passwords for digest authentication Because Digest authentication requires a password hashed in the format dened by the RFC, in order to correctly hash a password for use with Digest authentication Components 285

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you should use the special password hashing function on DigestAuthenticate. If you are going to be combining digest authentication with any other authentication strategies, its also recommended that you store the digest password in a separate column, from the normal password hash:

class User extends AppModel { public function beforeSave($options = array()) { // make a password for digest auth. $this->data[User][digest_hash] = DigestAuthenticate::password( $this->data[User][username], $this->data[User][password], env(SERVER_N ); return true; } }

Passwords for digest authentication need a bit more information than other password hashes, based on the RFC for digest authentication. Note: The third parameter of DigestAuthenticate::password() must match the realm cong value dened when DigestAuthentication was congured in AuthComponent::$authenticate. This defaults to env(SCRIPT_NAME). You may wish to use a static string if you want consistent hashes in multiple environments.

Creating custom password hasher classes Custom password hasher classes need to extend the AbstractPasswordHasher class and need to implement the abstract methods hash() and check(). In app/Controller/Component/Auth/CustomPasswordHasher.php you could put the following:
App::uses(CustomPasswordHasher, Controller/Component/Auth); class CustomPasswordHasher extends AbstractPasswordHasher { public function hash($password) { // stuff here } public function check($password, $hashedPassword) { // stuff here } }

Manually logging users in Sometimes the need arises where you need to manually log a user in, such as just after they registered for your application. You can do this by calling $this->Auth->login() with the user data you want to login:

public function register() { if ($this->User->save($this->request->data)) { $id = $this->User->id; $this->request->data[User] = array_merge($this->request->data[User], array(id $this->Auth->login($this->request->data[User]); $this->redirect(/users/home);

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} }

Warning: Be sure to manually add the new User id to the array passed to the login method. Otherwise you wont have the user id available.

Accessing the logged in user Once a user is logged in, you will often need some particular information about the current user. You can access the currently logged in user using AuthComponent::user(). This method is static, and can be used globally after the AuthComponent has been loaded. You can access it both as an instance method or as a static method:
// Use anywhere AuthComponent::user(id) // From inside a controller $this->Auth->user(id);

Logging users out Eventually youll want a quick way to de-authenticate someone, and redirect them to where they need to go. This method is also useful if you want to provide a Log me out link inside a members area of your application:
public function logout() { $this->redirect($this->Auth->logout()); }

Logging out users that logged in with Digest or Basic auth is difcult to accomplish for all clients. Most browsers will retain credentials for the duration they are still open. Some clients can be forced to logout by sending a 401 status code. Changing the authentication realm is another solution that works for some clients.
Authorization

Authorization is the process of ensuring that an identied/authenticated user is allowed to access the resources they are requesting. If enabled AuthComponent can automatically check authorization handlers and ensure that logged in users are allowed to access the resources they are requesting. There are several built-in authorization handlers, and you can create custom ones for your application, or as part of a plugin. ActionsAuthorize Uses the AclComponent to check for permissions on an action level. CrudAuthorize Uses the AclComponent and action -> CRUD mappings to check permissions for resources. ControllerAuthorize Calls isAuthorized() on the active controller, and uses the return of that to authorize a user. This is often the most simple way to authorize users. Conguring Authorization handlers You congure authorization handlers using $this->Auth->authorize. You can congure one or many handlers for authorization. Using Components 287

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multiple handlers allows you to support different ways of checking authorization. When authorization handlers are checked, they will be called in the order they are declared. Handlers should return false, if they are unable to check authorization, or the check has failed. Handlers should return true if they were able to check authorization successfully. Handlers will be called in sequence until one passes. If all checks fail, the user will be redirected to the page they came from. Additionally you can halt all authorization by throwing an exception. You will need to catch any thrown exceptions, and handle them. You can congure authorization handlers in your controllers beforeFilter or, in the $components array. You can pass conguration information into each authorization object, using an array:
// Basic setup $this->Auth->authorize = array(Controller); // Pass settings in $this->Auth->authorize = array( Actions => array(actionPath => controllers/), Controller );

Much like Auth->authenticate, Auth->authorize, helps you keep your code DRY, by using the all key. This special key allows you to set settings that are passed to every attached object. The all key is also exposed as AuthComponent::ALL:
// Pass settings in using all $this->Auth->authorize = array( AuthComponent::ALL => array(actionPath => controllers/), Actions, Controller );

In the above example, both the Actions and Controller will get the settings dened for the all key. Any settings passed to a specic authorization object will override the matching key in the all key. The core authorize objects support the following conguration keys. actionPath Used by ActionsAuthorize to locate controller action ACOs in the ACO tree. actionMap Action -> CRUD mappings. Used by CrudAuthorize and authorization objects that want to map actions to CRUD roles. userModel The name of the ARO/Model node user information can be found under. Used with ActionsAuthorize. Creating Custom Authorize objects Because authorize objects are pluggable, you can create custom authorize objects in your application or plugins. If for example you wanted to create an LDAP authorize object. In app/Controller/Component/Auth/LdapAuthorize.php you could put the following:
App::uses(BaseAuthorize, Controller/Component/Auth); class LdapAuthorize extends BaseAuthorize { public function authorize($user, CakeRequest $request) { // Do things for ldap here. } }

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Authorize objects should return false if the user is denied access, or if the object is unable to perform a check. If the object is able to verify the users access, true should be returned. Its not required that you extend BaseAuthorize, only that your authorize object implements an authorize() method. The BaseAuthorize class provides a number of helpful methods that are commonly used. Using custom authorize objects Once youve created your custom authorize object, you can use them by including them in your AuthComponents authorize array:
$this->Auth->authorize = array( Ldap, // app authorize object. AuthBag.Combo, // plugin authorize object. );

Using no authorization If youd like to not use any of the built-in authorization objects, and want to handle things entirely outside of AuthComponent you can set $this->Auth->authorize = false;. By default AuthComponent starts off with authorize = false. If you dont use an authorization scheme, make sure to check authorization yourself in your controllers beforeFilter, or with another component. Making actions public There are often times controller actions that you wish to remain entirely public, or that dont require users to be logged in. AuthComponent is pessimistic, and defaults to denying access. You can mark actions as public actions by using AuthComponent::allow(). By marking actions as public, AuthComponent, will not check for a logged in user, nor will authorize objects be checked:
// Allow all actions. CakePHP 2.0 $this->Auth->allow(*); // Allow all actions. CakePHP 2.1 $this->Auth->allow(); // Allow only the view and index actions. $this->Auth->allow(view, index); // Allow only the view and index actions. $this->Auth->allow(array(view, index));

Warning: If youre using scaffolding, allow all will not identify and allow the scaffolded methods. You have to specify their action names. You can provide as many action names as you need to allow(). You can also supply an array containing all the action names. Making actions require authorization By default all actions require authorization. However, after making actions public, you want to revoke the public access. You can do so using AuthComponent::deny():

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// remove one action $this->Auth->deny(add); // remove all the actions. $this->Auth->deny(); // remove a group of actions. $this->Auth->deny(add, edit); $this->Auth->deny(array(add, edit));

You can provide as many action names as you need to deny(). You can also supply an array containing all the action names. Using ControllerAuthorize ControllerAuthorize allows you to handle authorization checks in a controller callback. This is ideal when you have very simple authorization, or you need to use a combination of models + components to do your authorization, and dont want to create a custom authorize object. The callback is always called isAuthorized() and it should return a boolean as to whether or not the user is allowed to access resources in the request. The callback is passed the active user, so it can be checked:
class AppController extends Controller { public $components = array( Auth => array(authorize => Controller), ); public function isAuthorized($user = null) { // Any registered user can access public functions if (empty($this->request->params[admin])) { return true; } // Only admins can access admin functions if (isset($this->request->params[admin])) { return (bool)($user[role] === admin); } // Default deny return false; } }

The above callback would provide a very simple authorization system where, only users with role = admin could access actions that were in the admin prex. Using ActionsAuthorize ActionsAuthorize integrates with the AclComponent, and provides a ne grained per action ACL check on each request. ActionsAuthorize is often paired with DbAcl to give dynamic and exible permission systems that can be edited by admin users through the application. It can however, be combined with other Acl implementations such as IniAcl and custom application Acl backends. Using CrudAuthorize CrudAuthorize integrates with AclComponent, and provides the ability to map requests to CRUD operations. Provides the ability to authorize using CRUD mappings. These mapped 290 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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results are then checked in the AclComponent as specic permissions. For example, taking /posts/index as the current request. The default mapping for index, is a read permission check. The Acl check would then be for the posts controller with the read permission. This allows you to create permission systems that focus more on what is being done to resources, rather than the specic actions being visited. Mapping actions when using CrudAuthorize When using CrudAuthorize or any other authorize objects that use action mappings, it might be necessary to map additional methods. You can map actions -> CRUD permissions using mapAction(). Calling this on AuthComponent will delegate to all the of the congured authorize objects, so you can be sure the settings were applied every where:
$this->Auth->mapActions(array( create => array(register), view => array(show, display) ));

The keys for mapActions should be the CRUD permissions you want to set, while the values should be an array of all the actions that are mapped to the CRUD permission.
AuthComponent API

AuthComponent is the primary interface to the built-in authorization and authentication mechanics in CakePHP. property AuthComponent::$ajaxLogin The name of an optional view element to render when an Ajax request is made with an invalid or expired session. property AuthComponent::$authenticate Set to an array of Authentication objects you want to use when logging users in. There are several core authentication objects, see the section on Authentication. property AuthComponent::$authError Error to display when user attempts to access an object or action to which they do not have access. Changed in version 2.4: You can suppress authError message from being displayed by setting this value to boolean false. property AuthComponent::$authorize Set to an array of Authorization objects you want to use when authorizing users on each request, see the section on Authorization. property AuthComponent::$components Other components utilized by AuthComponent property AuthComponent::$flash Settings to use when Auth needs to do a ash message with SessionComponent::setFlash(). Available keys are: element - The element to use, defaults to default. key - The key to use, defaults to auth Components 291

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params - The array of additional params to use, defaults to array() property AuthComponent::$loginAction A URL (dened as a string or array) to the controller action that handles logins. Defaults to /users/login property AuthComponent::$loginRedirect The URL (dened as a string or array) to the controller action users should be redirected to after logging in. This value will be ignored if the user has an Auth.redirect value in their session. property AuthComponent::$logoutRedirect The default action to redirect to after the user is logged out. While AuthComponent does not handle post-logout redirection, a redirect URL will be returned from AuthComponent::logout(). Defaults to AuthComponent::$loginAction. property AuthComponent::$unauthorizedRedirect Controls handling of unauthorized access. By default unauthorized user is redirected to the referrer url or AuthComponent::$loginAction or /. If set to false a ForbiddenException exception is thrown instead of redirecting. property AuthComponent::$request Request object property AuthComponent::$response Response object property AuthComponent::$sessionKey The session key name where the record of the current user is stored. If unspecied, it will be Auth.User. AuthComponent::allow($action[, $action, ... ]) Set one or more actions as public actions, this means that no authorization checks will be performed for the specied actions. The special value of * will mark all the current controllers actions as public. Best used in your controllers beforeFilter method. AuthComponent::constructAuthenticate() Loads the congured authentication objects. AuthComponent::constructAuthorize() Loads the authorization objects congured. AuthComponent::deny($action[, $action, ... ]) Toggle one more more actions previously declared as public actions, as non-public methods. These methods will now require authorization. Best used inside your controllers beforeFilter method. AuthComponent::flash($message) Set a ash message. Uses the Session component, and values from AuthComponent::$flash. AuthComponent::identify($request, $response) Parameters $request (CakeRequest) The request to use. $response (CakeResponse) The response to use, headers can be sent if authentication fails. 292 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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This method is used by AuthComponent to identify a user based on the information contained in the current request. AuthComponent::initialize($Controller) Initializes AuthComponent for use in the controller. AuthComponent::isAuthorized($user = null, $request = null) Uses the congured Authorization adapters to check whether or not a user is authorized. Each adapter will be checked in sequence, if any of them return true, then the user will be authorized for the request. AuthComponent::loggedIn() Returns true if the current client is a logged in user, or false if they are not. AuthComponent::login($user) Parameters $user (array) Array of logged in user data. Takes an array of user data to login with. Allows for manual logging of users. Calling user() will populate the session value with the provided information. If no user is provided, AuthComponent will try to identify a user using the current request information. See AuthComponent::identify() AuthComponent::logout() Returns A string url to redirect the logged out user to. Logs out the current user. AuthComponent::mapActions($map = array()) Maps action names to CRUD operations. Used for controller-based authentication. Make sure to congure the authorize property before calling this method. As it delegates $map to all the attached authorize objects. static AuthComponent::password($pass) Deprecated since version 2.4. AuthComponent::redirect($url = null) Deprecated since version 2.3. AuthComponent::redirectUrl($url = null) If no parameter is passed, gets the authentication redirect URL. Pass a url in to set the destination a user should be redirected to upon logging in. Will fallback to AuthComponent::$loginRedirect if there is no stored redirect value. New in version 2.3. AuthComponent::shutdown($Controller) Component shutdown. If user is logged in, wipe out redirect. AuthComponent::startup($Controller) Main execution method. Handles redirecting of invalid users, and processing of login form data. static AuthComponent::user($key = null) Parameters Components 293

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$key (string) The user data key you want to fetch. If null, all user data will be returned. Can also be called as an instance method. Get data concerning the currently logged in user, you can use a property key to fetch specic data about the user:
$id = $this->Auth->user(id);

If the current user is not logged in or the key doesnt exist, null will be returned. Cookie class CookieComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) The CookieComponent is a wrapper around the native PHP setcookie method. It also includes a host of delicious icing to make coding cookies in your controllers very convenient. Before attempting to use the CookieComponent, you must make sure that Cookie is listed in your controllers $components array.
Controller Setup

There are a number of controller variables that allow you to congure the way cookies are created and managed. Dening these special variables in the beforeFilter() method of your controller allows you to dene how the CookieComponent works. Cookie variable string $name string $key dedescription fault Cake- The name of the cookie. Cookie null This string is used to encrypt the value written to the cookie. This string should be random and difcult to guess. When using rijndael encryption this value must be longer than 32 bytes. string The domain name allowed to access the cookie. e.g. Use .yourdomain.com to $domain allow access from all your subdomains. int or 5 The time when your cookie will expire. Integers are Interpreted as seconds and a string Days value of 0 is equivalent to a session cookie: i.e. the cookie expires when the $time browser is closed. If a string is set, this will be interpreted with PHP function strtotime(). You can set this directly within the write() method. string / The server path on which the cookie will be applied. If $path is set to /foo/, the $path cookie will only be available within the /foo/ directory and all sub-directories such as /foo/bar/ of your domain. The default value is the entire domain. You can set this directly within the write() method. boolean false Indicates that the cookie should only be transmitted over a secure HTTPS $secure connection. When set to true, the cookie will only be set if a secure connection exists. You can set this directly within the write() method. boolean false Set to true to make HTTP only cookies. Cookies that are HTTP only are not $httpOnly accessible in Javascript. The following snippet of controller code shows how to include the CookieComponent and set up the controller variables needed to write a cookie named baker_id for the domain example.com which needs a 294 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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secure connection, is available on the path /bakers/preferences/, expires in one hour and is HTTP only:
public $components = array(Cookie); public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); $this->Cookie->name = baker_id; $this->Cookie->time = 3600; // or 1 hour $this->Cookie->path = /bakers/preferences/; $this->Cookie->domain = example.com; $this->Cookie->secure = true; // i.e. only sent if using secure HTTPS $this->Cookie->key = qSI232qs*&sXOw!adre@34SAv!@*(XSL#$%)asGb$@11~_+!@#HKis~#^; $this->Cookie->httpOnly = true; }

Next, lets look at how to use the different methods of the Cookie Component.
Using the Component

The CookieComponent offers a number of methods for working with Cookies. CookieComponent::write(mixed $key, mixed $value = null, boolean $encrypt = true, mixed $expires = null) The write() method is the heart of cookie component, $key is the cookie variable name you want, and the $value is the information to be stored:
$this->Cookie->write(name, Larry);

You can also group your variables by supplying dot notation in the key parameter:
$this->Cookie->write(User.name, Larry); $this->Cookie->write(User.role, Lead);

If you want to write more than one value to the cookie at a time, you can pass an array:
$this->Cookie->write(User, array(name => Larry, role => Lead) );

All values in the cookie are encrypted by default. If you want to store the values as plain-text, set the third parameter of the write() method to false. The encryption performed on cookie values is fairly uncomplicated encryption system. It uses Security.salt and a predened Congure class var Security.cipherSeed to encrypt values. To make your cookies more secure you should change Security.cipherSeed in app/Cong/core.php to ensure a better encryption.:
$this->Cookie->write(name, Larry, false);

The last parameter to write is $expires the number of seconds before your cookie will expire. For convenience, this parameter can also be passed as a string that the php strtotime() function understands:
// Both cookies expire in one hour. $this->Cookie->write(first_name, Larry, false, 3600); $this->Cookie->write(last_name, Masters, false, 1 hour);

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CookieComponent::read(mixed $key = null) This method is used to read the value of a cookie variable with the name specied by $key.:
// Outputs Larry echo $this->Cookie->read(name); // You can also use the dot notation for read echo $this->Cookie->read(User.name); // To get the variables which you had grouped // using the dot notation as an array use something like $this->Cookie->read(User); // this outputs something like array(name => Larry, role => Lead)

CookieComponent::check($key) Parameters $key (string) The key to check. Used to check if a key/path exists and has not-null value. CookieComponent::check() was added in 2.3 CookieComponent::delete(mixed $key) Deletes a cookie variable of the name in $key. Works with dot notation:
// Delete a variable $this->Cookie->delete(bar); // Delete the cookie variable bar, but not all under foo $this->Cookie->delete(foo.bar);

New in version 2.3:

CookieComponent::destroy() Destroys the current cookie. CookieComponent::type($type) Allows you to change the encryption scheme. By default the cipher scheme is used. However, you should use the rijndael scheme for improved security. Changed in version 2.2: The rijndael type was added. EmailComponent EmailComponent is now deprecated, but it will keep working. Internally this class is using CakeEmail to send emails. Unfortunately, you will need to move your les from app/views/elements/emails to app/View/Emails. Also, rename the directory email to Emails in the layouts path. If it affects others places in your application, we recommend to you create symbolic links. We recommend to you upgrade your code to use CakeEmail class instead of the EmailComponent. Below some tips about the migration. The headers are not changed to be X-... What you set is what is used. So, remember to put X- in your custom headers.

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The send() method receives only the message content. The template and layout should be set using CakeEmail::template() method. The list of attachments should be an array of lenames (that will appear in email) as key and value the full path to real le. At any error, CakeEmail will throw an exception instead of return false. We recommend to you use try/catch to ensure your messages are delivered correctly. Below some examples of using EmailComponent ($component) and now with CakeEmail ($lib): From $component->to = [email protected]; to $lib->to([email protected]); From $component->to = Alias <[email protected]>; to $lib->to([email protected], Alias); or $lib->to(array([email protected] => Alias)); From $component->subject = My subject; subject); to $lib->subject(My to

From $component->date = Sun, 25 Apr 2011 01:00:00 -0300; $lib->addHeaders(array(Date => Sun, 25 Apr 2011 01:00:00 -0300)); From $component->header[Custom] = only my; $lib->addHeaders(array(X-Custom => only my)); From $component->send(null, template, layout); $lib->template(template, layout)->send(); From $component->delivery = smtp; to $lib->transport(Smtp);

to to

From $component->smtpOptions = array(host => smtp.example.com); to $lib->config(array(host => smtp.example.com)); From $sent = $component->httpMessage; $lib->message(CakeEmail::MESSAGE_HTML); For more information you should read the CakeEmail documentation. Request Handling class RequestHandlerComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) The Request Handler component is used in CakePHP to obtain additional information about the HTTP requests that are made to your applications. You can use it to inform your controllers about Ajax as well as gain additional insight into content types that the client accepts and automatically changes to the appropriate layout when le extensions are enabled. By default RequestHandler will automatically detect Ajax requests based on the HTTP-XRequested-With header that many javascript libraries use. When used in conjunction with Router::parseExtensions() RequestHandler will automatically switch the layout and view les to $sent =

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to those that match the requested type. Furthermore, if a helper with the same name as the requested extension exists, it will be added to the Controllers Helper array. Lastly, if XML/JSON data is POSTed to your Controllers, it will be parsed into an array which is assigned to $this->request->data, and can then be saved as model data. In order to make use of RequestHandler it must be included in your $components array:
class WidgetController extends AppController { public $components = array(RequestHandler); // Rest of controller }

Obtaining Request Information

Request Handler has several methods that provide information about the client and its request. RequestHandlerComponent::accepts($type = null) $type can be a string, or an array, or null. If a string, accepts will return true if the client accepts the content type. If an array is specied, accepts return true if any one of the content types is accepted by the client. If null returns an array of the content-types that the client accepts. For example:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $components = array(RequestHandler); public function beforeFilter() { if ($this->RequestHandler->accepts(html)) { // Execute code only if client accepts an HTML (text/html) response } elseif ($this->RequestHandler->accepts(xml)) { // Execute XML-only code } if ($this->RequestHandler->accepts(array(xml, rss, atom))) { // Executes if the client accepts any of the above: XML, RSS or Atom } } }

Other request type detection methods include: RequestHandlerComponent::isXml() Returns true if the current request accepts XML as a response. RequestHandlerComponent::isRss() Returns true if the current request accepts RSS as a response. RequestHandlerComponent::isAtom() Returns true if the current call accepts an Atom response, false otherwise. RequestHandlerComponent::isMobile() Returns true if user agent string matches a mobile web browser, or if the client accepts WAP content. The supported Mobile User Agent strings are:

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Android AvantGo BlackBerry DoCoMo Fennec iPad iPhone iPod J2ME MIDP NetFront Nokia Opera Mini Opera Mobi PalmOS PalmSource portalmmm Plucker ReqwirelessWeb SonyEricsson Symbian UP.Browser webOS Windows CE Windows Phone OS Xiino RequestHandlerComponent::isWap() Returns true if the client accepts WAP content. All of the above request detection methods can be used in a similar fashion to lter functionality intended for specic content types. For example when responding to Ajax requests, you often will want to disable browser caching, and change the debug level. However, you want to allow caching for non-ajax requests. The following would accomplish that:

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if ($this->request->is(ajax)) { $this->disableCache(); } // Continue Controller action

Obtaining Additional Client Information

RequestHandlerComponent::getAjaxVersion() Gets Prototype version if call is Ajax, otherwise empty string. The Prototype library sets a special Prototype version HTTP header.
Automatically decoding request data

RequestHandlerComponent::addInputType($type, $handler) Parameters $type (string) The content type alias this attached decoder is for. e.g. json or xml $handler (array) The handler information for the type. Add a request data decoder. The handler should contain a callback, and any additional arguments for the callback. The callback should return an array of data contained in the request input. For example adding a CSV handler in your controllers beforeFilter could look like:
$parser = function ($data) { $rows = str_getcsv($data, "\n"); foreach ($rows as &$row) { $row = str_getcsv($row, ,); } return $rows; }; $this->RequestHandler->addInputType(csv, array($parser));

The above example requires PHP 5.3, however you can use any callable (http://php.net/callback) for the handling function. You can also pass additional arguments to the callback, this is useful for callbacks like json_decode:
$this->RequestHandler->addInputType(json, array(json_decode, true));

The above will make $this->request->data an array of the JSON input data, without the additional true youd get a set of StdClass objects.
Responding To Requests

In addition to request detection RequestHandler also provides easy access to altering the output and content type mappings for your application. RequestHandlerComponent::setContent($name, $type = null) 300 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Parameters $name (string) The name or le extension of the Content-type ie. html, css, json, xml. $type (mixed) The mime-type(s) that the Content-type maps to. setContent adds/sets the Content-types for the given name. Allows content-types to be mapped to friendly aliases and or extensions. This allows RequestHandler to automatically respond to requests of each type in its startup method. If you are using Router::parseExtension, you should use the le extension as the name of the Content-type. Furthermore, these content types are used by prefers() and accepts(). setContent is best used in the beforeFilter() of your controllers, as this will best leverage the automagicness of content-type aliases. The default mappings are: javascript text/javascript js text/javascript json application/json css text/css html text/html, */* text text/plain txt text/plain csv application/vnd.ms-excel, text/plain form application/x-www-form-urlencoded le multipart/form-data xhtml application/xhtml+xml, application/xhtml, text/xhtml xhtml-mobile application/vnd.wap.xhtml+xml xml application/xml, text/xml rss application/rss+xml atom application/atom+xml amf application/x-amf wap text/vnd.wap.wml, text/vnd.wap.wmlscript, image/vnd.wap.wbmp wml text/vnd.wap.wml wmlscript text/vnd.wap.wmlscript wbmp image/vnd.wap.wbmp pdf application/pdf zip application/x-zip Components 301

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tar application/x-tar RequestHandlerComponent::prefers($type = null) Determines which content-types the client prefers. If no parameter is given the most likely content type is returned. If $type is an array the rst type the client accepts will be returned. Preference is determined primarily by the le extension parsed by Router if one has been provided, and secondly by the list of content-types in HTTP_ACCEPT. RequestHandlerComponent::renderAs($controller, $type) Parameters $controller (Controller) Controller Reference $type (string) friendly content type name to render content for ex. xml, rss. Change the render mode of a controller to the specied type. Will also append the appropriate helper to the controllers helper array if available and not already in the array. RequestHandlerComponent::respondAs($type, $options) Parameters $type (string) Friendly content type name ex. xml, rss or a full content type like application/x-shockwave $options (array) If $type is a friendly type name that has more than one content association, $index is used to select the content type. Sets the response header based on content-type map names. RequestHandlerComponent::responseType() Returns the current response type Content-type header or null if one has yet to be set.
Taking advantage of HTTP cache validation

New in version 2.1. The HTTP cache validation model is one of the processes used for cache gateways, also known as reverse proxies, to determine if they can serve a stored copy of a response to the client. Under this model, you mostly save bandwidth, but when used correctly you can also save some CPU processing, reducing this way response times. Enabling the RequestHandlerComponent in your controller automatically activates a check done before rendering the view. This check compares the response object against the original request to determine whether the response was not modied since the last time the client asked for it. If response is evaluated as not modied, then the view rendering process is stopped, saving processing time an no content is returned to the client, saving bandwidth. The response status code is then set to 304 Not Modied. You can opt-out this automatic checking by setting the checkHttpCache setting to false:
public $components = array( RequestHandler => array( checkHttpCache => false ));

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Using custom ViewClasses

New in version 2.3. When using JsonView/XmlView you might want to override the default serialization with a custom View class, or add View classes for other types. You can map existing and new types to your custom classes. RequestHandlerComponent::viewClassMap($type, $viewClass) Parameters $type (string|array) The type string or map array with format array(json => MyJson) $viewClass (string) The viewClass to be used for the type without View appended You can also set this automatically by using the viewClassMap setting:
public $components = array( RequestHandler => array( viewClassMap => array( json => ApiKit.MyJson, xml => ApiKit.MyXml, csv => ApiKit.Csv ) ));

Pagination class PaginatorComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) One of the main obstacles of creating exible and user-friendly web applications is designing an intuitive UI. Many applications tend to grow in size and complexity quickly, and designers and programmers alike nd they are unable to cope with displaying hundreds or thousands of records. Refactoring takes time, and performance and user satisfaction can suffer. Displaying a reasonable number of records per page has always been a critical part of every application and used to cause many headaches for developers. CakePHP eases the burden on the developer by providing a quick, easy way to paginate data. Pagination in CakePHP is offered by a Component in the controller, to make building paginated queries easier. In the View PaginatorHelper is used to make the generation of pagination links & buttons simple.
Query Setup

In the controller, we start by dening the query conditions pagination will use by default in the $paginate controller variable. These conditions, serve as the basis of your pagination queries. They are augmented by the sort, direction limit, and page parameters passed in from the url. It is important to note here that the order key must be dened in an array structure like below:

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class PostsController extends AppController { public $paginate = array( limit => 25, order => array( Post.title => asc ) ); }

You can also include other find() options, such as fields:

class PostsController extends AppController { public $paginate = array( fields => array(Post.id, Post.created), limit => 25, order => array( Post.title => asc ) ); }

Other keys that can be included in the $paginate array are similar to the parameters of the Model->find(all) method, that is: conditions, fields, order, limit, page, contain, joins, and recursive. In addition to the aforementioned keys, any additional keys will also be passed directly to the model nd methods. This makes it very simple to use behaviors like ContainableBehavior with pagination:
class RecipesController extends AppController { public $paginate = array( limit => 25, contain => array(Article) ); }

In addition to dening general pagination values, you can dene more than one set of pagination defaults in the controller, you just name the keys of the array after the model you wish to congure:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $paginate = array( Post => array (...), Author => array (...) ); }

The values of the Post and Author keys could contain all the properties that a model/key less $paginate array could. Once the $paginate variable has been dened, we can call the paginate() method in a controller action. This method will dynamically load the PaginatorComponent, and call its paginate() method. This

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will return find() results from the model. It also sets some additional paging statistics, which are added to the request object. The additional information is set to $this->request->params[paging], and is used by PaginatorHelper for creating links. Controller::paginate() also adds PaginatorHelper to the list of helpers in your controller, if it has not been added already.:
public function list_recipes() { // similar to findAll(), but fetches paged results $data = $this->paginate(Recipe); $this->set(data, $data); }

You can lter the records by passing conditions as second parameter to the paginate() function.:
$data = $this->paginate(Recipe, array(Recipe.title LIKE => a%));

Or you can also set conditions and other keys in the $paginate array inside your action.:
public function list_recipes() { $this->paginate = array( conditions => array(Recipe.title LIKE => a%), limit => 10 ); $data = $this->paginate(Recipe); $this->set(compact(data)); );

Custom Query Pagination

If youre not able to use the standard nd options to create the query you need to display your data, there are a few options. You can use a custom nd type. You can also implement the paginate() and paginateCount() methods on your model, or include them in a behavior attached to your model. Behaviors implementing paginate and/or paginateCount should implement the method signatures dened below with the normal additional rst parameter of $model:

// paginate and paginateCount implemented on a behavior. public function paginate(Model $model, $conditions, $fields, $order, $limit, $page = 1, $re // method content }

public function paginateCount(Model $model, $conditions = null, $recursive = 0, $extra = ar // method body }

Its seldom youll need to implement paginate() and paginateCount(). You should make sure you cant achieve your goal with the core model methods, or a custom nder. To paginate with a custom nd type, you should set the 0th element, or the findType key as of 2.3:
public $paginate = array( popular );

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public $paginate = array( findType => popular );

The paginate() method should implement the following method signature. method/logic override it in the model you wish to get the data from:

To use your own

/** * Overridden paginate method - group by week, away_team_id and home_team_id */ public function paginate($conditions, $fields, $order, $limit, $page = 1, $recursive = null $recursive = -1; $group = $fields = array(week, away_team_id, home_team_id); return $this->find(all, compact(conditions, fields, order, limit, page, re }

You also need to override the core paginateCount(), this method expects the same arguments as Model::find(count). The example below uses some Postgres-specifc features, so please adjust accordingly depending on what database you are using:

/** * Overridden paginateCount method */ public function paginateCount($conditions = null, $recursive = 0, $extra = array()) { $sql = "SELECT DISTINCT ON(week, home_team_id, away_team_id) week, home_team_id, away_t $this->recursive = $recursive; $results = $this->query($sql); return count($results); }

The observant reader will have noticed that the paginate method weve dened wasnt actually necessary All you have to do is add the keyword in controllers $paginate class variable:
/** * Add GROUP BY clause */ public $paginate = array( MyModel => array( limit => 20, order => array(week => desc), group => array(week, home_team_id, away_team_id) ) ); /** * Or on-the-fly from within the action */ public function index() { $this->paginate = array( MyModel => array( limit => 20, order => array(week => desc), group => array(week, home_team_id, away_team_id) )

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); }

In CakePHP 2.0, you no longer need to implement paginateCount() when using group clauses. The core find(count) will correctly count the total number of rows.
Control which elds used for ordering

By default sorting can be done with any column on a model. This is sometimes undesirable as it can allow users to sort on un-indexed columns, or virtual elds that can be expensive to calculate. You can use the 3rd parameter of Controller::paginate() to restrict the columns sorting will be done on:
$this->paginate(Post, array(), array(title, slug));

This would allow sorting on the title and slug columns only. A user that sets sort to any other value will be ignored.
Limit the maximum number of rows that can be fetched

The number of results that are fetched is exposed to the user as the limit parameter. It is generally undesirable to allow users to fetch all rows in a paginated set. By default CakePHP limits the maximum number of rows that can be fetched to 100. If this default is not appropriate for your application, you can adjust it as part of the pagination options:
public $paginate = array( // other keys here. maxLimit => 10 );

If the requests limit param is greater than this value, it will be reduced to the maxLimit value.
Pagination with GET parameters

In previous versions of CakePHP you could only generate pagination links using named parameters. But if pages were requested with GET parameters they would still work. For 2.0, we decided to make how you generate pagination parameters more controlled and consistent. You can choose to use either querystring or named parameters in the component. Incoming requests will accept only the chosen type, and the PaginatorHelper will generate links with the chosen type of parameter:
public $paginate = array( paramType => querystring );

The above would enable querystring parameter parsing and generation. $settings property on the PaginatorComponent:
$this->Paginator->settings[paramType] = querystring;

You can also modify the

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By default all of the typical paging parameters will be converted into GET arguments. Note: You can run into a situation where assigning a value to a nonexistent property will throw errors:
$this->paginate[limit] = 10;

will throw the error Notice: Indirect modication of overloaded property $paginate has no effect. Assigning an initial value to the property solves the issue:
$this->paginate = array(); $this->paginate[limit] = 10; //or $this->paginate = array(limit => 10);

Or just declare the property in the controller class:

class PostsController { public $paginate = array(); }

Or use $this->Paginator->settings = array(limit => 10); Make sure you have added the Paginator component to your $components array if you want to modify the $settings property of the PaginatorComponent. Either of these approaches will solve the notice errors.

Out of range page requests

As of 2.3 the PaginatorComponent will throw a NotFoundException when trying to access a non-existent page, i.e. page number requested is greater than total page count. So you could either let the normal error page be rendered or use a try catch block and take appropriate action when a NotFoundException is caught:
public function index() { try { $this->paginate(); } catch (NotFoundException $e) { //Do something here like redirecting to first or last page. //$this->request->params[paging] will give you required info. } }

AJAX Pagination

Its very easy to incorporate Ajax functionality into pagination. Using the JsHelper and RequestHandlerComponent you can easily add Ajax pagination to your application. See Ajax Pagination for more information.

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Pagination in the view

Check the PaginatorHelper documentation for how to create links for pagination navigation. Security class SecurityComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) The Security Component creates an easy way to integrate tighter security in your application. It provides methods for various tasks like: Restricting which HTTP methods your application accepts. CSRF protection. Form tampering protection Requiring that SSL be used. Limiting cross controller communication. Like all components it is congured through several congurable parameters. All of these properties can be set directly or through setter methods of the same name in your controllers beforeFilter. By using the Security Component you automatically get CSRF (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crosssite_request_forgery) and form tampering protection. Hidden token elds will automatically be inserted into forms and checked by the Security component. Among other things, a form submission will not be accepted after a certain period of inactivity, which is controlled by the csrfExpires time. If you are using Security components form protection features and other components that process form data in their startup() callbacks, be sure to place Security Component before those components in your $components array. Note: When using the Security Component you must use the FormHelper to create your forms. In addition, you must not override any of the elds name attributes. The Security Component looks for certain indicators that are created and managed by the FormHelper (especially those created in create() and end()). Dynamically altering the elds that are submitted in a POST request (e.g. disabling, deleting or creating new elds via JavaScript) is likely to trigger a black-holing of the request. See the $validatePost or $disabledFields conguration parameters.

Handling blackhole callbacks

If an action is restricted by the Security Component it is black-holed as an invalid request which will result in a 404 error by default. You can congure this behavior by setting the $this->Security->blackHoleCallback property to a callback function in the controller. SecurityComponent::blackHole(object $controller, string $error) Black-hole an invalid request with a 404 error or a custom callback. With no callback, the request will be exited. If a controller callback is set to SecurityComponent::blackHoleCallback, it will be called and passed any error information. Components 309

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property SecurityComponent::$blackHoleCallback A Controller callback that will handle and requests that are blackholed. A blackhole callback can be any public method on a controllers. The callback should expect an parameter indicating the type of error:
public function beforeFilter() { $this->Security->blackHoleCallback = blackhole; } public function blackhole($type) { // handle errors. }

The $type parameter can have the following values: auth Indicates a form validation error, or a controller/action mismatch error. csrf Indicates a CSRF error. get Indicates an HTTP method restriction failure. post Indicates an HTTP method restriction failure. put Indicates an HTTP method restriction failure. delete Indicates an HTTP method restriction failure. secure Indicates an SSL method restriction failure.
Restricting HTTP methods

SecurityComponent::requirePost() Sets the actions that require a POST request. Takes any number of arguments. Can be called with no arguments to force all actions to require a POST. SecurityComponent::requireGet() Sets the actions that require a GET request. Takes any number of arguments. Can be called with no arguments to force all actions to require a GET. SecurityComponent::requirePut() Sets the actions that require a PUT request. Takes any number of arguments. Can be called with no arguments to force all actions to require a PUT. SecurityComponent::requireDelete() Sets the actions that require a DELETE request. Takes any number of arguments. Can be called with no arguments to force all actions to require a DELETE.
Restrict actions to SSL

SecurityComponent::requireSecure() Sets the actions that require a SSL-secured request. Takes any number of arguments. Can be called with no arguments to force all actions to require a SSL-secured.

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SecurityComponent::requireAuth() Sets the actions that require a valid Security Component generated token. Takes any number of arguments. Can be called with no arguments to force all actions to require a valid authentication.
Restricting cross controller communication

property SecurityComponent::$allowedControllers A List of Controller from which the actions of the current controller are allowed to receive requests from. This can be used to control cross controller requests. property SecurityComponent::$allowedActions Actions from which actions of the current controller are allowed to receive requests. This can be used to control cross controller requests.
Form tampering prevention

By default SecurityComponent prevents users from tampering with forms. It does this by working with FormHelper and tracking which les are in a form. It also keeps track of the values of hidden input elements. All of this data is combined and turned into a hash. When a form is submitted, SecurityComponent will use the POST data to build the same structure and compare the hash. property SecurityComponent::$unlockedFields Set to a list of form elds to exclude from POST validation. Fields can be unlocked either in the Component, or with FormHelper::unlockField(). Fields that have been unlocked are not required to be part of the POST and hidden unlocked elds do not have their values checked. property SecurityComponent::$validatePost Set to false to completely skip the validation of POST requests, essentially turning off form validation.
CSRF conguration

property SecurityComponent::$csrfCheck Whether to use CSRF protected forms. Set to false to disable CSRF protection on forms. property SecurityComponent::$csrfExpires The duration from when a CSRF token is created that it will expire on. Each form/page request will generate a new token that can only be submitted once unless it expires. Can be any value compatible with strtotime(). The default is +30 minutes. property SecurityComponent::$csrfUseOnce Controls whether or not CSRF tokens are use and burn. Set to false to not generate new tokens on each request. One token will be reused until it expires. This reduces the chances of users getting invalid requests because of token consumption. It has the side effect of making CSRF less secure, as tokens are reusable.

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Usage

Using the security component is generally done in the controller beforeFilter(). You would specify the security restrictions you want and the Security Component will enforce them on its startup:
class WidgetController extends AppController { public $components = array(Security); public function beforeFilter() { $this->Security->requirePost(delete); } }

In this example the delete action can only be successfully triggered if it receives a POST request:
class WidgetController extends AppController { public $components = array(Security); public function beforeFilter() { if (isset($this->request->params[admin])) { $this->Security->requireSecure(); } } }

This example would force all actions that had admin routing to require secure SSL requests:
class WidgetController extends AppController { public $components = array(Security); public function beforeFilter() { if (isset($this->params[admin])) { $this->Security->blackHoleCallback = forceSSL; $this->Security->requireSecure(); } } public function forceSSL() { $this->redirect(https:// . env(SERVER_NAME) . $this->here); } }

This example would force all actions that had admin routing to require secure SSL requests. When the request is black holed, it will call the nominated forceSSL() callback which will redirect non-secure requests to secure requests automatically.

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CSRF protection

CSRF or Cross Site Request Forgery is a common vulnerability in web applications. It allows an attacker to capture and replay a previous request, and sometimes submit data requests using image tags or resources on other domains. Double submission and replay attacks are handled by the SecurityComponents CSRF features. They work by adding a special token to each form request. This token once used cannot be used again. If an attempt is made to re-use an expired token the request will be blackholed. Using CSRF protection Simply by adding the SecurityComponent to your components array, you can benet from the CSRF protection it provides. By default CSRF tokens are valid for 30 minutes and expire on use. You can control how long tokens last by setting csrfExpires on the component.:
public $components = array( Security => array( csrfExpires => +1 hour ) );

You can also set this property in your controllers beforeFilter:

public function beforeFilter() { $this->Security->csrfExpires = +1 hour; // ... }

The csrfExpires property can be any value that is compatible with strtotime() (http://php.net/manual/en/function.strtotime.php). By default the FormHelper will add a data[_Token][key] containing the CSRF token to every form when the component is enabled. Handling missing or expired tokens Missing or expired tokens are handled similar to other security violations. The SecurityComponents blackHoleCallback will be called with a csrf parameter. This helps you lter out CSRF token failures, from other warnings. Using per-session tokens instead of one-time use tokens By default a new CSRF token is generated for each request, and each token can only be used once. If a token is used twice, it will be blackholed. Sometimes, this behaviour is not desirable, as it can create issues with single page applications. You can toggle on longer, multi-use tokens by setting csrfUseOnce to false. This can be done in the components array, or in the beforeFilter of your controller:
public $components = array( Security => array( csrfUseOnce => false ) );

This will tell the component that you want to re-use a CSRF token until it expires - which is controlled by the csrfExpires value. If you are having issues with expired tokens, this is a good balance between

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security and ease of use. Disabling the CSRF protection There may be cases where you want to disable CSRF protection on your forms for some reason. If you do want to disable this feature, you can set $this->Security->csrfCheck = false; in your beforeFilter or use the components array. By default CSRF protection is enabled, and congured to use one-use tokens.
Disabling Security Component For Specic Actions

There may be cases where you want to disable all security checks for an action (ex. ajax request). You may unlock these actions by listing them in $this->Security->unlockedActions in your beforeFilter. New in version 2.3. Sessions class SessionComponent(ComponentCollection $collection, array $settings = array()) The CakePHP SessionComponent provides a way to persist client data between page requests. It acts as a wrapper for the $_SESSION as well as providing convenience methods for several $_SESSION related functions. Sessions can be congured in a number of ways in CakePHP. For more information, you should see the Session conguration documentation.
Interacting with Session data

The Session component is used to interact with session information. It includes basic CRUD functions as well as features for creating feedback messages to users. It should be noted that Array structures can be created in the Session by using dot notation. User.username would reference the following:
array(User => array( username => [email protected] ));

So

Dots are used to indicate nested arrays. This notation is used for all Session component methods wherever a name/key is used. SessionComponent::write($name, $value) Write to the Session puts $value into $name. $name can be a dot separated array. For example:
$this->Session->write(Person.eyeColor, Green);

This writes the value Green to the session under Person => eyeColor. SessionComponent::read($name) Returns the value at $name in the Session. If $name is null the entire session will be returned. E.g:

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$green = $this->Session->read(Person.eyeColor);

Retrieve the value Green from the session. Reading data that does not exist will return null. SessionComponent::check($name) Used to check if a Session variable has been set. Returns true on existence and false on non-existence. SessionComponent::delete($name) Clear the session data at $name. E.g:
$this->Session->delete(Person.eyeColor);

Our session data no longer has the value Green, or the index eyeColor set. However, Person is still in the Session. To delete the entire Person information from the session use:
$this->Session->delete(Person);

SessionComponent::destroy() The destroy method will delete the session cookie and all session data stored in the temporary le system. It will then destroy the PHP session and then create a fresh session:
$this->Session->destroy();

Creating notication messages

SessionComponent::setFlash(string $message, string $element = default, array $params = array(), string $key = ash) Return type void Often in web applications, you will need to display a one-time notication message to the user after processing a form or acknowledging data. In CakePHP, these are referred to as ash messages. You can set ash message with the SessionComponent and display them with the SessionHelper::flash(). To set a message, use setFlash:
// In the controller. $this->Session->setFlash(Your stuff has been saved.);

This will create a one-time message that can be displayed to the user, using the SessionHelper:
// In the view. echo $this->Session->flash(); // The above will output. <div id="flashMessage" class="message"> Your stuff has been saved. </div>

You can use the additional parameters of setFlash() to create different kinds of ash messages. For example, error and positive notications may look differently. CakePHP gives you a way to do that. Using the $key parameter you can store multiple messages, which can be output separately:

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// set a bad message. $this->Session->setFlash(Something bad., default, array(), bad); // set a good message. $this->Session->setFlash(Something good., default, array(), good);

In the view, these messages can be output and styled differently:

// in a view. echo $this->Session->flash(good); echo $this->Session->flash(bad);

The $element parameter allows you to control which element (located in /app/View/Elements) should be used to render the message in. In the element the message is available as $message. First we set the ash in our controller:
$this->Session->setFlash(Something custom!, flash_custom);

Then we create the le app/View/Elements/flash_custom.ctp and build our custom ash element:
<div id="myCustomFlash"><?php echo $message; ?></div>

$params allows you to pass additional view variables to the rendered layout. Parameters can be passed affecting the rendered div, for example adding class in the $params array will apply a class to the div output using $this->Session->flash() in your layout or view.:

$this->Session->setFlash(Example message text, default, array(class => example_

The output from using $this->Session->flash() with the above example would be:
<div id="flashMessage" class="example_class">Example message text</div>

To use an element from a plugin just specify the plugin in the $params:
// Will use /app/Plugin/Comment/View/Elements/flash_no_spam.ctp $this->Session->setFlash(Message!, flash_no_spam, array(plugin => Comment));

Helpers
CakePHP features a number of helpers that aid in view creation. They assist in creating well-formed markup (including forms), aid in formatting text, times and numbers, and can even integrate with popular javascript libraries. Here is a summary of the built-in helpers. Read Helpers to learn more about helpers, their api, and how you can create and use your own helpers.

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Helpers
CacheHelper class CacheHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The Cache helper assists in caching entire layouts and views, saving time repetitively retrieving data. View Caching in Cake temporarily stores parsed layouts and views as simple PHP + HTML les. It should be noted that the Cache helper works quite differently than other helpers. It does not have methods that are directly called. Instead, a view is marked with cache tags indicating which blocks of content should not be cached. The CacheHelper then uses helper callbacks to process the le and output to generate the cache le. When a URL is requested, CakePHP checks to see if that request string has already been cached. If it has, the rest of the url dispatching process is skipped. Any nocache blocks are processed normally and the view is served. This creates a big savings in processing time for each request to a cached URL as minimal code is executed. If Cake doesnt nd a cached view, or the cache has expired for the requested URL it continues to process the request normally.
Using the Helper

There are two steps you have to take before you can use the CacheHelper. First in your APP/Config/core.php uncomment the Congure write call for Cache.check. This will tell CakePHP to check for, and generate view cache les when handling requests. Once youve uncommented the Cache.check line you will need to add the helper to your controllers $helpers array:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Cache); }

You will also need to add the CacheDispatcher to your dispatcher lters in your bootstrap:
Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( CacheDispatcher ));

New in version 2.3: If you have a setup with multiple domains or languages you can use Congure::write(Cache.viewPrex, YOURPREFIX); to store the view cache les prexed. Additional conguration options CacheHelper has a few additional conguration options you can use to tune and tweak its behavior. This is done through the $cacheAction variable in your controllers. $cacheAction should be set to an array which contains the actions you want cached, and the duration in seconds you want those views cached. The time value can be expressed in a strtotime() format (e.g. 1 hour, or 3 minutes). Using the example of an ArticlesController, that receives a lot of trafc that needs to be cached:
public $cacheAction = array( view => 36000,

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index );

=> 48000

This will cache the view action 10 hours, and the index action 13 hours. By making $cacheAction a strtotime() friendly value you can cache every action in the controller:
public $cacheAction = "1 hour";

You can also enable controller/component callbacks for cached views created with CacheHelper. To do so you must use the array format for $cacheAction and create an array like the following:
public $cacheAction = array( view => array(callbacks => true, duration => 21600), add => array(callbacks => true, duration => 36000), index => array(callbacks => true, duration => 48000) );

By setting callbacks => true you tell CacheHelper that you want the generated les to create the components and models for the controller. Additionally, re the component initialize, controller beforeFilter, and component startup callbacks. Note: Setting callbacks => true partly defeats the purpose of caching. This is also the reason it is disabled by default.

Marking Non-Cached Content in Views

There will be times when you dont want an entire view cached. For example, certain parts of the page may look different whether a user is currently logged in or browsing your site as a guest. To indicate blocks of content that are not to be cached, wrap them in <!--nocache--> <!--/nocache--> like so:
<!--nocache--> <?php if ($this->Session->check(User.name)): ?> Welcome, <?php echo h($this->Session->read(User.name)); ?>. <?php else: ?> <?php echo $this->Html->link(Login, users/login); ?> <?php endif; ?> <!--/nocache-->

Note: You cannot use nocache tags in elements. Since there are no callbacks around elements, they cannot be cached. It should be noted that once an action is cached, the controller method for the action will not be called. When a cache le is created, the request object, and view variables are serialized with PHPs serialize(). Warning: If you have view variables that contain un-serializable content such as SimpleXML objects, resource handles, or closures you might not be able to use view caching.

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Clearing the Cache

It is important to remember that CakePHP will clear a cached view if a model used in the cached view is modied. For example, if a cached view uses data from the Post model, and there has been an INSERT, UPDATE, or DELETE query made to a Post, the cache for that view is cleared, and new content is generated on the next request. Note: This automatic cache clearing requires the controller/model name to be part of the URL. If youve used routing to change your urls this feature will not work. If you need to manually clear the cache, you can do so by calling Cache::clear(). This will clear all cached data, excluding cached view les. If you need to clear the cached view les, use clearCache(). FormHelper class FormHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The FormHelper does most of the heavy lifting in form creation. The FormHelper focuses on creating forms quickly, in a way that will streamline validation, re-population and layout. The FormHelper is also exible - it will do almost everything for you using conventions, or you can use specic methods to get only what you need.
Creating Forms

The rst method youll need to use in order to take advantage of the FormHelper is create(). This special method outputs an opening form tag. FormHelper::create(string $model = null, array $options = array()) All parameters are optional. If create() is called with no parameters supplied, it assumes you are building a form that submits to the current controller, via the current URL. The default method for form submission is POST. The form element is also returned with a DOM ID. The ID is generated using the name of the model, and the name of the controller action, CamelCased. If I were to call create() inside a UsersController view, Id see something like the following output in the rendered view:
<form id="UserAddForm" method="post" action="/users/add">

Note: You can also pass false for $model. This will place your form data into the array: $this->request->data (instead of in the sub-array: $this->request->data[Model]). This can be handy for short forms that may not represent anything in your database. The create() method allows us to customize much more using the parameters, however. First, you can specify a model name. By specifying a model for a form, you are creating that forms context. All elds are assumed to belong to this model (unless otherwise specied), and all models referenced

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are assumed to be associated with it. If you do not specify a model, then it assumes you are using the default model for the current controller:
// If you are on /recipes/add echo $this->Form->create(Recipe);

Output:
<form id="RecipeAddForm" method="post" action="/recipes/add">

This will POST the form data to the add() action of RecipesController. However, you can also use the same logic to create an edit form. The FormHelper uses the $this->request->data property to automatically detect whether to create an add or edit form. If $this->request->data contains an array element named after the forms model, and that array contains a non-empty value of the models primary key, then the FormHelper will create an edit form for that record. For example, if we browse to http://site.com/recipes/edit/5, we would get the following:
// Controller/RecipesController.php: public function edit($id = null) { if (empty($this->request->data)) { $this->request->data = $this->Recipe->findById($id); } else { // Save logic goes here } } // View/Recipes/edit.ctp: // Since $this->request->data[Recipe][id] = 5, we will get an edit form <?php echo $this->Form->create(Recipe); ?>

Output:
<form id="RecipeEditForm" method="post" action="/recipes/edit/5"> <input type="hidden" name="_method" value="PUT" />

Note: Since this is an edit form, a hidden input eld is generated to override the default HTTP method. When creating forms for models in plugins, you should always use plugin syntax when creating a form. This will ensure the form is correctly generated:
echo $this->Form->create(ContactManager.Contact);

The $options array is where most of the form conguration happens. This special array can contain a number of different key-value pairs that affect the way the form tag is generated. Changed in version 2.0: The default url for all forms, is now the current url including passed, named, and querystring parameters. You can override this default by supplying $options[url] in the second parameter of $this->Form->create(). Options for create() There are a number of options for create():

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$options[type] This key is used to specify the type of form to be created. Valid values include post, get, le, put and delete. Supplying either post or get changes the form submission method accordingly:
echo $this->Form->create(User, array(type => get));

Output:
<form id="UserAddForm" method="get" action="/users/add">

Specifying le changes the form submission method to post, and includes an enctype of multipart/form-data on the form tag. This is to be used if there are any le elements inside the form. The absence of the proper enctype attribute will cause the le uploads not to function:
echo $this->Form->create(User, array(type => file));

Output:

<form id="UserAddForm" enctype="multipart/form-data" method="post" action="/users/add"

When using put or delete, your form will be functionally equivalent to a post form, but when submitted, the HTTP request method will be overridden with PUT or DELETE, respectively. This allows CakePHP to emulate proper REST support in web browsers. $options[action] The action key allows you to point the form to a specic action in your current controller. For example, if youd like to point the form to the login() action of the current controller, you would supply an $options array like the following:
echo $this->Form->create(User, array(action => login));

Output:
<form id="UserLoginForm" method="post" action="/users/login">

$options[url] If the desired form action isnt in the current controller, you can specify a URL for the form action using the url key of the $options array. The supplied URL can be relative to your CakePHP application:
echo $this->Form->create(null, array(url => /recipes/add)); // or echo $this->Form->create(null, array( url => array(controller => recipes, action => add) ));

Output:
<form method="post" action="/recipes/add">

or can point to an external domain:

echo $this->Form->create(null, array( url => http://www.google.com/search, type => get ));

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Output:
<form method="get" action="http://www.google.com/search">

Also check HtmlHelper::url() method for more examples of different types of urls. $options[default] If default has been set to boolean false, the forms submit action is changed so that pressing the submit button does not submit the form. If the form is meant to be submitted via AJAX, setting default to false suppresses the forms default behavior so you can grab the data and submit it via AJAX instead. $options[inputDefaults] You can declare a set of default options for input() with the inputDefaults key to customize your default input creation:
echo $this->Form->create(User, array( inputDefaults => array( label => false, div => false ) ));

All inputs created from that point forward would inherit the options declared in inputDefaults. You can override the defaultOptions by declaring the option in the input() call:

echo $this->Form->input(password); // No div, no label echo $this->Form->input(username, array(label => Username)); // has a label elem

Closing the Form

FormHelper::end($options = null) The FormHelper includes an end() method that completes the form. Often, end() only outputs a closing form tag, but using end() also allows the FormHelper to insert needed hidden form elements that SecurityComponent requires:
<?php echo $this->Form->create(); ?> <!-- Form elements go here --> <?php echo $this->Form->end(); ?>

If a string is supplied as the rst parameter to end(), the FormHelper outputs a submit button named accordingly along with the closing form tag:
<?php echo $this->Form->end(Finish); ?>

Will output:
<div class="submit"> <input type="submit" value="Finish" /> </div> </form>

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$options = array( label => Update, div => array( class => glass-pill, ) ); echo $this->Form->end($options);

Will output:
<div class="glass-pill"><input type="submit" value="Update" name="Update"></div>

See the API (http://api20.cakephp.org) for further details. Note: If you are using SecurityComponent in your application you should always end your forms with end().

Creating form elements

There are a few ways to create form inputs with the FormHelper. Well start by looking at input(). This method will automatically inspect the model eld it has been supplied in order to create an appropriate input for that eld. Internally input() delegates to other methods in FormHelper. FormHelper::input(string $eldName, array $options = array()) Creates the following elements given a particular Model.field: Wrapping div. Label element Input element(s) Error element with message if applicable. The type of input created depends on the column datatype: Column Type Resulting Form Field string (char, varchar, etc.) text boolean, tinyint(1) checkbox text textarea text, with name of password, passwd, or psword password text, with name of email email text, with name of tel, telephone, or phone tel date day, month, and year selects datetime, timestamp day, month, year, hour, minute, and meridian selects time hour, minute, and meridian selects Helpers 323

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The $options parameter allows you to customize how input() works, and nely control what is generated. The wrapping div will have a required classname appended if the validation rules for the Models eld do not specify allowEmpty => true. One limitation of this behavior is the elds model must have been loaded during this request. Or be directly associated to the model supplied to create(). New in version 2.3. Since 2.3 the HTML5 required attribute will also be added to the input based on validation rules. You can explicitly set required key in options array to override it for a eld. To skip browser validation triggering for the whole form you can set option formnovalidate => true for the input button you generate using FormHelper::submit() or set novalidate => true in options for FormHelper::create(). For example, lets assume that your User model includes elds for a username (varchar), password (varchar), approved (datetime) and quote (text). You can use the input() method of the FormHelper to create appropriate inputs for all of these form elds:
echo $this->Form->create(); echo echo echo echo $this->Form->input(username); $this->Form->input(password); $this->Form->input(approved); $this->Form->input(quote); //text //password //day, month, year, hour, minute, meridian //textarea

echo $this->Form->end(Add);

A more extensive example showing some options for a date eld:

echo $this->Form->input(birth_dt, array( label => Date of birth, dateFormat => DMY, minYear => date(Y) - 70, maxYear => date(Y) - 18, ));

Besides the specic options for input() found below, you can specify any option for the input type & any html attribute (for instance onfocus). For more information on $options and $htmlAttributes see HtmlHelper. Assuming that User hasAndBelongsToMany Group. In your controller, set a camelCase plural variable (group -> groups in this case, or ExtraFunkyModel -> extraFunkyModels) with the select options. In the controller action you would put the following:
$this->set(groups, $this->User->Group->find(list));

And in the view a multiple select can be created with this simple code:
echo $this->Form->input(Group);

If you want to create a select eld while using a belongsTo - or hasOne - Relation, you can add the following to your Users-controller (assuming your User belongsTo Group):

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$this->set(groups, $this->User->Group->find(list));

Afterwards, add the following to your form-view:

echo $this->Form->input(group_id);

If your model name consists of two or more words, e.g., UserGroup, when passing the data using set() you should name your data in a pluralised and camelCased format as follows:

$this->set(userGroups, $this->UserGroup->find(list)); // or $this->set(reallyInappropriateModelNames, $this->ReallyInappropriateModelName->find(

Note: Try to avoid using FormHelper::input() to generate submit buttons. FormHelper::submit() instead. FormHelper::inputs(mixed $elds = null, array $blacklist = null) Generate a set of inputs for $fields. If $elds is null the current model will be used.

Use

In addition to controller elds output, $fields can be used to control legend and eldset rendering with the fieldset and legend keys. $this->Form->inputs(array(legend => My legend)); Would generate an input set with a custom legend. You can customize individual inputs through $fields as well.:
echo $this->Form->inputs(array( name => array(label => custom label) ));

In addition to elds control, inputs() allows you to use a few additional options. fieldset Set to false to disable the eldset. If a string is supplied it will be used as the classname for the eldset element. legend Set to false to disable the legend for the generated input set. Or supply a string to customize the legend text. Field naming conventions The Form helper is pretty smart. Whenever you specify a eld name with the form helper methods, itll automatically use the current model name to build an input with a format like the following:
<input type="text" id="ModelnameFieldname" name="data[Modelname][fieldname]">

This allows you to omit the model name when generating inputs for the model that the form was created for. You can create inputs for associated models, or arbitrary models by passing in Modelname.eldname as the rst parameter:
echo $this->Form->input(Modelname.fieldname);

If you need to specify multiple elds using the same eld name, thus creating an array that can be saved in one shot with saveAll(), use the following convention:

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echo $this->Form->input(Modelname.0.fieldname); echo $this->Form->input(Modelname.1.fieldname);

Output:
<input type="text" id="Modelname0Fieldname" name="data[Modelname][0][fieldname]"> <input type="text" id="Modelname1Fieldname" name="data[Modelname][1][fieldname]">

FormHelper uses several eld-sufxes internally for datetime input creation. If you are using elds named year, month, day, hour, minute, or meridian and having issues getting the correct input, you can set the name attribute to override the default behavior:
echo $this->Form->input(Model.year, array( type => text, name => data[Model][year] ));

Options FormHelper::input() supports a large number of options. In addition to its own options input() accepts options for the generated input types, as well as html attributes. The following will cover the options specic to FormHelper::input(). $options[type] You can force the type of an input, overriding model introspection, by specifying a type. In addition to the eld types found in the Creating form elements, you can also create le, password, and any type supported by HTML5:
echo $this->Form->input(field, array(type => file)); echo $this->Form->input(email, array(type => email));

Output:
<div class="input file"> <label for="UserField">Field</label> <input type="file" name="data[User][field]" value="" id="UserField" /> </div> <div class="input email"> <label for="UserEmail">Email</label> <input type="email" name="data[User][email]" value="" id="UserEmail" /> </div>

$options[div] Use this option to set attributes of the inputs containing div. Using a string value will set the divs class name. An array will set the divs attributes to those specied by the arrays keys/values. Alternatively, you can set this key to false to disable the output of the div. Setting the class name:
echo $this->Form->input(User.name, array( div => class_name ));

Output:

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<div class="class_name"> <label for="UserName">Name</label> <input name="data[User][name]" type="text" value="" id="UserName" /> </div>

Setting multiple attributes:

echo $this->Form->input(User.name, array( div => array( id => mainDiv, title => Div Title, style => display:block ) ));

Output:
<div class="input text" id="mainDiv" title="Div Title" style="display:block"> <label for="UserName">Name</label> <input name="data[User][name]" type="text" value="" id="UserName" /> </div>

Disabling div output:

echo $this->Form->input(User.name, array(div => false)); ?>

Output:
<label for="UserName">Name</label> <input name="data[User][name]" type="text" value="" id="UserName" />

$options[label] Set this key to the string you would like to be displayed within the label that usually accompanies the input:
echo $this->Form->input(User.name, array( label => The User Alias ));

Output:
<div class="input"> <label for="UserName">The User Alias</label> <input name="data[User][name]" type="text" value="" id="UserName" /> </div>

Alternatively, set this key to false to disable the output of the label:
echo $this->Form->input(User.name, array(label => false));

Output:
<div class="input"> <input name="data[User][name]" type="text" value="" id="UserName" /> </div>

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Set this to an array to provide additional options for the label element. If you do this, you can use a text key in the array to customize the label text:
echo $this->Form->input(User.name, array( label => array( class => thingy, text => The User Alias ) ));

Output:
<div class="input"> <label for="UserName" class="thingy">The User Alias</label> <input name="data[User][name]" type="text" value="" id="UserName" /> </div>

$options[error] Using this key allows you to override the default model error messages and can be used, for example, to set i18n messages. It has a number of suboptions which control the wrapping element, wrapping element class name, and whether HTML in the error message will be escaped. To disable error message output & eld classes set the error key to false:
$this->Form->input(Model.field, array(error => false));

To disable only the error message, but retain the eld classes, set the errorMessage key to false:
$this->Form->input(Model.field, array(errorMessage => false));

To modify the wrapping element type and its class, use the following format:
$this->Form->input(Model.field, array( error => array(attributes => array(wrap => span, class => bzzz)) ));

To prevent HTML being automatically escaped in the error message output, set the escape suboption to false:
$this->Form->input(Model.field, array( error => array( attributes => array(escape => false) ) ));

To override the model error messages use an array with the keys matching the validation rule names:
$this->Form->input(Model.field, array( error => array(tooShort => __(This is not long enough)) ));

As seen above you can set the error message for each validation rule you have in your models. In addition you can provide i18n messages for your forms. New in version 2.3: Support for the errorMessage option was added in 2.3

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$options[before], $options[after]

$options[between],

$options[separator],

and

Use these keys if you need to inject some markup inside the output of the input() method:
echo $this->Form->input(field, array( before => --before--, after => --after--, between => --between--- ));

Output:
<div class="input"> --before-<label for="UserField">Field</label> --between--<input name="data[User][field]" type="text" value="" id="UserField" /> --after-</div>

For radio inputs the separator attribute can be used to inject markup to separate each input/label pair:
echo $this->Form->input(field, array( before => --before--, after => --after--, between => --between---, separator => --separator--, options => array(1, 2) ));

Output:
<div class="input"> --before-<input name="data[User][field]" type="radio" value="1" id="UserField1" /> <label for="UserField1">1</label> --separator-<input name="data[User][field]" type="radio" value="2" id="UserField2" /> <label for="UserField2">2</label> --between----after-</div>

For date and datetime type elements the separator attribute can be used to change the string between select elements. Defaults to -. $options[format] The ordering of the html generated FormHelper is controllable as well. The format options supports an array of strings describing the template you would like said element to follow. The supported array keys are: array(before, input, between, label, after,error). $options[inputDefaults] If you nd yourself repeating the same options in multiple input() calls, you can use inputDefaults to keep your code dry:

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echo $this->Form->create(User, array( inputDefaults => array( label => false, div => false ) ));

All inputs created from that point forward would inherit the options declared in inputDefaults. You can override the defaultOptions by declaring the option in the input() call:
// No div, no label echo $this->Form->input(password); // has a label element echo $this->Form->input(username, array(label => Username));

If you need to later change the defaults you can use FormHelper::inputDefaults().
Generating specic types of inputs

In addition to the generic input() method, FormHelper has specic methods for generating a number of different types of inputs. These can be used to generate just the input widget itself, and combined with other methods like label() and error() to generate fully custom form layouts. Common options Many of the various input element methods support a common set of options. All of these options are also supported by input(). To reduce repetition the common options shared by all input methods are as follows: $options[class] You can set the classname for an input:
echo $this->Form->input(title, array(class => custom-class));

$options[id] Set this key to force the value of the DOM id for the input. $options[default] Used to set a default value for the input eld. The value is used if the data passed to the form does not contain a value for the eld (or if no data is passed at all). Example usage:
echo $this->Form->input(ingredient, array(default => Sugar));

Example with select eld (Size Medium will be selected as default):

$sizes = array(s => Small, m => Medium, l => Large); echo $this->Form->input(size, array(options => $sizes, default => m));

Note: You cannot use default to check a checkbox - instead you might set the value in $this->request->data in your controller, or set the input option checked to true. Date and datetime elds default values can be set by using the selected key.

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Beware of using false to assign a default value. A false value is used to disable/exclude options of an input eld, so default => false would not set any value at all. Instead use default => 0. In addition to the above options, you can mixin any html attribute you wish to use. Any non-special option name will be treated as an HTML attribute, and applied to the generated HTML input element. Options for select, checkbox and radio inputs $options[selected] Used in combination with a select-type input (i.e. For types select, date, time, datetime). Set selected to the value of the item you wish to be selected by default when the input is rendered:
echo $this->Form->input(close_time, array( type => time, selected => 13:30:00 ));

Note: The selected key for date and datetime inputs may also be a UNIX timestamp. $options[empty] If set to true, forces the input to remain empty. When passed to a select list, this creates a blank option with an empty value in your drop down list. If you want to have a empty value with text displayed instead of just a blank option, pass in a string to empty:
echo $this->Form->input(field, array( options => array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5), empty => (choose one) ));

Output:
<div class="input"> <label for="UserField">Field</label> <select name="data[User][field]" id="UserField"> <option value="">(choose one)</option> <option value="0">1</option> <option value="1">2</option> <option value="2">3</option> <option value="3">4</option> <option value="4">5</option> </select> </div>

Note: If you need to set the default value in a password eld to blank, use value => instead. Options can also supplied as key-value pairs.

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$options[hiddenField] For certain input types (checkboxes, radios) a hidden input is created so that the key in $this->request->data will exist even without a value specied:
<input type="hidden" name="data[Post][Published]" id="PostPublished_" value="0" /> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Post][Published]" value="1" id="PostPublished" />

This can be disabled by setting the $options[hiddenField] = false:

echo $this->Form->checkbox(published, array(hiddenField => false));

Which outputs:
<input type="checkbox" name="data[Post][Published]" value="1" id="PostPublished" />

If you want to create multiple blocks of inputs on a form that are all grouped together, you should use this parameter on all inputs except the rst. If the hidden input is on the page in multiple places, only the last group of inputs values will be saved In this example, only the tertiary colors would be passed, and the primary colors would be overridden:
<h2>Primary Colors</h2> <input type="hidden" name="data[Color][Color]" id="Colors_" value="0" /> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Color][Color][]" value="5" id="ColorsRed" /> <label for="ColorsRed">Red</label> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Color][Color][]" value="5" id="ColorsBlue" /> <label for="ColorsBlue">Blue</label> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Color][Color][]" value="5" id="ColorsYellow" /> <label for="ColorsYellow">Yellow</label> <h2>Tertiary Colors</h2> <input type="hidden" name="data[Color][Color]" id="Colors_" value="0" /> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Color][Color][]" value="5" id="ColorsGreen" /> <label for="ColorsGreen">Green</label> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Color][Color][]" value="5" id="ColorsPurple" /> <label for="ColorsPurple">Purple</label> <input type="checkbox" name="data[Addon][Addon][]" value="5" id="ColorsOrange" /> <label for="ColorsOrange">Orange</label>

Disabling the hiddenField on the second input group would prevent this behavior. You can set a different hidden eld value other than 0 such as N:
echo $this->Form->checkbox(published, array( value => Y, hiddenField => N, ));

Datetime options $options[timeFormat] Used to specify the format of the select inputs for a time-related set of inputs. Valid values include 12, 24, and null. $options[dateFormat] Used to specify the format of the select inputs for a date-related set of inputs. Valid values include any combination of D, M and Y or null. The inputs will be put 332 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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in the order dened by the dateFormat option. $options[minYear], $options[maxYear] Used in combination with a date/datetime input. Denes the lower and/or upper end of values shown in the years select eld. $options[orderYear] Used in combination with a date/datetime input. Denes the order in which the year values will be set. Valid values include asc, desc. The default value is desc. $options[interval] This option species the number of minutes between each option in the minutes select box:
echo $this->Form->input(Model.time, array( type => time, interval => 15 ));

Would create 4 options in the minute select. One for each 15 minutes.
Form Element-Specic Methods

FormHelper::label(string $eldName, string $text, array $options) Create a label element. $fieldName is used for generating the DOM id. If $text is undened, $fieldName will be used to inect the labels text:
echo $this->Form->label(User.name); echo $this->Form->label(User.name, Your username);

Output:
<label for="UserName">Name</label> <label for="UserName">Your username</label>

$options can either be an array of html attributes, or a string that will be used as a classname:
echo $this->Form->label(User.name, null, array(id => user-label)); echo $this->Form->label(User.name, Your username, highlight);

Output:
<label for="UserName" id="user-label">Name</label> <label for="UserName" class="highlight">Your username</label>

FormHelper::text(string $name, array $options) The rest of the methods available in the FormHelper are for creating specic form elements. Many of these methods also make use of a special $options parameter. In this case, however, $options is used primarily to specify HTML tag attributes (such as the value or DOM id of an element in the form):
echo $this->Form->text(username, array(class => users));

Will output:

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<input name="data[User][username]" type="text" class="users" id="UserUsername" />

FormHelper::password(string $eldName, array $options) Creates a password eld.:

echo $this->Form->password(password);

Will output:
<input name="data[User][password]" value="" id="UserPassword" type="password" />

FormHelper::hidden(string $eldName, array $options) Creates a hidden form input. Example:

echo $this->Form->hidden(id);

Will output:
<input name="data[User][id]" value="10" id="UserId" type="hidden" />

Changed in version 2.0: Hidden elds no longer remove the class attribute. This means that if there are validation errors on hidden elds, the error-eld classname will be applied. FormHelper::textarea(string $eldName, array $options) Creates a textarea input eld.:
echo $this->Form->textarea(notes);

Will output:
<textarea name="data[User][notes]" id="UserNotes"></textarea>

Note: The textarea input type allows for the $options attribute of escape which determines whether or not the contents of the textarea should be escaped. Defaults to true.
echo $this->Form->textarea(notes, array(escape => false); // OR.... echo $this->Form->input(notes, array(type => textarea, escape => false);

Options In addition to the Common options, textarea() supports a few specic options: $options[rows], $options[cols] These two keys specify the number of rows and columns:
echo $this->Form->textarea(textarea, array(rows => 5, cols => 5));

Output:
<textarea name="data[Form][textarea]" cols="5" rows="5" id="FormTextarea"> </textarea>

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FormHelper::checkbox(string $eldName, array $options) Creates a checkbox form element. This method also generates an associated hidden form input to force the submission of data for the specied eld.:
echo $this->Form->checkbox(done);

Will output:
<input type="hidden" name="data[User][done]" value="0" id="UserDone_" /> <input type="checkbox" name="data[User][done]" value="1" id="UserDone" />

It is possible to specify the value of the checkbox by using the $options array:
echo $this->Form->checkbox(done, array(value => 555));

Will output:
<input type="hidden" name="data[User][done]" value="0" id="UserDone_" /> <input type="checkbox" name="data[User][done]" value="555" id="UserDone" />

If you dont want the Form helper to create a hidden input:

echo $this->Form->checkbox(done, array(hiddenField => false));

Will output:
<input type="checkbox" name="data[User][done]" value="1" id="UserDone" />

FormHelper::radio(string $eldName, array $options, array $attributes) Creates a set of radio button inputs. Options $attributes[value] to set which value should be selected default. $attributes[separator] to specify HTML in between radio buttons (e.g. <br />). $attributes[between] specify some content to be inserted between the legend and rst element. $attributes[disabled] Setting this to true or disabled will disable all of the generated radio buttons. $attributes[legend] Radio elements are wrapped with a label and eldset by default. Set $attributes[legend] to false to remove them.:
$options = array(M => Male, F => Female); $attributes = array(legend => false); echo $this->Form->radio(gender, $options, $attributes);

Will output:
<input name="data[User][gender]" id="UserGender_" value="" type="hidden" /> <input name="data[User][gender]" id="UserGenderM" value="M" type="radio" /> <label for="UserGenderM">Male</label>

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<input name="data[User][gender]" id="UserGenderF" value="F" type="radio" /> <label for="UserGenderF">Female</label>

If for some reason you dont want the hidden input, setting $attributes[value] to a selected value or boolean false will do just that. Changed in version 2.1: The $attributes[disabled] option was added in 2.1. FormHelper::select(string $eldName, array $options, array $attributes) Creates a select element, populated with the items in $options, with the option specied by $attributes[value] shown as selected by default. Set to false the the empty key in the $attributes variable to turn off the default empty option:
$options = array(M => Male, F => Female); echo $this->Form->select(gender, $options);

Will output:
<select name="data[User][gender]" id="UserGender"> <option value=""></option> <option value="M">Male</option> <option value="F">Female</option> </select>

The select input type allows for a special $option attribute called escape which accepts a bool and determines whether to HTML entity encode the contents of the select options. Defaults to true:
$options = array(M => Male, F => Female); echo $this->Form->select(gender, $options, array(escape => false));

$attributes[options] This key allows you to manually specify options for a select input, or for a radio group. Unless the type is specied as radio, the FormHelper will assume that the target output is a select input:
echo $this->Form->select(field, array(1,2,3,4,5));

Output:
<select name="data[User][field]" id="UserField"> <option value="0">1</option> <option value="1">2</option> <option value="2">3</option> <option value="3">4</option> <option value="4">5</option> </select>

Options can also be supplied as key-value pairs:

echo $this->Form->select(field, array( Value 1 => Label 1, Value 2 => Label 2, Value 3 => Label 3 ));

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Output:
<select name="data[User][field]" id="UserField"> <option value="Value 1">Label 1</option> <option value="Value 2">Label 2</option> <option value="Value 3">Label 3</option> </select>

If you would like to generate a select with optgroups, just pass data in hierarchical format. This works on multiple checkboxes and radio buttons too, but instead of optgroups wraps elements in eldsets:
$options = array( Group 1 => array( Value 1 => Label 1, Value 2 => Label 2 ), Group 2 => array( Value 3 => Label 3 ) ); echo $this->Form->select(field, $options);

Output:
<select name="data[User][field]" id="UserField"> <optgroup label="Group 1"> <option value="Value 1">Label 1</option> <option value="Value 2">Label 2</option> </optgroup> <optgroup label="Group 2"> <option value="Value 3">Label 3</option> </optgroup> </select>

$attributes[multiple] If multiple has been set to true for an input that outputs a select, the select will allow multiple selections:
echo $this->Form->select(Model.field, $options, array(multiple => true));

Alternatively set multiple to checkbox to output a list of related check boxes:

$options = array( Value 1 => Label 1, Value 2 => Label 2 ); echo $this->Form->select(Model.field, $options, array( multiple => checkbox ));

Output:
<div class="input select"> <label for="ModelField">Field</label> <input name="data[Model][field]" value="" id="ModelField" type="hidden">

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<div class="checkbox"> <input name="data[Model][field][]" value="Value 1" id="ModelField1" type="ch <label for="ModelField1">Label 1</label> </div> <div class="checkbox"> <input name="data[Model][field][]" value="Value 2" id="ModelField2" type="ch <label for="ModelField2">Label 2</label> </div> </div>

$attributes[disabled] When creating checkboxes, this option can be set to disable all or some checkboxes. To disable all checkboxes set disabled to true:
$options = array( Value 1 => Label 1, Value 2 => Label 2 ); echo $this->Form->select(Model.field, $options, array( multiple => checkbox, disabled => array(Value 1) ));

Output:

<div class="input select"> <label for="ModelField">Field</label> <input name="data[Model][field]" value="" id="ModelField" type="hidden"> <div class="checkbox"> <input name="data[Model][field][]" disabled="disabled" value="Value 1" id="M <label for="ModelField1">Label 1</label> </div> <div class="checkbox"> <input name="data[Model][field][]" value="Value 2" id="ModelField2" type="ch <label for="ModelField2">Label 2</label> </div> </div>

Changed in version 2.3: Support for arrays in $attributes[disabled] was added in 2.3. FormHelper::file(string $eldName, array $options) To add a le upload eld to a form, you must rst make sure that the form enctype is set to multipart/form-data, so start off with a create function such as the following:
echo $this->Form->create(Document, array(enctype => multipart/form-data)); // OR echo $this->Form->create(Document, array(type => file));

Next add either of the two lines to your form view le:
echo $this->Form->input(Document.submittedfile, array( between => <br />, type => file ));

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// OR echo $this->Form->file(Document.submittedfile);

Due to the limitations of HTML itself, it is not possible to put default values into input elds of type le. Each time the form is displayed, the value inside will be empty. Upon submission, le elds provide an expanded data array to the script receiving the form data. For the example above, the values in the submitted data array would be organized as follows, if the CakePHP was installed on a Windows server. tmp_name will have a different path in a Unix environment:
$this->request->data[Document][submittedfile] = array( name => conference_schedule.pdf, type => application/pdf, tmp_name => C:/WINDOWS/TEMP/php1EE.tmp, error => 0, size => 41737, );

This array is generated by PHP itself, so for more detail on the way PHP handles data passed via le elds read the PHP manual section on le uploads (http://php.net/features.le-upload). Validating Uploads Below is an example validation method you could dene in your model to validate whether a le has been successfully uploaded:
public function isUploadedFile($params) { $val = array_shift($params); if ((isset($val[error]) && $val[error] == 0) || (!empty( $val[tmp_name]) && $val[tmp_name] != none) ) { return is_uploaded_file($val[tmp_name]); } return false; }

Creates a le input:
echo $this->Form->create(User, array(type => file)); echo $this->Form->file(avatar);

Will output:
<form enctype="multipart/form-data" method="post" action="/users/add"> <input name="data[User][avatar]" value="" id="UserAvatar" type="file">

Note: When using $this->Form->file(), remember to set the form encoding-type, by setting the type option to le in $this->Form->create()

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Creating buttons and submit elements

FormHelper::submit(string $caption, array $options) Creates a submit button with caption $caption. If the supplied $caption is a URL to an image (it contains a . character), the submit button will be rendered as an image. It is enclosed between div tags by default; you can avoid this by declaring $options[div] = false:
echo $this->Form->submit();

Will output:
<div class="submit"><input value="Submit" type="submit"></div>

You can also pass a relative or absolute url to an image for the caption parameter instead of caption text.:
echo $this->Form->submit(ok.png);

Will output:
<div class="submit"><input type="image" src="/img/ok.png"></div>

FormHelper::button(string $title, array $options = array()) Creates an HTML button with the specied title and a default type of button. $options[type] will output one of the three possible button types: 1.submit: Same as the $this->Form->submit method - (the default). 2.reset: Creates a form reset button. 3.button: Creates a standard push button.
echo echo echo echo

Setting

$this->Form->button(A Button); $this->Form->button(Another Button, array(type => button)); $this->Form->button(Reset the Form, array(type => reset)); $this->Form->button(Submit Form, array(type => submit));

Will output:
<button <button <button <button type="submit">A Button</button> type="button">Another Button</button> type="reset">Reset the Form</button> type="submit">Submit Form</button>

The button input type supports the escape option, which accepts a bool and determines whether to HTML entity encode the $title of the button. Defaults to false:
echo $this->Form->button(Submit Form, array(type => submit, escape => true));

FormHelper::postButton(string $title, mixed $url, array $options = array ()) Create a <button> tag with a surrounding <form> that submits via POST.

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This method creates a <form> element. So do not use this method in some opened form. Instead use FormHelper::submit() or FormHelper::button() to create buttons inside opened forms. FormHelper::postLink(string $title, mixed $url = null, array $options = array (), string $conrmMessage = false) Creates an HTML link, but access the url using method POST. Requires javascript to be enabled in browser. This method creates a <form> element. So do not use this method inside an existing form. Instead you should add a submit button using FormHelper::submit() Changed in version 2.3: The method option was added.
Creating date and time inputs

FormHelper::dateTime($eldName, $dateFormat = DMY, $timeFormat = 12, $attributes = array()) Creates a set of select inputs for date and time. Valid values for $dateformat are DMY, MDY, YMD or NONE. Valid values for $timeFormat are 12, 24, and null. You can specify not to display empty values by setting array(empty => false) in the attributes parameter. It will also pre-select the elds with the current datetime. FormHelper::year(string $eldName, int $minYear, int $maxYear, array $attributes) Creates a select element populated with the years from $minYear to $maxYear. HTML attributes may be supplied in $attributes. If $attributes[empty] is false, the select will not include an empty option:
echo $this->Form->year(purchased, 2000, date(Y));

Will output:
<select name="data[User][purchased][year]" id="UserPurchasedYear"> <option value=""></option> <option value="2009">2009</option> <option value="2008">2008</option> <option value="2007">2007</option> <option value="2006">2006</option> <option value="2005">2005</option> <option value="2004">2004</option> <option value="2003">2003</option> <option value="2002">2002</option> <option value="2001">2001</option> <option value="2000">2000</option> </select>

FormHelper::month(string $eldName, array $attributes) Creates a select element populated with month names:
echo $this->Form->month(mob);

Will output:

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<select name="data[User][mob][month]" id="UserMobMonth"> <option value=""></option> <option value="01">January</option> <option value="02">February</option> <option value="03">March</option> <option value="04">April</option> <option value="05">May</option> <option value="06">June</option> <option value="07">July</option> <option value="08">August</option> <option value="09">September</option> <option value="10">October</option> <option value="11">November</option> <option value="12">December</option> </select>

You can pass in your own array of months to be used by setting the monthNames attribute, or have months displayed as numbers by passing false. (Note: the default months are internationalized and can be translated using localization.):
echo $this->Form->month(mob, null, array(monthNames => false));

FormHelper::day(string $eldName, array $attributes) Creates a select element populated with the (numerical) days of the month. To create an empty option with prompt text of your choosing (e.g. the rst option is Day), you can supply the text as the nal parameter as follows:
echo $this->Form->day(created);

Will output:
<select name="data[User][created][day]" id="UserCreatedDay"> <option value=""></option> <option value="01">1</option> <option value="02">2</option> <option value="03">3</option> ... <option value="31">31</option> </select>

FormHelper::hour(string $eldName, boolean $format24Hours, array $attributes) Creates a select element populated with the hours of the day. FormHelper::minute(string $eldName, array $attributes) Creates a select element populated with the minutes of the hour. FormHelper::meridian(string $eldName, array $attributes) Creates a select element populated with am and pm.

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Displaying and checking errors

FormHelper::error(string $eldName, mixed $text, array $options) Shows a validation error message, specied by $text, for the given eld, in the event that a validation error has occurred. Options: escape bool Whether or not to html escape the contents of the error. wrap mixed Whether or not the error message should be wrapped in a div. If a string, will be used as the HTML tag to use. class string The classname for the error message FormHelper::isFieldError(string $eldName) Returns true if the supplied $eldName has an active validation error.:
if ($this->Form->isFieldError(gender)) { echo $this->Form->error(gender); }

Note: When using FormHelper::input(), errors are rendered by default. FormHelper::tagIsInvalid() Returns false if given form eld described by the current entity has no errors. Otherwise it returns the validation message.
Setting Defaults for all elds

New in version 2.2. You can declare a set of default options for input() using FormHelper::inputDefaults(). Changing the default options allows you to consolidate repeated options into a single method call:
$this->Form->inputDefaults(array( label => false, div => false, class => fancy ) );

All inputs created from that point forward will inherit the options declared in inputDefaults. You can override the default options by declaring the option in the input() call:

echo $this->Form->input(password); // No div, no label with class fancy echo $this->Form->input(username, array(label => Username)); // has a label element s

Working with SecurityComponent

SecurityComponent offers several features that make your forms safer and more secure. By simply Helpers 343

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including the SecurityComponent in your controller, youll automatically benet from CSRF and form tampering features. As mentioned previously when using SecurityComponent, you should always close your forms using FormHelper::end(). This will ensure that the special _Token inputs are generated. FormHelper::unlockField($name) Unlocks a eld making it exempt from the SecurityComponent eld hashing. This also allows the elds to be manipulated by Javascript. The $name parameter should be the entity name for the input:
$this->Form->unlockField(User.id);

FormHelper::secure(array $elds = array()) Generates a hidden eld with a security hash based on the elds used in the form.
2.0 updates

$selected parameter removed The $selected parameter was removed from several methods in FormHelper. All methods now support a $attributes[value] key now which should be used in place of $selected. This change simplies the FormHelper methods, reducing the number of arguments, and reduces the duplication that $selected created. The effected methods are: FormHelper::select() FormHelper::dateTime() FormHelper::year() FormHelper::month() FormHelper::day() FormHelper::hour() FormHelper::minute() FormHelper::meridian() Default urls on forms is the current action The default url for all forms, is now the current url including passed, named, and querystring parameters. You can override this default by supplying $options[url] in the second parameter of $this->Form->create() FormHelper::hidden() Hidden elds no longer remove the class attribute. This means that if there are validation errors on hidden elds, the error-eld classname will be applied.

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HtmlHelper class HtmlHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The role of the HtmlHelper in CakePHP is to make HTML-related options easier, faster, and more resilient to change. Using this helper will enable your application to be more light on its feet, and more exible on where it is placed in relation to the root of a domain. Many HtmlHelper methods include a $htmlAttributes parameter, that allow you to tack on any extra attributes on your tags. Here are a few examples of how to use the $htmlAttributes parameter:
Desired attributes: <tag class="someClass" /> Array parameter: array(class => someClass) Desired attributes: <tag name="foo" value="bar" /> Array parameter: array(name => foo, value => bar)

Note: The HtmlHelper is available in all views by default. If youre getting an error informing you that it isnt there, its usually due to its name being missing from a manually congured $helpers controller variable.

Inserting Well-Formatted elements

The most important task the HtmlHelper accomplishes is creating well formed markup. Dont be afraid to use it often - you can cache views in CakePHP in order to save some CPU cycles when views are being rendered and delivered. This section will cover some of the methods of the HtmlHelper and how to use them. HtmlHelper::charset($charset=null) Parameters $charset (string) Desired character set. If null, the value of App.encoding will be used. Used to create a meta tag specifying the documents character. Defaults to UTF-8 Example use:
echo $this->Html->charset();

Will output:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />

Alternatively,
echo $this->Html->charset(ISO-8859-1);

Will output:

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<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" />

HtmlHelper::css(mixed $path, array $options = array()) Changed in version 2.4. Parameters $path (mixed) Either a string of the css le to link, or an array with multiple les $options (array) An array of options or html attributes. Creates a link(s) to a CSS style-sheet. If key inline is set to false in $options parameter, the link tags are added to the css block which you can print inside the head tag of the document. You can use the block option to control which block the link element will be appended to. By default it will append to the css block. If key rel in $options array is set to import the stylesheet will be imported. This method of CSS inclusion assumes that the CSS le specied resides inside the /app/webroot/css directory if path doesnt start with a /.:
echo $this->Html->css(forms);

Will output:
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/forms.css" />

The rst parameter can be an array to include multiple les.:

echo $this->Html->css(array(forms, tables, menu));

Will output:
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/forms.css" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/tables.css" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/css/menu.css" />

You can include css les from any loaded plugin using plugin syntax. To include app/Plugin/DebugKit/webroot/css/toolbar.css You could use the following:
echo $this->Html->css(DebugKit.toolbar.css);

If you want to include a css le which shares a name with a loaded plugin you can do the following. For example if you had a Blog plugin, and also wanted to include app/webroot/css/Blog.common.css, you would:
echo $this->Html->css(Blog.common.css, null, array(plugin => false));

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$url (mixed) The url for the meta tag, either a string or a routing array. $options (array) An array of html attributes. This method is handy for linking to external resources like RSS/Atom feeds and favicons. Like css(), you can specify whether or not youd like this tag to appear inline or appended to the meta block by setting the inline key in the $attributes parameter to false, ie - array(inline => false). If you set the type attribute using the $attributes parameter, CakePHP contains a few shortcuts: type html rss atom icon translated value text/html application/rss+xml application/atom+xml image/x-icon

<?php echo $this->Html->meta( favicon.ico, /favicon.ico, array(type => icon) ); ?> // Output (line breaks added) <link href="http://example.com/favicon.ico" title="favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" rel="alternate" /> <?php echo $this->Html->meta( Comments, /comments/index.rss, array(type => rss) ); ?> // Output (line breaks added) <link href="http://example.com/comments/index.rss" title="Comments" type="application/rss+xml" rel="alternate" />

This method can also be used to add the meta keywords and descriptions. Example:
<?php echo $this->Html->meta( keywords, enter any meta keyword here ); ?> // Output <meta name="keywords" content="enter any meta keyword here" />

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<?php echo $this->Html->meta( description, enter any meta description here ); ?> // Output <meta name="description" content="enter any meta description here" />

If you want to add a custom meta tag then the rst parameter should be set to an array. To output a robots noindex tag use the following code:
echo $this->Html->meta(array(name => robots, content => noindex));

Changed in version 2.1: The block option was added. HtmlHelper::docType(string $type = xhtml-strict) Parameters $type (string) The type of doctype being made. Returns a (X)HTML doctype tag. Supply the doctype according to the following table: type html4-strict html4-trans html4-frame html5 xhtml-strict xhtml-trans xhtml-frame xhtml11 translated value HTML4 Strict HTML4 Transitional HTML4 Frameset HTML5 XHTML1 Strict XHTML1 Transitional XHTML1 Frameset XHTML1.1

echo $this->Html->docType(); // Outputs: <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.or echo $this->Html->docType(html5); // Outputs: <!DOCTYPE html>

echo $this->Html->docType(html4-trans); // Outputs: <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www

Changed in version 2.1: The default doctype is html5 in 2.1. HtmlHelper::style(array $data, boolean $oneline = true) Parameters $data (array) A set of key => values with CSS properties. $oneline (boolean) Should the contents be on one line. Builds CSS style denitions based on the keys and values of the array passed to the method. Especially handy if your CSS le is dynamic.:

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echo $this->Html->style(array( background => #633, border-bottom => 1px solid #000, padding => 10px ));

Will output:
background:#633; border-bottom:1px solid #000; padding:10px;

HtmlHelper::image(string $path, array $options = array()) Parameters $path (string) Path to the image. $options (array) An array of html attributes. Creates a formatted image tag. The path supplied should be relative to /app/webroot/img/.:
echo $this->Html->image(cake_logo.png, array(alt => CakePHP));

Will output:
<img src="/img/cake_logo.png" alt="CakePHP" />

To create an image link specify the link destination using the url option in $htmlAttributes.:
echo $this->Html->image("recipes/6.jpg", array( "alt" => "Brownies", url => array(controller => recipes, action => view, 6) ));

Will output:
<a href="/recipes/view/6"> <img src="/img/recipes/6.jpg" alt="Brownies" /> </a>

If you are creating images in emails, or want absolute paths to images you can use the fullBase option:
echo $this->Html->image("logo.png", array(fullBase => true));

Will output:
<img src="http://example.com/img/logo.jpg" alt="" />

You can include image les from any loaded plugin using plugin syntax. To include app/Plugin/DebugKit/webroot/img/icon.png You could use the following:
echo $this->Html->image(DebugKit.icon.png);

If you want to include a image le which shares a name with a loaded plugin you can do the following. For example if you had a Blog plugin, and also wanted to include app/webroot/js/Blog.icon.png, you would: Helpers 349

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echo $this->Html->image(Blog.icon.png, array(plugin => false));

Changed in version 2.1: The fullBase option was added. Support for plugin syntax was added. HtmlHelper::link(string $title, mixed $url = null, array $options = array(), string $conrmMessage = false) param string $title The text to display as the body of the link. param mixed $url Either the string location, or a routing array. param array $options An array of html attributes. General purpose method for creating HTML links. Use $options to specify attributes for the element and whether or not the $title should be escaped.:

echo $this->Html->link(Enter, /pages/home, array(class => button, target

Will output:
<a href="/pages/home" class="button" target="_blank">Enter</a>

Use full_base=>true option for absolute URLs:

echo $this->Html->link( Dashboard, array(controller => dashboards, action => index, full_base => true) );

Will output:
<a href="http://www.yourdomain.com/dashboards/index">Dashboard</a>

Specify $confirmMessage to display a javascript confirm() dialog:

echo $this->Html->link( Delete, array(controller => recipes, action => delete, 6), array(), "Are you sure you wish to delete this recipe?" );

Will output:

<a href="/recipes/delete/6" onclick="return confirm(Are you sure you wish to dele

Query strings can also be created with link().:

echo $this->Html->link(View image, array( controller => images, action => view, 1, ? => array(height => 400, width => 500)) );

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<a href="/images/view/1?height=400&width=500">View image</a>

HTML special characters in $title will be converted to HTML entities. To disable this conversion, set the escape option to false in the $options array.:
<?php echo $this->Html->link( $this->Html->image("recipes/6.jpg", array("alt" => "Brownies")), "recipes/view/6", array(escape => false) );

Will output:
<a href="/recipes/view/6"> <img src="/img/recipes/6.jpg" alt="Brownies" /> </a>

Setting escape to false will also disable escaping of attributes of the link. As of 2.4 you can use the option escapeTitle to disable just escaping of title and not the attributes.:
<?php echo $this->Html->link( $this->Html->image(recipes/6.jpg, array(alt => Brownies)), recipes/view/6, array(escapeTitle => false, title => hi "howdy") );

Will output:
<a href="/recipes/view/6" title="hi &quot;howdy&quot;"> <img src="/img/recipes/6.jpg" alt="Brownies" /> </a>

Changed in version 2.4: The escapeTitle option was added. Also check HtmlHelper::url method for more examples of different types of urls. HtmlHelper::media(string|array $path, array $options) Parameters $path (string|array) Path to the video le, relative to the webroot/{$options[pathPrex]} directory. Or an array where each item itself can be a path string or an associate array containing keys src and type. $options (array) Array of HTML attributes, and special options. Options: type Type of media element to generate, valid values are audio or video. If type is not provided media type is guessed based on les mime type. text Text to include inside the video tag pathPrex Path prex to use for relative urls, defaults to les/

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fullBase If provided the src attribute will get a full address including domain name New in version 2.1. Returns a formatted audio/video tag:
<?php echo $this->Html->media(audio.mp3); ?> // Output <audio src="/files/audio.mp3"></audio> <?php echo $this->Html->media(video.mp4, array( fullBase => true, text => Fallback text )); ?> // Output <video src="http://www.somehost.com/files/video.mp4">Fallback text</video>

<?php echo $this->Html->media( array(video.mp4, array(src => video.ogg, type => "video/ogg; codecs=theo array(autoplay) ); ?> // Output <video autoplay="autoplay"> <source src="/files/video.mp4" type="video/mp4"/> <source src="/files/video.ogg" type="video/ogg; codecs=theora, vorbis"/> </video>

HtmlHelper::tag(string $tag, string $text, array $htmlAttributes) Parameters $tag (string) The tag name being generated. $text (string) The contents for the tag. $options (array) An array of html attributes. Returns text wrapped in a specied tag. If no text is specied then only the opening <tag> is returned.:
<?php echo $this->Html->tag(span, Hello World., array(class => welcome)); ?> // Output <span class="welcome">Hello World</span> // No text specified. <?php echo $this->Html->tag(span, null, array(class => welcome)); ?> // Output <span class="welcome">

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Note: Text is not escaped by default but you may use $htmlOptions[escape] = true to escape your text. This replaces a fourth parameter boolean $escape = false that was available in previous versions. HtmlHelper::div(string $class, string $text, array $options) Parameters $class (string) The classname for the div. $text (string) The content inside the div. $options (array) An array of html attributes. Used for creating div-wrapped sections of markup. The rst parameter species a CSS class, and the second is used to supply the text to be wrapped by div tags. If the last parameter has been set to true, $text will be printed HTML-escaped. If no text is specied, only an opening div tag is returned.:
<?php echo $this->Html->div(error, Please enter your credit card number.); ?> // Output <div class="error">Please enter your credit card number.</div>

HtmlHelper::para(string $class, string $text, array $options) Parameters $class (string) The classname for the paragraph. $text (string) The content inside the paragraph. $options (array) An array of html attributes. Returns a text wrapped in a CSS-classed <p> tag. If no text is supplied, only a starting <p> tag is returned.:
<?php echo $this->Html->para(null, Hello World.); ?> // Output <p>Hello World.</p>

HtmlHelper::script(mixed $url, mixed $options) Parameters $url (mixed) Either a string to a single Javascript le, or an array of strings for multiple les. $options (array) An array of html attributes.

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Include a script le(s), contained either locally or as a remote url. By default, script tags are added to the document inline. If you override this by setting $options[inline] to false, the script tags will instead be added to the script block which you can print elsewhere in the document. If you wish to override which block name is used, you can do so by setting $options[block]. $options[once] controls whether or not you want to include this script once per request or more than once. This defaults to true. You can use $options to set additional properties to the generated script tag. If an array of script tags is used, the attributes will be applied to all of the generated script tags. This method of javascript le inclusion assumes that the javascript le specied resides inside the /app/webroot/js directory:
echo $this->Html->script(scripts);

Will output:
<script type="text/javascript" href="/js/scripts.js"></script>

You can link to les with absolute paths as well to link les that are not in app/webroot/js:
echo $this->Html->script(/otherdir/script_file);

You can also link to a remote URL:

echo $this->Html->script(http://code.jquery.com/jquery.min.js);

Will output:
<script type="text/javascript" href="http://code.jquery.com/jquery.min.js"></script>

The rst parameter can be an array to include multiple les.:

echo $this->Html->script(array(jquery, wysiwyg, scripts));

Will output:
<script type="text/javascript" href="/js/jquery.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" href="/js/wysiwyg.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" href="/js/scripts.js"></script>

You can append the script tag to a specic block using the block option:
echo $this->Html->script(wysiwyg, array(block => scriptBottom));

In your layout you can output all the script tags added to scriptBottom:
echo $this->fetch(scriptBottom);

You can include script les from any loaded plugin using plugin syntax. To include app/Plugin/DebugKit/webroot/js/toolbar.js You could use the following:

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echo $this->Html->script(DebugKit.toolbar.js);

If you want to include a script le which shares a name with a loaded plugin you can do the following. For example if you had a Blog plugin, and also wanted to include app/webroot/js/Blog.plugins.js, you would:
echo $this->Html->script(Blog.plugins.js, array(plugin => false));

Changed in version 2.1: The block option was added. Support for plugin syntax was added. HtmlHelper::scriptBlock($code, $options = array()) Parameters $code (string) The code to go in the script tag. $options (array) An array of html attributes. Generate a code block containing $code set $options[inline] to false to have the script block appear in the script view block. Other options dened will be added as attributes to script tags. $this->Html->scriptBlock(stuff, array(defer => true)); will create a script tag with defer="defer" attribute. HtmlHelper::scriptStart($options = array()) Parameters $options (array) An array of html attributes to be used when scriptEnd is called. Begin a buffering code block. This code block will capture all output between scriptStart() and scriptEnd() and create an script tag. Options are the same as scriptBlock() HtmlHelper::scriptEnd() End a buffering script block, returns the generated script element or null if the script block was opened with inline = false. An example of using scriptStart() and scriptEnd() would be:
$this->Html->scriptStart(array(inline => false)); echo $this->Js->alert(I am in the javascript); $this->Html->scriptEnd();

HtmlHelper::nestedList(array $list, array $options = array(), array $itemOptions = array(), string $tag = ul) Parameters $list (array) Set of elements to list. $options (array) Additional HTML attributes of the list (ol/ul) tag or if ul/ol use that as tag. $itemOptions (array) Additional HTML attributes of the list item (LI) tag. $tag (string) Type of list tag to use (ol/ul).

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Build a nested list (UL/OL) out of an associative array:

$list = array( Languages => array( English => array( American, Canadian, British, ), Spanish, German, ) ); echo $this->Html->nestedList($list);

Output:
// Output (minus the whitespace) <ul> <li>Languages <ul> <li>English <ul> <li>American</li> <li>Canadian</li> <li>British</li> </ul> </li> <li>Spanish</li> <li>German</li> </ul> </li> </ul>

HtmlHelper::tableHeaders(array $names, array $trOptions = null, array $thOptions = null) Parameters $names (array) An array of strings to create table headings. $trOptions (array) An array of html attributes for the <tr> $thOptions (array) An array of html attributes for the <th> elements Creates a row of table header cells to be placed inside of <table> tags.:
echo $this->Html->tableHeaders(array(Date, Title, Active));

Output:
<tr> <th>Date</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Active</th> </tr>

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echo $this->Html->tableHeaders( array(Date,Title,Active), array(class => status), array(class => product_table) );

Output:
<tr class="status"> <th class="product_table">Date</th> <th class="product_table">Title</th> <th class="product_table">Active</th> </tr>

Changed in version 2.2: tableHeaders() now accepts attributes per cell, see below. As of 2.2 you can set attributes per column, these are used instead of the defaults provided in the $thOptions:
echo $this->Html->tableHeaders(array( id, array(Name => array(class => highlight)), array(Date => array(class => sortable)) ));

Output:
<tr> <th>id</th> <th class="highlight">Name</th> <th class="sortable">Date</th> </tr>

HtmlHelper::tableCells(array $data, array $oddTrOptions = null, array $evenTrOptions = null, $useCount = false, $continueOddEven = true) Parameters $data (array) A two dimensional array with data for the rows. $oddTrOptions (array) An array of html attributes for the odd <tr>s. $evenTrOptions (array) An array of html attributes for the even <tr>s. $useCount (boolean) Adds class column-$i. $continueOddEven (boolean) If false, will use a non-static $count variable, so that the odd/even count is reset to zero just for that call. Creates table cells, in rows, assigning <tr> attributes differently for odd- and even-numbered rows. Wrap a single table cell within an array() for specic <td>-attributes.
echo $this->Html->tableCells(array( array(Jul 7th, 2007, Best Brownies, Yes), array(Jun 21st, 2007, Smart Cookies, Yes), array(Aug 1st, 2006, Anti-Java Cake, No), ));

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Output:
<tr><td>Jul 7th, 2007</td><td>Best Brownies</td><td>Yes</td></tr> <tr><td>Jun 21st, 2007</td><td>Smart Cookies</td><td>Yes</td></tr> <tr><td>Aug 1st, 2006</td><td>Anti-Java Cake</td><td>No</td></tr>

echo $this->Html->tableCells(array( array(Jul 7th, 2007, array(Best Brownies, array(class => highlight)) , Ye array(Jun 21st, 2007, Smart Cookies, Yes), array(Aug 1st, 2006, Anti-Java Cake, array(No, array(id => special))), ));

Output:
<tr><td>Jul 7th, 2007</td><td class="highlight">Best Brownies</td><td>Yes</td></tr> <tr><td>Jun 21st, 2007</td><td>Smart Cookies</td><td>Yes</td></tr> <tr><td>Aug 1st, 2006</td><td>Anti-Java Cake</td><td id="special">No</td></tr> echo $this->Html->tableCells( array( array(Red, Apple), array(Orange, Orange), array(Yellow, Banana), ), array(class => darker) );

Output:
<tr class="darker"><td>Red</td><td>Apple</td></tr> <tr><td>Orange</td><td>Orange</td></tr> <tr class="darker"><td>Yellow</td><td>Banana</td></tr>

HtmlHelper::url(mixed $url = NULL, boolean $full = false) Parameters $url (mixed) A routing array. $full (mixed) Either a boolean to indicate whether or not the base path should be included on an array of options for Router::url() Returns an URL pointing to a combination of controller and action. If $url is empty, it returns the REQUEST_URI, otherwise it generates the url for the controller and action combo. If full is true, the full base URL will be prepended to the result:
echo $this->Html->url(array( "controller" => "posts", "action" => "view", "bar" )); // Output /posts/view/bar

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Here are a few more usage examples: URL with named parameters:
echo $this->Html->url(array( "controller" => "posts", "action" => "view", "foo" => "bar" )); // Output /posts/view/foo:bar

URL with extension:

echo $this->Html->url(array( "controller" => "posts", "action" => "list", "ext" => "rss" )); // Output /posts/list.rss

URL (starting with /) with the full base URL prepended:

echo $this->Html->url(/posts, true); // Output http://somedomain.com/posts

URL with GET params and named anchor:

echo $this->Html->url(array( "controller" => "posts", "action" => "search", "?" => array("foo" => "bar"), "#" => "first" )); // Output /posts/search?foo=bar#first

For further information check Router::url (http://api20.cakephp.org/class/router#method-Routerurl) in the API. HtmlHelper::useTag(string $tag) Returns a formatted existent block of $tag:
$this->Html->useTag( form, http://example.com, array(method => post, class => myform) );

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Output:
<form action="http://example.com" method="post" class="myform">

Changing the tags output by HtmlHelper

HtmlHelper::loadConfig(mixed $congFile, string $path = null) The built in tag sets for HtmlHelper are XHTML compliant, however if you need to generate HTML for HTML5 you will need to create and load a new tags cong le containing the tags youd like to use. To change the tags used create app/Config/html5_tags.php containing:
$config = array(tags => array( css => <link rel="%s" href="%s" %s>, style => <style%s>%s</style>, charset => <meta charset="%s">, javascriptblock => <script%s>%s</script>, javascriptstart => <script>, javascriptlink => <script src="%s"%s></script>, // ... ));

You can then load this tag set by calling $this->Html->loadConfig(html5_tags);

Creating breadcrumb trails with HtmlHelper

HtmlHelper::getCrumbs(string $separator = &raquo;, string $startText = false) CakePHP has the built in ability to automatically create a breadcrumb trail in your app. To set this up, rst add something similar to the following in your layout template:
echo $this->Html->getCrumbs( > , Home);

The $startText option can also accept an array. This gives more control over the generated rst link:
echo $this->Html->getCrumbs( > , array( text => $this->Html->image(home.png), url => array(controller => pages, action => display, home), escape => false ));

Any keys that are not text or url will be passed to link() as the $options parameter. Changed in version 2.1: The $startText parameter now accepts an array. HtmlHelper::addCrumb(string $name, string $link = null, mixed $options = null) Now, in your view youll want to add the following to start the breadcrumb trails on each of the pages:
$this->Html->addCrumb(Users, /users); $this->Html->addCrumb(Add User, /users/add);

This will add the output of Home > Users > Add User in your layout where getCrumbs was added.

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HtmlHelper::getCrumbList(array $options = array(), mixed $startText) Parameters $options (array) An array of html attributes for the containing <ul> element. Can also contain the separator, rstClass and lastClass options. $startText (string|array) The text or element that precedes the ul. Returns breadcrumbs as a (x)html list. This method uses HtmlHelper::tag() to generate list and its elements. Works similar to getCrumbs(), so it uses options which every crumb was added with. You can use the $startText parameter to provide the rst breadcrumb link/text. This is useful when you always want to include a root link. This option works the same as the $startText option for getCrumbs(). Changed in version 2.1: The $startText parameter was added.Changed in version 2.3: The separator, rstClass and lastClass options were added. JsHelper class JsHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) Since the beginning CakePHPs support for Javascript has been with Prototype/Scriptaculous. While we still think these are an excellent Javascript library, the community has been asking for support for other libraries. Rather than drop Prototype in favour of another Javascript library. We created an Adapter based helper, and included 3 of the most requested libraries. Prototype/Scriptaculous, Mootools/Mootools-more, and jQuery/jQuery UI. And while the API is not as expansive as the previous AjaxHelper we feel that the adapter based solution allows for a more extensible solution giving developers the power and exibility they need to address their specic application needs. Javascript Engines form the backbone of the new JsHelper. A Javascript engine translates an abstract Javascript element into concrete Javascript code specic to the Javascript library being used. In addition they create an extensible system for others to use.
Using a specic Javascript engine

First of all download your preferred javascript library and place it in app/webroot/js Then you must include the library in your page. To include it in all pages, add this line to the <head> section of app/View/Layouts/default.ctp (copy this le from lib/Cake/View/Layouts/default.ctp if you have not created your own):
echo $this->Html->script(jquery); // Include jQuery library

Replace jquery with the name of your library le (.js will be added to the name). By default scripts are cached, and you must explicitly print out the cache. To do this at the end of each page, include this line just before the ending </body> tag:
echo $this->Js->writeBuffer(); // Write cached scripts

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Warning: You must include the library in your page and print the cache for the helper to function. Javascript engine selection is declared when you include the helper in your controller:
public $helpers = array(Js => array(Jquery));

The above would use the Jquery Engine in the instances of JsHelper in your views. If you do not declare a specic engine, the jQuery engine will be used as the default. As mentioned before, there are three engines implemented in the core, but we encourage the community to expand the library compatibility. Using jQuery with other libraries The jQuery library, and virtually all of its plugins are constrained within the jQuery namespace. As a general rule, global objects are stored inside the jQuery namespace as well, so you shouldnt get a clash between jQuery and any other library (like Prototype, MooTools, or YUI). That said, there is one caveat: By default, jQuery uses $ as a shortcut for jQuery To override the $ shortcut, use the jQueryObject variable:
$this->Js->JqueryEngine->jQueryObject = $j; echo $this->Html->scriptBlock( var $j = jQuery.noConflict();, array(inline => false) ); // Tell jQuery to go into noconflict mode

Using the JsHelper inside customHelpers Declare the JsHelper in the $helpers array in your customHelper:
public $helpers = array(Js);

Note: It is not possible to declare a javascript engine inside a custom helper. Doing that will have no effect. If you are willing to use an other javascript engine than the default, do the helper setup in your controller as follows:
public $helpers = array( Js => array(Prototype), CustomHelper );

Warning: controller.

Be sure to declare the JsHelper and its engine on top of the $helpers array in your

The selected javascript engine may disappear (replaced by the default) from the jsHelper object in your helper, if you miss to do so and you will get code that does not t your javascript library.

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Creating a Javascript Engine

Javascript engine helpers follow normal helper conventions, with a few additional restrictions. They must have the Engine sufx. DojoHelper is not good, DojoEngineHelper is correct. Furthermore, they should extend JsBaseEngineHelper in order to leverage the most of the new API.
Javascript engine usage

The JsHelper provides a few methods, and acts as a facade for the the Engine helper. You should not directly access the Engine helper except in rare occasions. Using the facade features of the JsHelper allows you to leverage the buffering and method chaining features built-in; (method chaining only works in PHP5). The JsHelper by default buffers almost all script code generated, allowing you to collect scripts throughout the view, elements and layout, and output it in one place. Outputting buffered scripts is done with $this->Js->writeBuffer(); this will return the buffer contents in a script tag. You can disable buffering wholesale with the $bufferScripts property or setting buffer => false in methods taking $options. Since most methods in Javascript begin with a selection of elements in the DOM, $this->Js->get() returns a $this, allowing you to chain the methods using the selection. Method chaining allows you to write shorter, more expressive code:
$this->Js->get(#foo)->event(click, $eventCode);

Is an example of method chaining. Method chaining is not possible in PHP4 and the above sample would be written like:
$this->Js->get(#foo); $this->Js->event(click, $eventCode);

Common options In attempts to simplify development where Js libraries can change, a common set of options is supported by JsHelper, these common options will be mapped out to the library specic options internally. If you are not planning on switching Javascript libraries, each library also supports all of its native callbacks and options. Callback wrapping By default all callback options are wrapped with the an anonymous function with the correct arguments. You can disable this behavior by supplying the wrapCallbacks = false in your options array. Working with buffered scripts One drawback to previous implementation of Ajax type features was the scattering of script tags throughout your document, and the inability to buffer scripts added by elements in the layout. The new JsHelper if used correctly avoids both of those issues. It is recommended that you place $this->Js->writeBuffer() at the bottom of your layout le above the </body> tag. This will allow all scripts generated in layout elements to be output in one place. It should be noted that buffered scripts are handled separately from included script les.

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JsHelper::writeBuffer($options = array()) Writes all Javascript generated so far to a code block or caches them to a le and returns a linked script. Options inline - Set to true to have scripts output as a script block inline if cache is also true, a script link tag will be generated. (default true) cache - Set to true to have scripts cached to a le and linked in (default false) clear - Set to false to prevent script cache from being cleared (default true) onDomReady - wrap cached scripts in domready event (default true) safe - if an inline block is generated should it be wrapped in <![CDATA[ ... ]]> (default true) Creating a cache le with writeBuffer() requires that webroot/js be world writable and allows a browser to cache generated script resources for any page. JsHelper::buffer($content) Add $content to the internal script buffer. JsHelper::getBuffer($clear = true) Get the contents of the current buffer. Pass in false to not clear the buffer at the same time. Buffering methods that are not normally buffered Some methods in the helpers are buffered by default. The engines buffer the following methods by default: event sortable drag drop slider Additionally you can force any other method in JsHelper to use the buffering. By appending an boolean to the end of the arguments you can force other methods to go into the buffer. For example the each() method does not normally buffer:
$this->Js->each(alert("whoa!");, true);

The above would force the each() method to use the buffer. Conversely if you want a method that does buffer to not buffer, you can pass a false in as the last argument:
$this->Js->event(click, alert("whoa!");, false);

This would force the event function which normally buffers to return its result.

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Other Methods

The core Javascript Engines provide the same feature set across all libraries, there is also a subset of common options that are translated into library specic options. This is done to provide end developers with as unied an API as possible. The following list of methods are supported by all the Engines included in the CakePHP core. Whenever you see separate lists for Options and Event Options both sets of parameters are supplied in the $options array for the method. JsHelper::object($data, $options = array()) Serializes $data into JSON. This method is a proxy for json_encode() with a few extra features added via the $options parameter. Options: prefix - String prepended to the returned data. postfix - String appended to the returned data. Example Use:
$json = $this->Js->object($data);

JsHelper::sortable($options = array()) Sortable generates a javascript snippet to make a set of elements (usually a list) drag and drop sortable. The normalized options are: Options containment - Container for move action handle - Selector to handle element. Only this element will start sort action. revert - Whether or not to use an effect to move sortable into nal position. opacity - Opacity of the placeholder distance - Distance a sortable must be dragged before sorting starts. Event Options start - Event red when sorting starts sort - Event red during sorting complete - Event red when sorting completes. Other options are supported by each Javascript library, and you should check the documentation for your javascript library for more detailed information on its options and parameters. Example Use:
$this->Js->get(#my-list); $this->Js->sortable(array( distance => 5, containment => parent, start => onStart, complete => onStop,

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sort => onSort, wrapCallbacks => false ));

Assuming you were using the jQuery engine, you would get the following code in your generated Javascript block

$("#myList").sortable({containment:"parent", distance:5, sort:onSort, start:onStart, s

JsHelper::request($url, $options = array()) Generate a javascript snippet to create an XmlHttpRequest or AJAX request. Event Options complete - Callback to re on complete. success - Callback to re on success. before - Callback to re on request initialization. error - Callback to re on request failure. Options method - The method to make the request with defaults to GET in more libraries async - Whether or not you want an asynchronous request. data - Additional data to send. update - Dom id to update with the content of the response. type - Data type for response. json and html are supported. Default is html for most libraries. evalScripts - Whether or not <script> tags should be evaled. dataExpression - Should the data key be treated as a callback. Useful for supplying $options[data] as another Javascript expression. Example use:
$this->Js->event( click, $this->Js->request( array(action => foo, param1), array(async => true, update => #element) ) );

JsHelper::get($selector) Set the internal selection to a CSS selector. The active selection is used in subsequent operations until a new selection is made:
$this->Js->get(#element);

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The JsHelper now will reference all other element based methods on the selection of #element. To change the active selection, call get() again with a new element. JsHelper::set(mixed $one, mixed $two = null) Pass variables into Javascript. Allows you to set variables that will be output when the buffer is fetched with JsHelper::getBuffer() or JsHelper::writeBuffer(). The Javascript variable used to output set variables can be controlled with JsHelper::$setVariable. JsHelper::drag($options = array()) Make an element draggable. Options handle - selector to the handle element. snapGrid - The pixel grid that movement snaps to, an array(x, y) container - The element that acts as a bounding box for the draggable element. Event Options start - Event red when the drag starts drag - Event red on every step of the drag stop - Event red when dragging stops (mouse release) Example use:
$this->Js->get(#element); $this->Js->drag(array( container => #content, start => onStart, drag => onDrag, stop => onStop, snapGrid => array(10, 10), wrapCallbacks => false ));

If you were using the jQuery engine the following code would be added to the buffer

$("#element").draggable({containment:"#content", drag:onDrag, grid:[10,10], start:onSt

JsHelper::drop($options = array()) Make an element accept draggable elements and act as a dropzone for dragged elements. Options accept - Selector for elements this droppable will accept. hoverclass - Class to add to droppable when a draggable is over. Event Options drop - Event red when an element is dropped into the drop zone. hover - Event red when a drag enters a drop zone. leave - Event red when a drag is removed from a drop zone without being dropped. Helpers 367

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Example use:
$this->Js->get(#element); $this->Js->drop(array( accept => .items, hover => onHover, leave => onExit, drop => onDrop, wrapCallbacks => false ));

If you were using the jQuery engine the following code would be added to the buffer
$("#element").droppable({accept:".items", drop:onDrop, out:onExit, over:onHover});

Note: Droppables in Mootools function differently from other libraries. Droppables are implemented as an extension of Drag. So in addition to making a get() selection for the droppable element. You must also provide a selector rule to the draggable element. Furthermore, Mootools droppables inherit all options from Drag. JsHelper::slider($options = array()) Create snippet of Javascript that converts an element into a slider ui widget. See your libraries implementation for additional usage and features. Options handle - The id of the element used in sliding. direction - The direction of the slider either vertical or horizontal min - The min value for the slider. max - The max value for the slider. step - The number of steps or ticks the slider will have. value - The initial offset of the slider. Events change - Fired when the sliders value is updated complete - Fired when the user stops sliding the handle Example use:
$this->Js->get(#element); $this->Js->slider(array( complete => onComplete, change => onChange, min => 0, max => 10, value => 2, direction => vertical,

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wrapCallbacks => false ));

If you were using the jQuery engine the following code would be added to the buffer

$("#element").slider({change:onChange, max:10, min:0, orientation:"vertical", stop:onC

JsHelper::effect($name, $options = array()) Creates a basic effect. By default this method is not buffered and returns its result. Supported effect names The following effects are supported by all JsEngines show - reveal an element. hide - hide an element. fadeIn - Fade in an element. fadeOut - Fade out an element. slideIn - Slide an element in. slideOut - Slide an element out. Options speed - Speed at which the animation should occur. Accepted values are slow, fast. Not all effects use the speed option. Example use If you were using the jQuery engine:
$this->Js->get(#element); $result = $this->Js->effect(fadeIn); // $result contains $("#foo").fadeIn();

JsHelper::event($type, $content, $options = array()) Bind an event to the current selection. $type can be any of the normal DOM events or a custom event type if your library supports them. $content should contain the function body for the callback. Callbacks will be wrapped with function (event) { ... } unless disabled with the $options. Options wrap - Whether you want the callback wrapped in an anonymous function. (defaults to true) stop - Whether you want the event to stop. (defaults to true) Example use:
$this->Js->get(#some-link); $this->Js->event(click, $this->Js->alert(hey you!));

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$(#some-link).bind(click, function (event) { alert(hey you!); return false; });

You can remove the return false; by passing setting the stop option to false:
$this->Js->get(#some-link); $this->Js->event(click, $this->Js->alert(hey you!), array(stop => false));

If you were using the jQuery library you would the following Javascript code would be added to the buffer. Note that the default browser event is not cancelled:
$(#some-link).bind(click, function (event) { alert(hey you!); });

JsHelper::domReady($callback) Creates the special DOM ready event. JsHelper::writeBuffer() automatically wraps the buffered scripts in a domReady method. JsHelper::each($callback) Create a snippet that iterates over the currently selected elements, and inserts $callback. Example:
$this->Js->get(div.message); $this->Js->each($(this).css({color: "red"}););

Using the jQuery engine would create the following Javascript:

$(div.message).each(function () { $(this).css({color: "red"}); });

JsHelper::alert($message) Create a javascript snippet containing an alert() snippet. By default, alert does not buffer, and returns the script snippet.:
$alert = $this->Js->alert(Hey there);

JsHelper::confirm($message) Create a javascript snippet containing a confirm() snippet. By default, confirm does not buffer, and returns the script snippet.:
$alert = $this->Js->confirm(Are you sure?);

JsHelper::prompt($message, $default) Create a javascript snippet containing a prompt() snippet. By default, prompt does not buffer, and returns the script snippet.:
$prompt = $this->Js->prompt(What is your favorite color?, blue);

JsHelper::submit($caption = null, $options = array()) Create a submit input button that enables XmlHttpRequest submitted forms. Options can include both those for FormHelper::submit() and JsBaseEngine::request(), JsBaseEngine::event(); 370 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Forms submitting with this method, cannot send les. Files do not transfer over XmlHttpRequest and require an iframe, or other more specialized setups that are beyond the scope of this helper. Options url - The url you wish the XHR request to submit to. confirm - Conrm message displayed before sending the request. Using conrm, does not replace any before callback methods in the generated XmlHttpRequest. buffer - Disable the buffering and return a script tag in addition to the link. wrapCallbacks - Set to false to disable automatic callback wrapping. Example use:
echo $this->Js->submit(Save, array(update => #content));

Will create a submit button with an attached onclick event. The click event will be buffered by default.:
echo $this->Js->submit(Save, array( update => #content, div => false, type => json, async => false ));

Shows how you can combine options that JsHelper::request() when using submit.

both

FormHelper::submit()

and

JsHelper::link($title, $url = null, $options = array()) Create an html anchor element that has a click event bound to it. Options can include both those for HtmlHelper::link() and JsHelper::request(), JsHelper::event(), $options is a html attributes array that are appended to the generated anchor element. If an option is not part of the standard attributes or $htmlAttributes it will be passed to JsHelper::request() as an option. If an id is not supplied, a randomly generated one will be created for each link generated. Options confirm - Generate a conrm() dialog before sending the event. id - use a custom id. htmlAttributes - additional non-standard htmlAttributes. Standard attributes are class, id, rel, title, escape, onblur and onfocus. buffer - Disable the buffering and return a script tag in addition to the link. Example use:
echo $this->Js->link(Page 2, array(page => 2), array(update => #content));

Will create a link pointing to /page:2 and updating #content with the response. You can use the htmlAttributes option to add in additional custom attributes.:

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echo $this->Js->link(Page 2, array(page => 2), array( update => #content, htmlAttributes => array(other => value) ));

Outputs the following html:

<a href="/posts/index/page:2" other="value">Page 2</a>

JsHelper::serializeForm($options = array()) Serialize the form attached to $selector. Pass true for $isForm if the current selection is a form element. Converts the form or the form element attached to the current selection into a string/json object (depending on the library implementation) for use with XHR operations. Options isForm - is the current selection a form, or an input? (defaults to false) inline - is the rendered statement going to be used inside another JS statement? (defaults to false) Setting inline == false allows you to remove the trailing ;. This is useful when you need to serialize a form element as part of another Javascript operation, or use the serialize method in an Object literal. JsHelper::redirect($url) Redirect the page to $url using window.location. JsHelper::value($value) Converts a PHP-native variable of any type to a JSON-equivalent representation. Escapes any string values into JSON compatible strings. UTF-8 characters will be escaped.
Ajax Pagination

Much like Ajax Pagination in 1.2, you can use the JsHelper to handle the creation of Ajax pagination links instead of plain HTML links. Making Ajax Links Before you can create ajax links you must include the Javascript library that matches the adapter you are using with JsHelper. By default the JsHelper uses jQuery. So in your layout include jQuery (or whichever library you are using). Also make sure to include RequestHandlerComponent in your components. Add the following to your controller:
public $components = array(RequestHandler); public $helpers = array(Js);

Next link in the javascript library you want to use. For this example well be using jQuery:
echo $this->Html->script(jquery);

Similar to 1.2 you need to tell the PaginatorHelper that you want to make Javascript enhanced links instead of plain HTML ones. To do so you use options():

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$this->Paginator->options(array( update => #content, evalScripts => true ));

The PaginatorHelper now knows to make javascript enhanced links, and that those links should update the #content element. Of course this element must exist, and often times you want to wrap $content_for_layout with a div matching the id used for the update option. You also should set evalScripts to true if you are using the Mootools or Prototype adapters, without evalScripts these libraries will not be able to chain requests together. The indicator option is not supported by JsHelper and will be ignored. You then create all the links as needed for your pagination features. Since the JsHelper automatically buffers all generated script content to reduce the number of <script> tags in your source code you must call write the buffer out. At the bottom of your view le. Be sure to include:
echo $this->Js->writeBuffer();

If you omit this you will not be able to chain ajax pagination links. When you write the buffer, it is also cleared, so you dont have worry about the same Javascript being output twice. Adding effects and transitions Since indicator is no longer supported, you must add any indicator effects yourself:
<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <?php echo $this->Html->script(jquery); ?> //more stuff here. </head> <body> <div id="content"> <?php echo $content_for_layout; ?> </div> <?php echo $this->Html->image(indicator.gif, array(id => busy-indicator)); ?> </body> </html>

Remember to place the indicator.gif le inside app/webroot/img folder. You may see a situation where the indicator.gif displays immediately upon the page load. You need to put in this css #busy-indicator { display:none; } in your main css le. With the above layout, weve included an indicator image le, that will display a busy indicator animation that we will show and hide with the JsHelper. To do that we need to update our options() function:

$this->Paginator->options(array( update => #content, evalScripts => true, before => $this->Js->get(#busy-indicator)->effect(fadeIn, array(buffer => false complete => $this->Js->get(#busy-indicator)->effect(fadeOut, array(buffer => fa ));

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This will show/hide the busy-indicator element before and after the #content div is updated. Although indicator has been removed, the new features offered by JsHelper allow for more control and more complex effects to be created. NumberHelper class NumberHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The NumberHelper contains convenience methods that enable display numbers in common formats in your views. These methods include ways to format currency, percentages, data sizes, format numbers to specic precisions and also to give you more exibility with formatting numbers. Changed in version 2.1: NumberHelper have been refactored into CakeNumber class to allow easier use outside of the View layer. Within a view, these methods are accessible via the NumberHelper class and you can call it as you would call a normal helper method: $this->Number->method($args);. All of these functions return the formatted number; They do not automatically echo the output into the view. NumberHelper::currency(mixed $number, string $currency = USD, array $options = array()) Parameters $number (oat) The value to covert. $currency (string) The known currency format to use. $options (array) Options, see below. This method is used to display a number in common currency formats (EUR,GBP,USD). Usage in a view looks like:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->currency($number, $currency); // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::currency($number, $currency);

The rst parameter, $number, should be a oating point number that represents the amount of money you are expressing. The second parameter is used to choose a predened currency formatting scheme: $currency EUR GBP USD 1234.56, formatted by currency type C 1.236,33 1,236.33 $ 1,236.33

The third parameter is an array of options for further dening the output. The following options are available:

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Option before after

Description The currency symbol to place before whole numbers ie. $ The currency symbol to place after decimal numbers ie. c. Set to boolean false to use no decimal symbol. eg. 0.35 => $0.35. zero The text to use for zero values, can be a string or a number. ie. 0, Free! places Number of decimal places to use. ie. 2 thousands Thousands separator ie. , decimals Decimal separator symbol ie. . negative Symbol for negative numbers. If equal to (), the number will be wrapped with ( and ) escape Should the output be htmlentity escaped? Defaults to true wholeSym- String to use for whole numbers ie. dollars bol wholePoEither before or after to place the whole symbol sition fractionString to use for fraction numbers ie. cents Symbol fractionEither before or after to place the fraction symbol Position If a non-recognized $currency value is supplied, it is prepended to a USD formatted number. For example:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->currency(1234.56, FOO); // Outputs FOO 1,234.56 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::currency(1234.56, FOO);

NumberHelper::defaultCurrency(string $currency) Parameters $currency (string) Set a known currency for CakeNumber::currency(). Setter/getter for default currency. This removes the need always passing the currency to CakeNumber::currency() and change all currency outputs by setting other default. New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3 NumberHelper::addFormat(string $formatName, array $options) Parameters $formatName (string) The format name to be used in the future $options (array) The array of options for this format. $options keys as CakeNumber::currency(). Uses the same

Add a currency format to the Number helper. Makes reusing currency formats easier:

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// called as NumberHelper $this->Number->addFormat(BRR, array(before => R$ )); // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); CakeNumber::addFormat(BRR, array(before => R$ ));

You can now use BRR as a short form when formatting currency amounts:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->currency($value, BRR); // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::currency($value, BRR);

Added formats are merged with the following defaults:

array( wholeSymbol wholePosition fractionSymbol fractionPosition zero places thousands decimals negative escape ) => => => => => => => => => => , before, , after, 0, 2, ,, ., (), true

NumberHelper::precision(mixed $number, int $precision = 3) Parameters $number (oat) The value to covert $precision (integer) The number of decimal places to display This method displays a number with the specied amount of precision (decimal places). It will round in order to maintain the level of precision dened.:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->precision(456.91873645, 2); // Outputs 456.92 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::precision(456.91873645, 2);

NumberHelper::toPercentage(mixed $number, int $precision = 2) Parameters

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$number (oat) The value to covert $precision (integer) The number of decimal places to display Like precision(), this method formats a number according to the supplied precision (where numbers are rounded to meet the given precision). This method also expresses the number as a percentage and prepends the output with a percent sign.:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->toPercentage(45.691873645); // Outputs 45.69% // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::toPercentage(45.691873645);

NumberHelper::fromReadableSize(string $size, $default) Parameters $size (string) The formatted human readable value. This method unformats a number from a human readable byte size to an integer number of bytes. New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3 NumberHelper::toReadableSize(string $dataSize) Parameters $dataSize (string) The number of bytes to make readable. This method formats data sizes in human readable forms. It provides a shortcut way to convert bytes to KB, MB, GB, and TB. The size is displayed with a two-digit precision level, according to the size of data supplied (i.e. higher sizes are expressed in larger terms):
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(0); // 0 Bytes echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(1024); // 1 KB echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(1321205.76); // 1.26 MB echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(5368709120); // 5.00 GB // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(0); // 0 Bytes echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(1024); // 1 KB echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(1321205.76); // 1.26 MB echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(5368709120); // 5.00 GB

NumberHelper::format(mixed $number, mixed $options=false) This method gives you much more control over the formatting of numbers for use in your views (and is used as the main method by most of the other NumberHelper methods). Using this method might looks like:

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// called as NumberHelper $this->Number->format($number, $options); // called as CakeNumber CakeNumber::format($number, $options);

The $number parameter is the number that you are planning on formatting for output. With no $options supplied, the number 1236.334 would output as 1,236. Note that the default precision is zero decimal places. The $options parameter is where the real magic for this method resides. If you pass an integer then this becomes the amount of precision or places for the function. If you pass an associated array, you can use the following keys: places (integer): the amount of desired precision before (string): to be put before the outputted number escape (boolean): if you want the value in before to be escaped decimals (string): used to delimit the decimal places in a number thousands (string): used to mark off thousand, millions, . . . places Example:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->format(123456.7890, array( places => 2, before => , escape => false, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output 123,456.79 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::format(123456.7890, array( places => 2, before => , escape => false, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output 123,456.79

NumberHelper::formatDelta(mixed $number, mixed $options=array()) This method displays differences in value as a signed number:
// called as NumberHelper $this->Number->formatDelta($number, $options);

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// called as CakeNumber CakeNumber::formatDelta($number, $options);

The $number parameter is the number that you are planning on formatting for output. With no $options supplied, the number 1236.334 would output as 1,236. Note that the default precision is zero decimal places. The $options parameter takes the same keys as CakeNumber::format() itself: places (integer): the amount of desired precision before (string): to be put before the outputted number after (string): to be put after the outputted number decimals (string): used to delimit the decimal places in a number thousands (string): used to mark off thousand, millions, . . . places Example:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->formatDelta(123456.7890, array( places => 2, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output +123,456.79 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::formatDelta(123456.7890, array( places => 2, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output +123,456.79

New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3 Warning: Since 2.4 the symbols are now UTF-8. Please see the migration guide for details if you run a non-UTF-8 app.

Paginator class PaginatorHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The Pagination helper is used to output pagination controls such as page numbers and next/previous links. It works in tandem with PaginatorComponent. See also Pagination for information on how to create paginated datasets and do paginated queries.

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Creating sort links

PaginatorHelper::sort($key, $title = null, $options = array()) Parameters $key (string) The name of the key that the recordset should be sorted. $title (string) Title for the link. If $title is null $key will be used for the title and will be generated by inection. $options (array) Options for sorting link. Generates a sorting link. Sets named or querystring parameters for the sort and direction. Links will default to sorting by asc. After the rst click, links generated with sort() will handle direction switching automatically. Link sorting default by asc. If the resultset is sorted asc by the specied key the returned link will sort by desc. Accepted keys for $options: escape Whether you want the contents html entity encoded, defaults to true. model The model to use, defaults to PaginatorHelper::defaultModel(). Assuming you are paginating some posts, and are on page one:
echo $this->Paginator->sort(user_id);

Output:
<a href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:user_id/direction:asc/">User Id</a>

You can use the title parameter to create custom text for your link:
echo $this->Paginator->sort(user_id, User account);

Output:
<a href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:user_id/direction:asc/">User account</a>

If you are using HTML like images in your links remember to set escaping off:
echo $this->Paginator->sort(user_id, <em>User account</em>, array(escape => false));

Output:
<a href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:user_id/direction:asc/"><em>User account</em></a>

The direction option can be used to set the default direction for a link. Once a link is active, it will automatically switch directions like normal:
echo $this->Paginator->sort(user_id, null, array(direction => desc));

Output:

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<a href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:user_id/direction:desc/">User Id</a>

PaginatorHelper::sortDir(string $model = null, mixed $options = array()) Gets the current direction the recordset is sorted. PaginatorHelper::sortKey(string $model = null, mixed $options = array()) Gets the current key by which the recordset is sorted.
Creating page number links

PaginatorHelper::numbers($options = array()) Returns a set of numbers for the paged result set. Uses a modulus to decide how many numbers to show on each side of the current page By default 8 links on either side of the current page will be created if those pages exist. Links will not be generated for pages that do not exist. The current page is also not a link. Supported options are: before Content to be inserted before the numbers. after Content to be inserted after the numbers. model Model to create numbers for, defaults to PaginatorHelper::defaultModel(). modulus how many numbers to include on either side of the current page, defaults to 8. separator Separator content defaults to | tag The tag to wrap links in, defaults to span. first Whether you want rst links generated, set to an integer to dene the number of rst links to generate. Defaults to false. If a string is set a link to the rst page will be generated with the value as the title:
echo $this->Paginator->numbers(array(first => First page));

last Whether you want last links generated, set to an integer to dene the number of last links to generate. Defaults to false. Follows the same logic as the first option. There is a last() method to be used separately as well if you wish. ellipsis Ellipsis content, defaults to ... class The classname used on the wrapping tag. currentClass The classname to use on the current/active link. Defaults to current. currentTag Tag to use for current page number, defaults to null. This allows you to generate for example Twitter Bootstrap like links with the current page number wrapped in extra a or span tag. While this method allows a lot of customization for its output. It is also ok to just call the method without any params.:
echo $this->Paginator->numbers();

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Using the rst and last options you can create links to the beginning and end of the page set. The following would create a set of page links that include links to the rst 2 and last 2 pages in the paged results:
echo $this->Paginator->numbers(array(first => 2, last => 2));

New in version 2.1: The currentClass option was added in 2.1.New in version 2.3: The currentTag option was added in 2.3.
Creating jump links

In addition to generating links that go directly to specic page numbers, youll often want links that go to the previous and next links, rst and last pages in the paged data set. PaginatorHelper::prev($title = << Previous, $options = array(), $disabledTitle = null, $disabledOptions = array()) Parameters $title (string) Title for the link. $options (mixed) Options for pagination link. $disabledTitle (string) Title when the link is disabled, as when youre already on the rst page, no previous page to go. $disabledOptions (mixed) Options for the disabled pagination link. Generates a link to the previous page in a set of paged records. $options and $disabledOptions supports the following keys: tag The tag wrapping tag you want to use, defaults to span. Set this to false to disable this option. escape Whether you want the contents html entity encoded, defaults to true. model The model to use, defaults to PaginatorHelper::defaultModel(). disabledTag Tag to use instead of A tag when there is no previous page A simple example would be:

echo $this->Paginator->prev( << . __(previous), array(), null, array(class =>

If you were currently on the second page of posts, you would get the following:

<span class="prev"><a rel="prev" href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:title/order:desc"><< p

If there were no previous pages you would get:

<span class="prev disabled"><< previous</span>

You can change the wrapping tag using the tag option:
echo $this->Paginator->prev(__(previous), array(tag => li));

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Output:

<li class="prev"><a rel="prev" href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:title/order:desc">previo

You can also disable the wrapping tag:

echo $this->Paginator->prev(__(previous), array(tag => false));

Output:

<a class="prev" rel="prev" href="/posts/index/page:1/sort:title/order:desc">previous</

Changed in version 2.3: For methods: PaginatorHelper::prev() and PaginatorHelper::next() it is now possible to set the tag option to false to disable the wrapper. New options disabledTag has been added. If you leave the $disabledOptions empty the $options parameter will be used. This can save some additional typing if both sets of options are the same. PaginatorHelper::next($title = Next >>, $options = array(), $disabledTitle = null, $disabledOptions = array()) This method is identical to prev() with a few exceptions. It creates links pointing to the next page instead of the previous one. It also uses next as the rel attribute value instead of prev PaginatorHelper::first($rst = << rst, $options = array()) Returns a rst or set of numbers for the rst pages. If a string is given, then only a link to the rst page with the provided text will be created:
echo $this->Paginator->first(< first);

The above creates a single link for the rst page. Will output nothing if you are on the rst page. You can also use an integer to indicate how many rst paging links you want generated:
echo $this->Paginator->first(3);

The above will create links for the rst 3 pages, once you get to the third or greater page. Prior to that nothing will be output. The options parameter accepts the following: tag The tag wrapping tag you want to use, defaults to span after Content to insert after the link/tag model The model to use defaults to PaginatorHelper::defaultModel() separator Content between the generated links, defaults to | ellipsis Content for ellipsis, defaults to ... PaginatorHelper::last($last = last >>, $options = array()) This method works very much like the first() method. It has a few differences though. It will not generate any links if you are on the last page for a string values of $last. For an integer value of $last no links will be generated once the user is inside the range of last pages. PaginatorHelper::current(string $model = null) Gets the current page of the recordset for the given model: Helpers 383

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// Our url is: http://example.com/comments/view/page:3 echo $this->Paginator->current(Comment); // Output is 3

PaginatorHelper::hasNext(string $model = null) Returns true if the given result set is not at the last page. PaginatorHelper::hasPrev(string $model = null) Returns true if the given result set is not at the rst page. PaginatorHelper::hasPage(string $model = null, integer $page = 1) Returns true if the given result set has the page number given by $page.
Creating a page counter

PaginatorHelper::counter($options = array()) Returns a counter string for the paged result set. Using a provided format string and a number of options you can create localized and application specic indicators of where a user is in the paged data set. There are a number of options for counter(). The supported ones are: format Format of the counter. Supported formats are range, pages and custom. Defaults to pages which would output like 1 of 10. In the custom mode the supplied string is parsed and tokens are replaced with actual values. The available tokens are: {:page} - the current page displayed. {:pages} - total number of pages. {:current} - current number of records being shown. {:count} - the total number of records in the result set. {:start} - number of the rst record being displayed. {:end} - number of the last record being displayed. {:model} - The pluralized human form of the model name. If your model was RecipePage, {:model} would be recipe pages. This option was added in 2.0. You could also supply only a string to the counter method using the tokens available. For example:
echo $this->Paginator->counter( Page {:page} of {:pages}, showing {:current} records out of {:count} total, starting on record {:start}, ending on {:end} );

Setting format to range would output like 1 - 3 of 13:

echo $this->Paginator->counter(array( format => range ));

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separator The separator between the actual page and the number of pages. Defaults to of . This is used in conjunction with format = pages which is format default value:
echo $this->Paginator->counter(array( separator => of a total of ));

model The name of the model being paginated, defaults to PaginatorHelper::defaultModel(). This is used in conjunction with the custom string on format option.
Modifying the options PaginatorHelper uses

PaginatorHelper::options($options = array()) Parameters $options (mixed) Default options for pagination links. If a string is supplied - it is used as the DOM id element to update. Sets all the options for the Paginator Helper. Supported options are: url The url of the paginating action. url has a few sub options as well: sort The key that the records are sorted by. direction The direction of the sorting. Defaults to ASC. page The page number to display. The above mentioned options can be used to force particular pages/directions. You can also append additional url content into all urls generated in the helper:
$this->Paginator->options(array( url => array( sort => email, direction => desc, page => 6, lang => en ) ));

The above adds the en route parameter to all links the helper will generate. It will also create links with specic sort, direction and page values. By default PaginatorHelper will merge in all of the current pass and named parameters. So you dont have to do that in each view le. escape Denes if the title eld for links should be HTML escaped. Defaults to true. update The CSS selector of the element to update with the results of AJAX pagination calls. If not specied, regular links will be created:
$this->Paginator->options(array(update => #content));

This is useful when doing Ajax Pagination. Keep in mind that the value of update can be any valid CSS selector, but most often is simpler to use an id selector.

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model The name of the model PaginatorHelper::defaultModel().

being

paginated,

defaults

to

Using GET parameters for pagination Normally Pagination in CakePHP uses Named parameters. There are times you want to use GET parameters instead. While the main conguration option for this feature is in PaginatorComponent, you have some additional control in the view. You can use options() to indicate that you want other named parameters to be converted:
$this->Paginator->options(array(convertKeys => array(your, keys, here)));

Conguring the PaginatorHelper to use a javascript helper By default the PaginatorHelper uses JsHelper to do ajax features. However, if you dont want that and want to use a custom helper for ajax links, you can do so by changing the $helpers array in your controller. After running paginate() do the following:
// In your controller action. $this->set(posts, $this->paginate()); $this->helpers[Paginator] = array(ajax => CustomJs);

Will change the PaginatorHelper to use the CustomJs for ajax operations. You could also set the ajax key to be any helper, as long as that class implements a link() method that behaves like HtmlHelper::link()
Pagination in Views

Its up to you to decide how to show records to the user, but most often this will be done inside HTML tables. The examples below assume a tabular layout, but the PaginatorHelper available in views doesnt always need to be restricted as such. See the details on PaginatorHelper (http://api20.cakephp.org/class/paginator-helper) in the API. As mentioned, the PaginatorHelper also offers sorting features which can be easily integrated into your table column headers:
// app/View/Posts/index.ctp <table> <tr> <th><?php echo $this->Paginator->sort(id, ID); ?></th> <th><?php echo $this->Paginator->sort(title, Title); ?></th> </tr> <?php foreach ($data as $recipe): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $recipe[Recipe][id]; ?> </td> <td><?php echo h($recipe[Recipe][title]); ?> </td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> </table>

The links output from the sort() method of the PaginatorHelper allow users to click on table headers to toggle the sorting of the data by a given eld. 386 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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It is also possible to sort a column based on associations:

<table> <tr> <th><?php echo $this->Paginator->sort(title, Title); ?></th> <th><?php echo $this->Paginator->sort(Author.name, Author); ?></th> </tr> <?php foreach ($data as $recipe): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo h($recipe[Recipe][title]); ?> </td> <td><?php echo h($recipe[Author][name]); ?> </td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> </table>

The nal ingredient to pagination display in views is the addition of page navigation, also supplied by the PaginationHelper:
// Shows the page numbers echo $this->Paginator->numbers(); // Shows the next and previous links echo $this->Paginator->prev( Previous, null, null, array(class => disabled)); echo $this->Paginator->next(Next , null, null, array(class => disabled)); // prints X of Y, where X is current page and Y is number of pages echo $this->Paginator->counter();

The wording output by the counter() method can also be customized using special markers:
echo $this->Paginator->counter(array( format => Page {:page} of {:pages}, showing {:current} records out of {:count} total, starting on record {:start}, ending on {:end} ));

Other Methods

PaginatorHelper::link($title, $url = array(), $options = array()) Parameters $title (string) Title for the link. $url (mixed) Url for the action. See Router::url() $options (array) Options for the link. See options() for list of keys. Accepted keys for $options: update The Id of the DOM element you wish to update. Creates Ajax enabled links. escape Whether you want the contents html entity encoded, defaults to true. model The model to use, defaults to PaginatorHelper::defaultModel().

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Creates a regular or AJAX link with pagination parameters:

echo $this->Paginator->link(Sort by title on page 5, array(sort => title, page => 5, direction => desc));

If created in the view for /posts/index /posts/index/page:5/sort:title/direction:desc

Would

create

link

pointing

at

PaginatorHelper::url($options = array(), $asArray = false, $model = null) Parameters $options (array) Pagination/URL options array. As used on options() or link() method. $asArray (boolean) Return the url as an array, or a URI string. Defaults to false. $model (string) Which model to paginate on By default returns a full pagination URL string for use in non-standard contexts (i.e. JavaScript).:
echo $this->Paginator->url(array(sort => title), true);

PaginatorHelper::defaultModel() Gets the default model of the paged sets or null if pagination is not initialized. PaginatorHelper::params(string $model = null) Gets the current paging parameters from the resultset for the given model:
debug($this->Paginator->params()); /* Array ( [page] => 2 [current] => 2 [count] => 43 [prevPage] => 1 [nextPage] => 3 [pageCount] => 3 [order] => [limit] => 20 [options] => Array ( [page] => 2 [conditions] => Array ( ) ) [paramType] => named ) */

PaginatorHelper::param(string $key, string $model = null) Gets the specic paging parameter from the resultset for the given model:

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debug($this->Paginator->param(count)); /* (int)43 */

New in version 2.4: The param() method was added in 2.4. RSS class RssHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The RSS helper makes generating XML for RSS feeds easy.
Creating an RSS feed with the RssHelper

This example assumes you have a Posts Controller and Post Model already created and want to make an alternative view for RSS. Creating an xml/rss version of posts/index is a snap with CakePHP. After a few simple steps you can simply append the desired extension .rss to posts/index making your URL posts/index.rss. Before we jump too far ahead trying to get our webservice up and running we need to do a few things. First parseExtensions needs to be activated, this is done in app/Config/routes.php:
Router::parseExtensions(rss);

In the call above weve activated the .rss extension. When using Router::parseExtensions() you can pass as many arguments or extensions as you want. This will activate each extension/content-type for use in your application. Now when the address posts/index.rss is requested you will get an xml version of your posts/index. However, rst we need to edit the controller to add in the rss-specic code. Controller Code It is a good idea to add RequestHandler to your PostsControllers $components array. This will allow a lot of automagic to occur:
public $components = array(RequestHandler);

Our view will also use the TextHelper for formatting, so that should be added to the controller as well:
public $helpers = array(Text);

Before we can make an RSS version of our posts/index we need to get a few things in order. It may be tempting to put the channel metadata in the controller action and pass it to your view using the Controller::set() method but this is inappropriate. That information can also go in the view. That will come later though, for now if you have a different set of logic for the data used to make the RSS feed and the data for the html view you can use the RequestHandler::isRss() method, otherwise your controller can stay the same:

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// Modify the Posts Controller action that corresponds to // the action which deliver the rss feed, which is the // index action in our example

public function index() { if ($this->RequestHandler->isRss() ) { $posts = $this->Post->find(all, array(limit => 20, order => Post.created DES return $this->set(compact(posts)); } // this is not an Rss request, so deliver // data used by websites interface $this->paginate[Post] = array(order => Post.created DESC, limit => 10); $posts = $this->paginate(); $this->set(compact(posts)); }

With all the View variables set we need to create an rss layout. Layout An Rss layout is very simple, app/View/Layouts/rss/default.ctp: put the following contents in

if (!isset($documentData)) { $documentData = array(); } if (!isset($channelData)) { $channelData = array(); } if (!isset($channelData[title])) { $channelData[title] = $title_for_layout; } $channel = $this->Rss->channel(array(), $channelData, $content_for_layout); echo $this->Rss->document($documentData, $channel);

It doesnt look like much but thanks to the power in the RssHelper its doing a lot of lifting for us. We havent set $documentData or $channelData in the controller, however in CakePHP your views can pass variables back to the layout. Which is where our $channelData array will come from setting all of the meta data for our feed. Next up is view le for my posts/index. Much like the layout le we created, we need to create a View/Posts/rss/ directory and create a new index.ctp inside that folder. The contents of the le are below. View Our view, located at app/View/Posts/rss/index.ctp, begins by setting the $documentData and $channelData variables for the layout, these contain all the metadata for our RSS feed. This is done by using the View::set() method which is analogous to the Controller::set() method. Here though we are passing the channels metadata back to the layout:
$this->set(channelData, array( title => __("Most Recent Posts"),

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link => $this->Html->url(/, true), description => __("Most recent posts."), language => en-us ));

The second part of the view generates the elements for the actual records of the feed. This is accomplished by looping through the data that has been passed to the view ($items) and using the RssHelper::item() method. The other method you can use, RssHelper::items() which takes a callback and an array of items for the feed. (The method I have seen used for the callback has always been called transformRss(). There is one downfall to this method, which is that you cannot use any of the other helper classes to prepare your data inside the callback method because the scope inside the method does not include anything that is not passed inside, thus not giving access to the TimeHelper or any other helper that you may need. The RssHelper::item() transforms the associative array into an element for each key value pair. Note: You will need to modify the $postLink variable as appropriate to your application.
// You should import Sanitize App::uses(Sanitize, Utility); foreach ($posts as $post) { $postTime = strtotime($post[Post][created]); $postLink = array( controller => posts, action => view, year => date(Y, $postTime), month => date(m, $postTime), day => date(d, $postTime), $post[Post][slug] ); // This is the part where we clean the body text for output as the description // of the rss item, this needs to have only text to make sure the feed validates $bodyText = preg_replace(=\(.*?\)=is, , $post[Post][body]); $bodyText = $this->Text->stripLinks($bodyText); $bodyText = Sanitize::stripAll($bodyText); $bodyText = $this->Text->truncate($bodyText, 400, array( ending => ..., exact => true, html => true, )); echo $this->Rss->item(array(), array( title => $post[Post][title], link => $postLink, guid => array(url => $postLink, isPermaLink => true), description => $bodyText, pubDate => $post[Post][created]

)); }

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You can see above that we can use the loop to prepare the data to be transformed into XML elements. It is important to lter out any non-plain text characters out of the description, especially if you are using a rich text editor for the body of your blog. In the code above we use the TextHelper::stripLinks() method and a few methods from the Sanitize class, but we recommend writing a comprehensive text cleaning helper to really scrub the text clean. Once we have set up the data for the feed, we can then use the RssHelper::item() method to create the XML in RSS format. Once you have all this setup, you can test your RSS feed by going to your site /posts/index.rss and you will see your new feed. It is always important that you validate your RSS feed before making it live. This can be done by visiting sites that validate the XML such as Feed Validator or the w3c site at http://validator.w3.org/feed/. Note: You may need to set the value of debug in your core conguration to 1 or to 0 to get a valid feed, because of the various debug information added automagically under higher debug settings that break XML syntax or feed validation rules.

Rss Helper API

property RssHelper::$action Current action property RssHelper::$base Base URL property RssHelper::$data POSTed model data property RssHelper::$field Name of the current eld property RssHelper::$helpers Helpers used by the RSS Helper property RssHelper::$here URL to current action property RssHelper::$model Name of current model property RssHelper::$params Parameter array property RssHelper::$version Default spec version of generated RSS. RssHelper::channel(array $attrib = array (), array $elements = array (), mixed $content = null) Return type string Returns an RSS <channel /> element. RssHelper::document(array $attrib = array (), string $content = null)

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Return type string Returns an RSS document wrapped in <rss /> tags. RssHelper::elem(string $name, array $attrib = array (), mixed $content = null, boolean $endTag = true) Return type string Generates an XML element. RssHelper::item(array $att = array (), array $elements = array ()) Return type string Converts an array into an <item /> element and its contents. RssHelper::items(array $items, mixed $callback = null) Return type string Transforms an array of data using an optional callback, and maps it to a set of <item /> tags. RssHelper::time(mixed $time) Return type string Converts a time in any format to an RSS time. See TimeHelper::toRSS(). SessionHelper class SessionHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) As a natural counterpart to the Session Component, the Session Helper replicates most of the components functionality and makes it available in your view. The major difference between the Session Helper and the Session Component is that the helper does not have the ability to write to the session. As with the Session Component, data is read by using dot notation array structures:
array(User => array( username => [email protected] ));

Given the previous array structure, the node would be accessed by User.username, with the dot indicating the nested array. This notation is used for all Session helper methods wherever a $key is used. SessionHelper::read(string $key) Return type mixed Read from the Session. Returns a string or array depending on the contents of the session. SessionHelper::check(string $key) Return type boolean Check to see if a key is in the Session. Returns a boolean on the keys existence. Helpers 393

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SessionHelper::error() Return type string Returns last error encountered in a session. SessionHelper::valid() Return type boolean Used to check is a session is valid in a view.
Displaying notications or ash messages

SessionHelper::flash(string $key = ash, array $params = array()) Return type string As explained in Creating notication messages you can create one-time notications for feedback. After creating messages with SessionComponent::setFlash() you will want to display them. Once a message is displayed, it will be removed and not displayed again:
echo $this->Session->flash();

The above will output a simple message, with the following html:
<div id="flashMessage" class="message"> Your stuff has been saved. </div>

As with the component method you can set additional properties and customize which element is used. In the controller you might have code like:
// in a controller $this->Session->setFlash(The user could not be deleted.);

When outputting this message, you can choose the element used to display this message:
// in a layout. echo $this->Session->flash(flash, array(element => failure));

This would use View/Elements/failure.ctp to render the message. The message text would be available as $message in the element. Inside the failure element le would be something like this:
<div class="flash flash-failure"> <?php echo $message; ?> </div>

You can also pass additional parameters into the flash() method, which allow you to generate customized messages:

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// In the controller $this->Session->setFlash(Thanks for your payment %s); // In the layout. echo $this->Session->flash(flash, array( params => array(name => $user[User][name]) element => payment )); // View/Elements/payment.ctp <div class="flash payment"> <?php printf($message, h($name)); ?> </div>

TextHelper class TextHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The TextHelper contains methods to make text more usable and friendly in your views. It aids in enabling links, formatting urls, creating excerpts of text around chosen words or phrases, highlighting key words in blocks of text, and to gracefully truncating long stretches of text. Changed in version 2.1: Several of TextHelper methods have been moved into String class to allow easier use outside of the View layer. Within a view, these methods are accessible via the TextHelper class and you can called it as you would call a normal helper method: $this->Text->method($args);. TextHelper::autoLinkEmails(string $text, array $options=array()) Parameters $text (string) The text to convert. $options (array) An array of html attributes for the generated links. Adds links to the well-formed email addresses in $text, according to any options dened in $htmlOptions (see HtmlHelper::link()).:

$myText = For more information regarding our world-famous pastries and desserts, cont $linkedText = $this->Text->autoLinkEmails($myText);

Output:
For more information regarding our world-famous pastries and desserts, contact <a href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected]</a>

Changed in version 2.1: In 2.1 this method automatically escapes its input. Use the escape option to disable this if necessary. TextHelper::autoLinkUrls(string $text, array $htmlOptions=array()) Parameters $text (string) The text to convert. $htmlOptions (array) An array html attributes for the generated links

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Same as in autoLinkEmails(), only this method searches for strings that start with https, http, ftp, or nntp and links them appropriately. Changed in version 2.1: In 2.1 this method automatically escapes its input. Use the escape option to disable this if necessary. TextHelper::autoLink(string $text, array $htmlOptions=array()) Parameters $text (string) The text to autolink. $htmlOptions (array) An array html attributes for the generated links Performs the functionality in both autoLinkUrls() and autoLinkEmails() on the supplied $text. All URLs and emails are linked appropriately given the supplied $htmlOptions. Changed in version 2.1: In 2.1 this method automatically escapes its input. Use the escape option to disable this if necessary. TextHelper::autoParagraph(string $text) Parameters $text (string) The text to convert. Adds proper <p> around text where double-line returns and <br> where single-line returns are found.:
$myText = For more information regarding our world-famous pastries and desserts. contact [email protected]; $formattedText = $this->Text->autoParagraph($myText);

Output:
<p>For more information<br /> regarding our world-famous pastries and desserts.<p> <p>contact [email protected]</p>

New in version 2.4. TextHelper::highlight(string $haystack, string $needle, array $options = array()) Parameters $haystack (string) The string to search. $needle (string) The string to nd. $options (array) An array of options, see below. Highlights $needle in $haystack using the $options[format] string specied or a default string. Options: format - string The piece of html with that the phrase will be highlighted html - bool If true, will ignore any HTML tags, ensuring that only the correct text is highlighted Example: 396 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->highlight($lastSentence, using, array(format => <span class="hi

// called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::highlight($lastSentence, using, array(format => <span class="highlig

Output:
Highlights $needle in $haystack <span class="highlight">using</span> the $options[format] string specified or a default string.

TextHelper::stripLinks($text) Strips the supplied $text of any HTML links. TextHelper::truncate(string $text, int $length=100, array $options) Parameters $text (string) The text to truncate. $length (int) The length to trim to. $options (array) An array of options to use. Cuts a string to the $length and adds a sufx with ellipsis if the text is longer than $length. If exact is passed as false, the truncation will occur after the next word ending. If html is passed as true, html tags will be respected and will not be cut off. $options is used to pass all extra parameters, and has the following possible keys by default, all of which are optional:
array( ellipsis => ..., exact => true, html => false )

Example:
// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->truncate( The killer crept forward and tripped on the rug., 22, array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) ); // called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::truncate( The killer crept forward and tripped on the rug., 22,

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array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) );

Output:
The killer crept...

Changed in version 2.3: ending has been replaced by ellipsis. ending is still used in 2.2.1 TextHelper::tail(string $text, int $length=100, array $options) Parameters $text (string) The text to truncate. $length (int) The length to trim to. $options (array) An array of options to use. Cuts a string to the $length and adds a prex with ellipsis if the text is longer than $length. If exact is passed as false, the truncation will occur before the next word ending. $options is used to pass all extra parameters, and has the following possible keys by default, all of which are optional:
array( ellipsis => ..., exact => true )

New in version 2.3. Example:

// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->tail( I packed my bag and in it I put a PSP, a PS3, a TV, a C# program that can divide 70, array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) ); // called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::tail( I packed my bag and in it I put a PSP, a PS3, a TV, a C# program that can divide 70, array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) );

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Output:
...a TV, a C# program that can divide by zero, death metal t-shirts

TextHelper::excerpt(string $haystack, string $needle, integer $radius=100, string $ellipsis=...) Parameters $haystack (string) The string to search. $needle (string) The string to excerpt around. $radius (int) The number of characters on either side of $needle you want to include. $ellipsis (string) Text to append/prepend to the beginning or end of the result. Extracts an excerpt from $haystack surrounding the $needle with a number of characters on each side determined by $radius, and prex/sufx with $ellipsis. This method is especially handy for search results. The query string or keywords can be shown within the resulting document.:
// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->excerpt($lastParagraph, method, 50, ...); // called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::excerpt($lastParagraph, method, 50, ...);

Output:
... by $radius, and prefix/suffix with $ellipsis. This method is especially handy for search results. The query...

TextHelper::toList(array $list, $and=and) Parameters $list (array) Array of elements to combine into a list sentence. $and (string) The word used for the last join. Creates a comma-separated list where the last two items are joined with and.:
// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->toList($colors); // called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::toList($colors);

Output:
red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet

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TimeHelper class TimeHelper(View $view, array $settings = array()) The Time Helper does what it says on the tin: saves you time. It allows for the quick processing of time related information. The Time Helper has two main tasks that it can perform: 1. It can format time strings. 2. It can test time (but cannot bend time, sorry). Changed in version 2.1: TimeHelper have been refactored into CakeTime class to allow easier use outside of the View layer. Within a view, these methods are accessible via the TimeHelper class and you can called it as you would call a normal helper method: $this->Time->method($args);.
Using the Helper

A common use of the Time Helper is to offset the date and time to match a users time zone. Lets use a forum as an example. Your forum has many users who may post messages at any time from any part of the world. An easy way to manage the time is to save all dates and times as GMT+0 or UTC. Uncomment the line date_default_timezone_set(UTC); in app/Config/core.php to ensure your applications time zone is set to GMT+0. Next add a time zone eld to your users table and make the necessary modications to allow your users to set their time zone. Now that we know the time zone of the logged in user we can correct the date and time on our posts using the Time Helper:
echo $this->Time->format(F jS, Y // Will display August 22nd, 2011 // August 22nd, 2011 03:53 PM for // and August 23rd, 2011 09:53 AM

h:i A, $post[Post][created], null, $user[User][ti 11:53 PM for a user in GMT+0 a user in GMT-8 GMT+10

Most of the Time Helper methods have a $timezone parameter. The $timezone parameter accepts a valid timezone identier string or an instance of DateTimeZone class.
Formatting

TimeHelper::convert($serverTime, $timezone = NULL) Return type integer Converts given time (in servers time zone) to users local time, given his/her timezone.:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->convert(time(), Asia/Jakarta); // 1321038036 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::convert(time(), new DateTimeZone(Asia/Jakarta));

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Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below. TimeHelper::convertSpecifiers($format, $time = NULL) Return type string Converts a string representing the format for the function strftime and returns a windows safe and i18n aware format. TimeHelper::dayAsSql($dateString, $eld_name, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Creates a string in the same format as daysAsSql but only needs a single date object:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->dayAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, modified); // (modified >= 2011-08-22 00:00:00) AND (modified <= 2011-08-22 23:59:59) // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::dayAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, modified);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::daysAsSql($begin, $end, $eldName, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Returns a string in the format ($eld_name >= 2008-01-21 00:00:00) AND ($eld_name <= 200801-25 23:59:59). This is handy if you need to search for records between two dates inclusively:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->daysAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, Aug 25, 2011, created); // (created >= 2011-08-22 00:00:00) AND (created <= 2011-08-25 23:59:59) // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::daysAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, Aug 25, 2011, created);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::format($date, $format = NULL, $default = false, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Will return a string formatted to the given format using the PHP date() formatting options (http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.date.php):
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->format(F jS, Y h:i A, 2011-08-22 11:53:00); // August 22nd, 2011 11:53 AM echo $this->Time->format(r, +2 days);

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// 2 days from now formatted as Sun, 13 Nov 2011 03:36:10 +0800 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::format(2011-08-22 11:53:00, F jS, Y h:i A); echo CakeTime::format(+2 days, r);

You can also provide the date/time as the rst argument. When doing this you should use strftime compatible formatting. This call signature allows you to leverage locale aware date formatting which is not possible using date() compatible formatting:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->format(2012-01-13, %d-%m-%Y, invalid); // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::format(2011-08-22, %d-%m-%Y);

Changed in version 2.2: $format and $date parameters are in opposite order as used in 2.1 and below. $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below. $default parameter replaces $invalid parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $date parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::fromString($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Takes a string and uses strtotime (http://us.php.net/manual/en/function.date.php) to convert it into a date integer:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->fromString(Aug 22, 2011); // 1313971200 echo $this->Time->fromString(+1 days); // 1321074066 (+1 day from current date) // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::fromString(Aug 22, 2011); echo CakeTime::fromString(+1 days);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::gmt($dateString = NULL) Return type integer Will return the date as an integer set to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->gmt(Aug 22, 2011); // 1313971200

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// called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::gmt(Aug 22, 2011);

TimeHelper::i18nFormat($date, $format = NULL, $invalid = false, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Returns a formatted date string, given either a UNIX timestamp or a valid strtotime() date string. It take in account the default date format for the current language if a LC_TIME le is used. Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below. TimeHelper::nice($dateString = NULL, $timezone = NULL, $format = null) Return type string Takes a date string and outputs it in the format Tue, Jan 1st 2008, 19:25 or as per optional $format param passed:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->nice(2011-08-22 11:53:00); // Mon, Aug 22nd 2011, 11:53 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::nice(2011-08-22 11:53:00);

TimeHelper::niceShort($dateString = NULL, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Takes a date string and outputs it in the format Jan 1st 2008, 19:25. If the date object is today, the format will be Today, 19:25. If the date object is yesterday, the format will be Yesterday, 19:25:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->niceShort(2011-08-22 11:53:00); // Aug 22nd, 11:53 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::niceShort(2011-08-22 11:53:00);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::serverOffset() Return type integer Returns servers offset from GMT in seconds. TimeHelper::timeAgoInWords($dateString, $options = array()) Return type string Will take a datetime string (anything that is parsable by PHPs strtotime() function or MySQLs datetime format) and convert it into a friendly word format like, 3 weeks, 3 days ago: Helpers 403

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// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011); // on 22/8/11 echo $this->Time->timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y)); // on August 22nd, 2011 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011); echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y));

Use the end option to determine the cutoff point to no longer will use words; default +1 month:

// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y, end => // On Nov 10th, 2011 it would display: 2 months, 2 weeks, 6 days ago

// called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y, end => +

Use the accuracy option to determine how precise the output should be. You can use this to limit the output:
// If $timestamp is 1 month, 1 week, 5 days and 6 hours ago echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords($timestamp, array( accuracy => array(month => month), end => 1 year )); // Outputs 1 month ago

Changed in version 2.2: The accuracy option was added.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::toAtom($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Will return a date string in the Atom format 2008-01-12T00:00:00Z Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::toQuarter($dateString, $range = false) Return type mixed Will return 1, 2, 3 or 4 depending on what quarter of the year the date falls in. If range is set to true, a two element array will be returned with start and end dates in the format 2008-03-31:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011); // Would print 3 $arr = $this->Time->toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011, true);

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/* Array ( [0] => 2011-07-01 [1] => 2011-09-30 ) */ // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011); $arr = CakeTime::toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011, true);

New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::toRSS($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Will return a date string in the RSS format Sat, 12 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0500 Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::toUnix($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type integer A wrapper for fromString. Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. TimeHelper::toServer($dateString, $timezone = NULL, $format = Y-m-d H:i:s) Return type mixed New in version 2.2: Returns a formatted date in servers timezone. TimeHelper::timezone($timezone = NULL) Return type DateTimeZone New in version 2.2: Returns a timezone object from a string or the users timezone object. If the function is called without a parameter it tries to get timezone from Cong.timezone conguration variable. TimeHelper::listTimezones($lter = null, $country = null, $group = true) Return type array New in version 2.2: Returns a list of timezone identiers.
Testing Time

TimeHelper::isToday($dateString, $timezone = NULL) TimeHelper::isThisWeek($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Helpers 405

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TimeHelper::isThisMonth($dateString, $timezone = NULL) TimeHelper::isThisYear($dateString, $timezone = NULL) TimeHelper::wasYesterday($dateString, $timezone = NULL) TimeHelper::isTomorrow($dateString, $timezone = NULL) TimeHelper::isFuture($dateString, $timezone = NULL) New in version 2.4. TimeHelper::isPast($dateString, $timezone = NULL) New in version 2.4. TimeHelper::wasWithinLast($timeInterval, $dateString, $timezone = NULL) Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. All of the above functions return true or false when passed a date string. wasWithinLast takes an additional $timeInterval option:
// called via TimeHelper $this->Time->wasWithinLast($timeInterval, $dateString); // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); CakeTime::wasWithinLast($timeInterval, $dateString);

wasWithinLast takes a time interval which is a string in the format 3 months and accepts a time interval of seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years (plural and not). If a time interval is not recognized (for example, if it is mistyped) then it will default to days.

Utilities
Beyond the core MVC components, CakePHP includes a great selection of utility classes that help you do everything from webservice requests, to caching, to logging, internationalization and more.

Utilities
Caching Caching is frequently used to reduce the time it takes to create or read from other resources. Caching is often used to make reading from expensive resources less expensive. You can easily store the results of expensive queries, or remote webservice access that doesnt frequently change in a cache. Once in the cache, re-reading the stored resource from the cache is much cheaper than accessing the remote resource. Caching in CakePHP is primarily facilitated by the Cache class. This class provides a set of static methods that provide a uniform API to dealing with all different types of Caching implementations. CakePHP comes with several cache engines built-in, and provides an easy system to implement your own caching systems. The built-in caching engines are:

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FileCache File cache is a simple cache that uses local les. It is the slowest cache engine, and doesnt provide as many features for atomic operations. However, since disk storage is often quite cheap, storing large objects, or elements that are infrequently written work well in les. This is the default Cache engine for 2.3+ ApcCache APC cache uses the PHP APC (http://php.net/apc) extension. This extension uses shared memory on the webserver to store objects. This makes it very fast, and able to provide atomic read/write features. By default CakePHP in 2.0-2.2 will use this cache engine if its available. Wincache Wincache uses the Wincache (http://php.net/wincache) extension. Wincache is similar to APC in features and performance, but optimized for Windows and IIS. XcacheEngine Xcache (http://xcache.lighttpd.net/) is a PHP extension that provides similar features to APC. MemcacheEngine Uses the Memcache (http://php.net/memcache) extension. Memcache provides a very fast cache system that can be distributed across many servers, and provides atomic operations. RedisEngine Uses the phpredis (https://github.com/nicolasff/phpredis) extension. Redis provides a fast and persistent cache system similar to memcached, also provides atomic operations. Changed in version 2.3: FileEngine is always the default cache engine. In the past a number of people had difculty setting up and deploying APC correctly both in cli + web. Using les should make setting up CakePHP simpler for new developers. Regardless of the CacheEngine you choose to use, your application interacts with Cache in a consistent manner. This means you can easily swap cache engines as your application grows. In addition to the Cache class, the CacheHelper allows for full page caching, which can greatly improve performance as well.
Conguring Cache class

Conguring the Cache class can be done anywhere, but generally you will want to congure Cache in app/Config/bootstrap.php. You can congure as many cache congurations as you need, and use any mixture of cache engines. CakePHP uses two cache congurations internally, which are congured in app/Config/core.php. If you are using APC or Memcache you should make sure to set unique keys for the core caches. This will prevent multiple applications from overwriting each others cached data. Using multiple cache congurations can help reduce the number of times you need to use Cache::set() as well as centralize all your cache settings. Using multiple congurations also lets you incrementally change the storage as needed. Note: You must specify which engine to use. It does not default to File. Example:
Cache::config(short, array( engine => File, duration => +1 hours, path => CACHE, prefix => cake_short_ ));

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// long Cache::config(long, array( engine => File, duration => +1 week, probability => 100, path => CACHE . long . DS, ));

By placing the above code in your app/Config/bootstrap.php you will have two additional Cache congurations. The name of these congurations short or long is used as the $config parameter for Cache::write() and Cache::read(). Note: When using the FileEngine you might need to use the mask option to ensure cache les are made with the correct permissions.

Creating a storage engine for Cache

You can provide custom Cache adapters in app/Lib as well as in plugins using $plugin/Lib. App/plugin cache engines can also override the core engines. Cache adapters must be in a cache directory. If you had a cache engine named MyCustomCacheEngine it would be placed in either app/Lib/Cache/Engine/MyCustomCacheEngine.php as an app/libs or in $plugin/Lib/Cache/Engine/MyCustomCacheEngine.php as part of a plugin. Cache congs from plugins need to use the plugin dot syntax.:
Cache::config(custom, array( engine => CachePack.MyCustomCache, // ... ));

Note: App and Plugin cache engines should be congured in app/Config/bootstrap.php. If you try to congure them in core.php they will not work correctly. Custom Cache engines must extend CacheEngine which denes a number of abstract methods as well as provides a few initialization methods. The required API for a CacheEngine is class CacheEngine The base class for all cache engines used with Cache. CacheEngine::write($key, $value, $cong = default) Returns boolean for success. Write value for a key into cache, optional string $cong species conguration name to write to. CacheEngine::read($key) Returns The cached value or false for failure.

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Read a key from the cache. Return false to indicate the entry has expired or does not exist. CacheEngine::delete($key) Returns Boolean true on success. Delete a key from the cache. Return false to indicate that the entry did not exist or could not be deleted. CacheEngine::clear($check) Returns Boolean true on success. Delete all keys from the cache. If $check is true, you should validate that each value is actually expired. CacheEngine::clearGroup($group) Returns Boolean true on success. Delete all keys from the cache belonging to the same group. CacheEngine::decrement($key, $offset = 1) Returns Boolean true on success. Decrement a number under the key and return decremented value CacheEngine::increment($key, $offset = 1) Returns Boolean true on success. Increment a number under the key and return incremented value CacheEngine::gc() Not required, but used to do clean up when resources expire. FileEngine uses this to delete les containing expired content.
Using Cache to store common query results

You can greatly improve the performance of your application by putting results that infrequently change, or that are subject to heavy reads into the cache. A perfect example of this are the results from Model::find(). A method that uses Cache to store results could look like:
class Post extends AppModel {

public function newest() { $result = Cache::read(newest_posts, longterm); if (!$result) { $result = $this->find(all, array(order => Post.updated DESC, limit => 1 Cache::write(newest_posts, $result, longterm); } return $result; } }

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You could improve the above code by moving the cache reading logic into a behavior, that read from the cache, or ran the associated model method. That is an exercise you can do though.
Using Cache to store counters

Counters for various things are easily stored in a cache. For example, a simple countdown for remaining slots in a contest could be stored in Cache. The Cache class exposes atomic ways to increment/decrement counter values in an easy way. Atomic operations are important for these values as it reduces the risk of contention, and ability for two users to simultaneously lower the value by one, resulting in an incorrect value. After setting an integer value, Cache::decrement(): you can manipulate it using Cache::increment() and

Cache::write(initial_count, 10); // Later on Cache::decrement(initial_count); // or Cache::increment(initial_count);

Note: Incrementing and decrementing do not work with FileEngine. You should use APC, Redis or Memcache instead.

Using groups

New in version 2.2. Sometimes you will want to mark multiple cache entries to belong to a certain group or namespace. This is a common requirement for mass-invalidating keys whenever some information changes that is shared among all entries in the same group. This is possible by declaring the groups in cache conguration:
Cache::config(site_home, array( engine => Redis, duration => +999 days, groups => array(comment, post) ));

Lets say you want to store the HTML generated for your homepage in cache, but would also want to automatically invalidate this cache every time a comment or post is added to your database. By adding the groups comment and post, we have effectively tagged any key stored into this cache conguration with both group names. For instance, whenever a new post is added, we could tell the Cache engine to remove all entries associated to the post group:
// Model/Post.php

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public function afterSave($created) { if ($created) { Cache::clearGroup(post, site_home); } }

New in version 2.4. Cache::groupConfigs() can be used to retrieve mapping between group and congurations, i.e.: having the same group:
// Model/Post.php /** * A variation of previous example that clears all Cache configurations * having the same group */ public function afterSave($created) { if ($created) { $configs = Cache::groupConfigs(post); foreach ($configs[post] as $config) { Cache::clearGroup(post, $config); } } }

Groups are shared across all cache congs using the same engine and same prex. If you are using groups and want to take advantage of group deletion, choose a common prex for all your congs.
Cache API

class Cache The Cache class in CakePHP provides a generic frontend for several backend caching systems. Different Cache congurations and engines can be set up in your app/Cong/core.php static Cache::config($name = null, $settings = array()) Cache::config() is used to create additional Cache congurations. These additional congurations can have different duration, engines, paths, or prexes than your default cache cong. static Cache::read($key, $cong = default) Cache::read() is used to read the cached value stored under $key from the $config. If $cong is null the default cong will be used. Cache::read() will return the cached value if it is a valid cache or false if the cache has expired or doesnt exist. The contents of the cache might evaluate false, so make sure you use the strict comparison operator === or !==. For example:
$cloud = Cache::read(cloud); if ($cloud !== false) { return $cloud; } // generate cloud data

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// ... // store data in cache Cache::write(cloud, $cloud); return $cloud;

static Cache::write($key, $value, $cong = default) Cache::write() will write a $value to the Cache. You can read or delete this value later by referring to it by $key. You may specify an optional conguration to store the cache in as well. If no $config is specied, default will be used. Cache::write() can store any type of object and is ideal for storing results of model nds:
if (($posts = Cache::read(posts)) === false) { $posts = $this->Post->find(all); Cache::write(posts, $posts); }

Using Cache::write() and Cache::read() to easily reduce the number of trips made to the database to fetch posts. static Cache::delete($key, $cong = default) Cache::delete() will allow you to completely remove a cached object from the Cache store. static Cache::set($settings = array(), $value = null, $cong = default) Cache::set() allows you to temporarily override a cache congs settings for one operation (usually a read or write). If you use Cache::set() to change the settings for a write, you should also use Cache::set() before reading the data back in. If you fail to do so, the default settings will be used when the cache key is read.:
Cache::set(array(duration => +30 days)); Cache::write(results, $data); // Later on Cache::set(array(duration => +30 days)); $results = Cache::read(results);

If you nd yourself repeatedly calling Cache::set() then perhaps you should create a new Cache::config(). This will remove the need to call Cache::set(). static Cache::increment($key, $offset = 1, $cong = default) Atomically increment a value stored in the cache engine. Ideal for modifying counters or semaphore type values. static Cache::decrement($key, $offset = 1, $cong = default) Atomically decrement a value stored in the cache engine. Ideal for modifying counters or semaphore type values. static Cache::clear($check, $cong = default) Destroy all cached values for a cache conguration. In engines like Apc, Memcache and Wincache, the cache congurations prex is used to remove cache entries. Make sure that different cache congurations have different prexes.

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Cache::clearGroup($group, $cong = default) Returns Boolean true on success. Delete all keys from the cache belonging to the same group. static Cache::gc($cong) Garbage collects entries in the cache conguration. This is primarily used by FileEngine. It should be implemented by any Cache engine that requires manual eviction of cached data. static Cache::groupConfigs($group = null) Returns Array of groups and its related conguration names. Retrieve group names to cong mapping. CakeEmail class CakeEmail(mixed $cong = null) CakeEmail is a new class to send email. With this class you can send email from any place of your application. In addition to using the EmailComponent from your controller, you can also send mail from Shells, and Models. This class replaces the EmailComponent and gives more exibility in sending emails. For example, you can create your own transports to send email instead of using the provided smtp and mail.
Basic usage

First of all, you should ensure the class is loaded using App::uses():
App::uses(CakeEmail, Network/Email);

Using CakeEmail is similar to using EmailComponent. But instead of using attributes you must use methods. Example:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->from(array([email protected] => My Site)); $Email->to([email protected]); $Email->subject(About); $Email->send(My message);

To simplify things, all of the setter methods return the instance of class. You can re-write the above code as:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->from(array([email protected] => My Site)) ->to([email protected]) ->subject(About) ->send(My message);

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Choosing the sender When sending email on behalf of other people its often a good idea to dene the original sender using the Sender header. You can do so using sender():
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->sender([email protected], MyApp emailer);

Note: Its also a good idea to set the envelope sender when sending mail on another persons behalf. This prevents them from getting any messages about deliverability.

Conguration

Similar of database conguration, emails can have a class to centralize all the conguration. Create the le app/Config/email.php with the class app/Config/email.php.default has an example of this le. EmailConfig. The

CakeEmail will create an instance of the EmailConfig class to access the cong. If you have dynamic data to put in the congs, you can use the constructor to do that:
class EmailConfig { public function __construct() { // Do conditional assignments here. } }

It is not required to create app/Config/email.php, CakeEmail can be used without it and use respective methods to set all congurations separately or load an array of congs. To load a cong from EmailConfig you can use the config() method or pass it to the constructor of CakeEmail:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->config(default); //or in constructor:: $Email = new CakeEmail(default);

Instead of passing a string which matches the conguration name in EmailConfig you can also just load an array of congs:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->config(array(from => [email protected], transport => MyCustom)); //or in constructor:: $Email = new CakeEmail(array(from => [email protected], transport => MyCustom));

You can congure SSL SMTP servers, like Gmail. To do so, put the ssl:// at prex in the host and congure the port value accordingly. Example:
class EmailConfig { public $gmail = array(

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host => ssl://smtp.gmail.com, port => 465, username => [email protected], password => secret, transport => Smtp ); }

Note: To use this feature, you will need to have the SSL congured in your PHP install. As of 2.3.0 you can also enable TLS SMTP using the tls option:
class EmailConfig { public $gmail = array( host => smtp.gmail.com, port => 465, username => [email protected], password => secret, transport => Smtp, tls => true ); }

The above conguration would enable TLS communication for email messages. Congurations The following conguration keys are used: from: Email or array of sender. See CakeEmail::from(). sender: Email or array of real sender. See CakeEmail::sender(). to: Email or array of destination. See CakeEmail::to(). cc: Email or array of carbon copy. See CakeEmail::cc(). bcc: Email or array of blind carbon copy. See CakeEmail::bcc(). replyTo: Email or array to reply the e-mail. See CakeEmail::replyTo(). readReceipt: Email address or an array of addresses to receive the receipt of read. See CakeEmail::readReceipt(). returnPath: Email address or and array of addresses to return if have some error. See CakeEmail::returnPath(). messageId: Message ID of e-mail. See CakeEmail::messageId(). subject: Subject of the message. See CakeEmail::subject(). message: Content of message. Do not set this eld if you are using rendered content. headers: Headers to be included. See CakeEmail::setHeaders(). viewRender: If you are using rendered content, set the view classname. CakeEmail::viewRender(). Utilities See

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template: If you are using rendered content, CakeEmail::template().

set the template name.

See

theme: Theme used when rendering template. See CakeEmail::theme(). layout: If you are using rendered content, set the layout to render. If you want to render a template without layout, set this eld to null. See CakeEmail::template(). viewVars: If you are using rendered content, set the array with variables to be used in the view. See CakeEmail::viewVars(). attachments: List of les to attach. See CakeEmail::attachments(). emailFormat: Format of email (html, text or both). See CakeEmail::emailFormat(). transport: Transport name. See CakeEmail::transport(). log: Log level to log the email headers and message. true will use LOG_DEBUG. See also CakeLog::write() All these congurations are optional, except from. If you put more conguration in this array, the congurations will be used in the CakeEmail::config() method and passed to the transport class config(). For example, if you are using smtp transport, you should pass the host, port and other congurations. Note: The values of above keys using Email or array, like from, to, cc, etc will be passed as rst parameter of corresponding methods. The equivalent for: CakeEmail::from([email protected], My Site) would be dened as from => array([email protected] => My Site) in your cong

Setting headers In CakeEmail you are free to set whatever headers you want. When migrating to use CakeEmail, do not forget to put the X- prex in your headers. See CakeEmail::setHeaders() and CakeEmail::addHeaders() Sending templated emails Emails are often much more than just a simple text message. In order to facilitate that, CakePHP provides a way to send emails using CakePHPs view layer. The templates for emails reside in a special folder in your applications View directory. Email views can also use layouts, and elements just like normal views:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->template(welcome, fancy) ->emailFormat(html) ->to([email protected]) ->from([email protected]) ->send();

The above would use app/View/Emails/html/welcome.ctp for the view, and app/View/Layouts/Emails/html/fancy.ctp for the layout. You can send multipart templated email messages as well:

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$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->template(welcome, fancy) ->emailFormat(both) ->to([email protected]) ->from([email protected]) ->send();

This would use the following view les: app/View/Emails/text/welcome.ctp app/View/Layouts/Emails/text/fancy.ctp app/View/Emails/html/welcome.ctp app/View/Layouts/Emails/html/fancy.ctp When sending templated emails you have the option of sending either text, html or both. You can set view variables with CakeEmail::viewVars():
$Email = new CakeEmail(templated); $Email->viewVars(array(value => 12345));

In your email templates you can use these with:

<p>Here is your value: <b><?php echo $value; ?></b></p>

You can use helpers in emails as well, much like you can in normal view les. By default only the HtmlHelper is loaded. You can load additional helpers using the helpers() method:
$Email->helpers(array(Html, Custom, Text));

When setting helpers be sure to include Html or it will be removed from the helpers loaded in your email template. If you want to send email using templates in a plugin you can use the familiar plugin syntax to do so:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->template(Blog.new_comment, Blog.auto_message);

The above would use templates from the Blog plugin as an example. In some cases, you might need to override the default template provided by plugins. You can do this using themes by telling CakeEmail to use appropriate theme using CakeEmail::theme() method:
$Email = new CakeEmail(); $Email->template(Blog.new_comment, Blog.auto_message); $Email->theme(TestTheme);

This allows you to override the new_comment template in your theme without modifying the Blog plugin. The template le needs to be created in the following path: APP/View/Themed/TestTheme/Blog/Emails/text/new_comment.ctp.

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Sending attachments CakeEmail::attachments($attachments = null) You can attach les to email messages as well. There are a few different formats depending on what kind of les you have, and how you want the lenames to appear in the recipients mail client: 1. String: $Email->attachments(/full/file/path/file.png) will attach this le with the name le.png. 2. Array: $Email->attachments(array(/full/file/path/file.png) will have the same behavior as using a string. 3. Array with key: $Email->attachments(array(photo.png => /full/some_hash.png)) will attach some_hash.png with the name photo.png. The recipient will see photo.png, not some_hash.png. 4. Nested arrays:
$Email->attachments(array( photo.png => array( file => /full/some_hash.png, mimetype => image/png, contentId => my-unique-id ) ));

The above will attach the le with different mimetype and with custom Content ID (when set the content ID the attachment is transformed to inline). The mimetype and contentId are optional in this form. 4.1. When you are using the contentId, you can use the le in the html body like <img src="cid:my-content-id">. 4.2. You can use the contentDisposition option to disable the Content-Disposition header for an attachment. This is useful when sending ical invites to clients using outlook. Changed in version 2.3: The contentDisposition option was added in 2.3 Using transports Transports are classes designed to send the e-mail over some protocol or method. CakePHP support the Mail (default), Debug and Smtp transports. To congure your method, you must use the CakeEmail::transport() method or have the transport in your conguration Creating custom Transports You are able to create your custom transports to integrate with others email systems (like SwiftMailer). To create your transport, rst create the le app/Lib/Network/Email/ExampleTransport.php (where Example is the name of your transport). To start off your le should look like:
App::uses(AbstractTransport, Network/Email); class ExampleTransport extends AbstractTransport {

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public function send(CakeEmail $Email) { // magic inside! } }

You must implement the method send(CakeEmail $Email) with your custom logic. Optionally, you can implement the config($config) method. config() is called before send() and allows you to accept user congurations. By default, this method puts the conguration in protected attribute $_config. If you need to call additional methods on the transport before send, CakeEmail::transportClass() to get an instance of the transport. Example:
$yourInstance = $Email->transport(your)->transportClass(); $yourInstance->myCustomMethod(); $Email->send();

you

can

use

Relaxing address validation rules CakeEmail::emailPattern($pattern = null) If you are having validation issues when sending to non compliant addresses, you can relax the pattern used to validate email addresses. This is sometimes necessary when dealing with some Japanese ISPs:
$email = new CakeEmail(default); // Relax the email pattern, so you can send // to non-conformant addresses. $email->emailPattern($newPattern);

New in version 2.4.

Sending messages quickly

Sometimes you need a quick way to re off an email, and you dont necessarily want do setup a bunch of conguration ahead of time. CakeEmail::deliver() is intended for that purpose. You can create your conguration in EmailConfig, or use an array with all options that you need and use the static method CakeEmail::deliver(). Example:

CakeEmail::deliver([email protected], Subject, Message, array(from => [email protected]

This method will send an email to [email protected] ([email protected]), from [email protected] ([email protected]) with subject Subject and content Message. The return of deliver() is a CakeEmail instance with all congurations set. If you do not want to send the email right away, and wish to congure a few things before sending, you can pass the 5th parameter as false. The 3rd parameter is the content of message or an array with variables (when using rendered content). The 4th parameter can be an array with the congurations or a string with the name of conguration in EmailConfig. Utilities 419

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If you want, you can pass the to, subject and message as null and do all congurations in the 4th parameter (as array or using EmailConfig). Check the list of congurations to see all accepted congs.
Sending emails from CLI

Changed in version 2.2: The domain() method was added in 2.2 When sending emails within a CLI script (Shells, Tasks, ...) you should manually set the domain name for CakeEmail to use. It will serve as the host name for the message id (since there is no host name in a CLI environment):
$Email->domain(www.example.org); // Results in message ids like <[email protected]> (valid) // instead of <UUID@> (invalid)

A valid message id can help to prevent emails ending up in spam folders. CakeNumber class CakeNumber If you need NumberHelper functionalities outside of a View, use the CakeNumber class:
class UsersController extends AppController { public $components = array(Auth);

public function afterLogin() { App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); $storageUsed = $this->Auth->user(storage_used); if ($storageUsed > 5000000) { // notify users of quota $this->Session->setFlash(__(You are using %s storage, CakeNumber::toReadableS } } }

New in version 2.1: CakeNumber has been factored out from NumberHelper. All of these functions return the formatted number; They do not automatically echo the output into the view. CakeNumber::currency(mixed $number, string $currency = USD, array $options = array()) Parameters $number (oat) The value to covert. $currency (string) The known currency format to use. $options (array) Options, see below. This method is used to display a number in common currency formats (EUR,GBP,USD). Usage in a view looks like:

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// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->currency($number, $currency); // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::currency($number, $currency);

The rst parameter, $number, should be a oating point number that represents the amount of money you are expressing. The second parameter is used to choose a predened currency formatting scheme: $currency EUR GBP USD 1234.56, formatted by currency type C 1.236,33 1,236.33 $ 1,236.33

The third parameter is an array of options for further dening the output. The following options are available: Option before after Description The currency symbol to place before whole numbers ie. $ The currency symbol to place after decimal numbers ie. c. Set to boolean false to use no decimal symbol. eg. 0.35 => $0.35. zero The text to use for zero values, can be a string or a number. ie. 0, Free! places Number of decimal places to use. ie. 2 thousands Thousands separator ie. , decimals Decimal separator symbol ie. . negative Symbol for negative numbers. If equal to (), the number will be wrapped with ( and ) escape Should the output be htmlentity escaped? Defaults to true wholeSym- String to use for whole numbers ie. dollars bol wholePoEither before or after to place the whole symbol sition fractionString to use for fraction numbers ie. cents Symbol fractionEither before or after to place the fraction symbol Position If a non-recognized $currency value is supplied, it is prepended to a USD formatted number. For example:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->currency(1234.56, FOO); // Outputs FOO 1,234.56 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::currency(1234.56, FOO);

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Parameters $currency (string) Set a known currency for CakeNumber::currency(). Setter/getter for default currency. This removes the need always passing the currency to CakeNumber::currency() and change all currency outputs by setting other default. New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3 CakeNumber::addFormat(string $formatName, array $options) Parameters $formatName (string) The format name to be used in the future $options (array) The array of options for this format. $options keys as CakeNumber::currency(). Uses the same

Add a currency format to the Number helper. Makes reusing currency formats easier:
// called as NumberHelper $this->Number->addFormat(BRR, array(before => R$ )); // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); CakeNumber::addFormat(BRR, array(before => R$ ));

You can now use BRR as a short form when formatting currency amounts:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->currency($value, BRR); // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::currency($value, BRR);

Added formats are merged with the following defaults:

array( wholeSymbol wholePosition fractionSymbol fractionPosition zero places thousands decimals negative escape ) => => => => => => => => => => , before, , after, 0, 2, ,, ., (), true

CakeNumber::precision(mixed $number, int $precision = 3) Parameters $number (oat) The value to covert $precision (integer) The number of decimal places to display 422 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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This method displays a number with the specied amount of precision (decimal places). It will round in order to maintain the level of precision dened.:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->precision(456.91873645, 2); // Outputs 456.92 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::precision(456.91873645, 2);

CakeNumber::toPercentage(mixed $number, int $precision = 2) Parameters $number (oat) The value to covert $precision (integer) The number of decimal places to display Like precision(), this method formats a number according to the supplied precision (where numbers are rounded to meet the given precision). This method also expresses the number as a percentage and prepends the output with a percent sign.:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->toPercentage(45.691873645); // Outputs 45.69% // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::toPercentage(45.691873645);

CakeNumber::fromReadableSize(string $size, $default) Parameters $size (string) The formatted human readable value. This method unformats a number from a human readable byte size to an integer number of bytes. New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3 CakeNumber::toReadableSize(string $dataSize) Parameters $dataSize (string) The number of bytes to make readable. This method formats data sizes in human readable forms. It provides a shortcut way to convert bytes to KB, MB, GB, and TB. The size is displayed with a two-digit precision level, according to the size of data supplied (i.e. higher sizes are expressed in larger terms):
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(0); // 0 Bytes echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(1024); // 1 KB

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echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(1321205.76); // 1.26 MB echo $this->Number->toReadableSize(5368709120); // 5.00 GB // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(0); // 0 Bytes echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(1024); // 1 KB echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(1321205.76); // 1.26 MB echo CakeNumber::toReadableSize(5368709120); // 5.00 GB

CakeNumber::format(mixed $number, mixed $options=false) This method gives you much more control over the formatting of numbers for use in your views (and is used as the main method by most of the other NumberHelper methods). Using this method might looks like:
// called as NumberHelper $this->Number->format($number, $options); // called as CakeNumber CakeNumber::format($number, $options);

The $number parameter is the number that you are planning on formatting for output. With no $options supplied, the number 1236.334 would output as 1,236. Note that the default precision is zero decimal places. The $options parameter is where the real magic for this method resides. If you pass an integer then this becomes the amount of precision or places for the function. If you pass an associated array, you can use the following keys: places (integer): the amount of desired precision before (string): to be put before the outputted number escape (boolean): if you want the value in before to be escaped decimals (string): used to delimit the decimal places in a number thousands (string): used to mark off thousand, millions, . . . places Example:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->format(123456.7890, array( places => 2, before => , escape => false, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output 123,456.79 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::format(123456.7890, array(

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places => 2, before => , escape => false, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output 123,456.79

CakeNumber::formatDelta(mixed $number, mixed $options=array()) This method displays differences in value as a signed number:
// called as NumberHelper $this->Number->formatDelta($number, $options); // called as CakeNumber CakeNumber::formatDelta($number, $options);

The $number parameter is the number that you are planning on formatting for output. With no $options supplied, the number 1236.334 would output as 1,236. Note that the default precision is zero decimal places. The $options parameter takes the same keys as CakeNumber::format() itself: places (integer): the amount of desired precision before (string): to be put before the outputted number after (string): to be put after the outputted number decimals (string): used to delimit the decimal places in a number thousands (string): used to mark off thousand, millions, . . . places Example:
// called as NumberHelper echo $this->Number->formatDelta(123456.7890, array( places => 2, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output +123,456.79 // called as CakeNumber App::uses(CakeNumber, Utility); echo CakeNumber::formatDelta(123456.7890, array( places => 2, decimals => ., thousands => , )); // output +123,456.79

New in version 2.3: This method was added in 2.3

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CakeTime class CakeTime If you need TimeHelper functionalities outside of a View, use the CakeTime class:
class UsersController extends AppController { public $components = array(Auth); public function afterLogin() { App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); if (CakeTime::isToday($this->Auth->user(date_of_birth]))) { // greet user with a happy birthday message $this->Session->setFlash(__(Happy birthday you...)); } } }

New in version 2.1: CakeTime has been factored out from TimeHelper.
Formatting

CakeTime::convert($serverTime, $timezone = NULL) Return type integer Converts given time (in servers time zone) to users local time, given his/her timezone.:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->convert(time(), Asia/Jakarta); // 1321038036 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::convert(time(), new DateTimeZone(Asia/Jakarta));

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below. CakeTime::convertSpecifiers($format, $time = NULL) Return type string Converts a string representing the format for the function strftime and returns a windows safe and i18n aware format. CakeTime::dayAsSql($dateString, $eld_name, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Creates a string in the same format as daysAsSql but only needs a single date object:

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// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->dayAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, modified); // (modified >= 2011-08-22 00:00:00) AND (modified <= 2011-08-22 23:59:59) // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::dayAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, modified);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::daysAsSql($begin, $end, $eldName, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Returns a string in the format ($eld_name >= 2008-01-21 00:00:00) AND ($eld_name <= 200801-25 23:59:59). This is handy if you need to search for records between two dates inclusively:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->daysAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, Aug 25, 2011, created); // (created >= 2011-08-22 00:00:00) AND (created <= 2011-08-25 23:59:59) // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::daysAsSql(Aug 22, 2011, Aug 25, 2011, created);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::format($date, $format = NULL, $default = false, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Will return a string formatted to the given format using the PHP date() formatting options (http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.date.php):
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->format(F jS, Y h:i A, 2011-08-22 11:53:00); // August 22nd, 2011 11:53 AM echo $this->Time->format(r, +2 days); // 2 days from now formatted as Sun, 13 Nov 2011 03:36:10 +0800 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::format(2011-08-22 11:53:00, F jS, Y h:i A); echo CakeTime::format(+2 days, r);

You can also provide the date/time as the rst argument. When doing this you should use strftime compatible formatting. This call signature allows you to leverage locale aware date formatting which is not possible using date() compatible formatting:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->format(2012-01-13, %d-%m-%Y, invalid);

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// called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::format(2011-08-22, %d-%m-%Y);

Changed in version 2.2: $format and $date parameters are in opposite order as used in 2.1 and below. $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below. $default parameter replaces $invalid parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $date parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::fromString($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Takes a string and uses strtotime (http://us.php.net/manual/en/function.date.php) to convert it into a date integer:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->fromString(Aug 22, 2011); // 1313971200 echo $this->Time->fromString(+1 days); // 1321074066 (+1 day from current date) // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::fromString(Aug 22, 2011); echo CakeTime::fromString(+1 days);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::gmt($dateString = NULL) Return type integer Will return the date as an integer set to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->gmt(Aug 22, 2011); // 1313971200 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::gmt(Aug 22, 2011);

CakeTime::i18nFormat($date, $format = NULL, $invalid = false, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Returns a formatted date string, given either a UNIX timestamp or a valid strtotime() date string. It take in account the default date format for the current language if a LC_TIME le is used. Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below. CakeTime::nice($dateString = NULL, $timezone = NULL, $format = null) Return type string 428 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Takes a date string and outputs it in the format Tue, Jan 1st 2008, 19:25 or as per optional $format param passed:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->nice(2011-08-22 11:53:00); // Mon, Aug 22nd 2011, 11:53 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::nice(2011-08-22 11:53:00);

CakeTime::niceShort($dateString = NULL, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Takes a date string and outputs it in the format Jan 1st 2008, 19:25. If the date object is today, the format will be Today, 19:25. If the date object is yesterday, the format will be Yesterday, 19:25:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->niceShort(2011-08-22 11:53:00); // Aug 22nd, 11:53 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::niceShort(2011-08-22 11:53:00);

Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::serverOffset() Return type integer Returns servers offset from GMT in seconds. CakeTime::timeAgoInWords($dateString, $options = array()) Return type string Will take a datetime string (anything that is parsable by PHPs strtotime() function or MySQLs datetime format) and convert it into a friendly word format like, 3 weeks, 3 days ago:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011); // on 22/8/11 echo $this->Time->timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y)); // on August 22nd, 2011 // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011); echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y));

Use the end option to determine the cutoff point to no longer will use words; default +1 month:

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// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y, end => // On Nov 10th, 2011 it would display: 2 months, 2 weeks, 6 days ago

// called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords(Aug 22, 2011, array(format => F jS, Y, end => +

Use the accuracy option to determine how precise the output should be. You can use this to limit the output:
// If $timestamp is 1 month, 1 week, 5 days and 6 hours ago echo CakeTime::timeAgoInWords($timestamp, array( accuracy => array(month => month), end => 1 year )); // Outputs 1 month ago

Changed in version 2.2: The accuracy option was added.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::toAtom($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Will return a date string in the Atom format 2008-01-12T00:00:00Z Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::toQuarter($dateString, $range = false) Return type mixed Will return 1, 2, 3 or 4 depending on what quarter of the year the date falls in. If range is set to true, a two element array will be returned with start and end dates in the format 2008-03-31:
// called via TimeHelper echo $this->Time->toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011); // Would print 3 $arr = $this->Time->toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011, true); /* Array ( [0] => 2011-07-01 [1] => 2011-09-30 ) */ // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); echo CakeTime::toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011); $arr = CakeTime::toQuarter(Aug 22, 2011, true);

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CakeTime::toRSS($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type string Will return a date string in the RSS format Sat, 12 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0500 Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::toUnix($dateString, $timezone = NULL) Return type integer A wrapper for fromString. Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. CakeTime::toServer($dateString, $timezone = NULL, $format = Y-m-d H:i:s) Return type mixed New in version 2.2: Returns a formatted date in servers timezone. CakeTime::timezone($timezone = NULL) Return type DateTimeZone New in version 2.2: Returns a timezone object from a string or the users timezone object. If the function is called without a parameter it tries to get timezone from Cong.timezone conguration variable. CakeTime::listTimezones($lter = null, $country = null, $group = true) Return type array New in version 2.2: Returns a list of timezone identiers.
Testing Time

CakeTime::isToday($dateString, $timezone = NULL) CakeTime::isThisWeek($dateString, $timezone = NULL) CakeTime::isThisMonth($dateString, $timezone = NULL) CakeTime::isThisYear($dateString, $timezone = NULL) CakeTime::wasYesterday($dateString, $timezone = NULL) CakeTime::isTomorrow($dateString, $timezone = NULL) CakeTime::isFuture($dateString, $timezone = NULL) New in version 2.4. CakeTime::isPast($dateString, $timezone = NULL) New in version 2.4.

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CakeTime::wasWithinLast($timeInterval, $dateString, $timezone = NULL) Changed in version 2.2: $timezone parameter replaces $userOffset parameter used in 2.1 and below.New in version 2.2: $dateString parameter now also accepts a DateTime object. All of the above functions return true or false when passed a date string. wasWithinLast takes an additional $timeInterval option:
// called via TimeHelper $this->Time->wasWithinLast($timeInterval, $dateString); // called as CakeTime App::uses(CakeTime, Utility); CakeTime::wasWithinLast($timeInterval, $dateString);

wasWithinLast takes a time interval which is a string in the format 3 months and accepts a time interval of seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years (plural and not). If a time interval is not recognized (for example, if it is mistyped) then it will default to days. Data Sanitization class Sanitize The CakePHP Sanitize class can be used to rid user-submitted data of malicious data and other unwanted information. Sanitize is a core library, so it can be used anywhere inside of your code, but is probably best used in controllers or models. CakePHP already protects you against SQL Injection if you use CakePHPs ORM methods (such as nd() and save()) and proper array notation (ie. array(eld => $value)) instead of raw SQL. For sanitization against XSS its generally better to save raw HTML in database without modication and sanitize at the time of output/display. All you need to do is include the Sanitize core library (e.g. before the controller class denition):
App::uses(Sanitize, Utility); class MyController extends AppController { ... ... }

Once youve done that, you can make calls to Sanitize statically. static Sanitize::clean($data, $options) Parameters $data (mixed) Data to clean. $options (mixed) Options to use when cleaning, see below. This function is an industrial-strength, multi-purpose cleaner, meant to be used on entire arrays (like $this->data, for example). The function takes an array (or string) and returns the clean version. The following cleaning operations are performed on each element in the array (recursively): Odd spaces (including 0xCA) are replaced with regular spaces. 432 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Double-checking special chars and removal of carriage returns for increased SQL security. Adding of slashes for SQL (just calls the sql function outlined above). Swapping of user-inputted backslashes with trusted backslashes. The $options argument can either be a string or an array. When a string is provided its the database connection name. If an array is provided it will be merged with the following options: connection odd_spaces encode dollar carriage unicode escape backslash remove_html (must be used in conjunction with the encode parameter) Usage of clean() with options looks something like the following:
$this->data = Sanitize::clean($this->data, array(encode => false));

static Sanitize::escape($string, $connection) Parameters $string (string) Data to clean. $connection (string) The name of the database to quote the string for, as named in your app/Cong/database.php le. Used to escape SQL statements by adding slashes, depending on the systems current magic_quotes_gpc setting, static Sanitize::html($string, $options = array()) Parameters $string (string) Data to clean. $options (array) An array of options to use, see below. This method prepares user-submitted data for display inside HTML. This is especially useful if you dont want users to be able to break your layouts or insert images or scripts inside of your HTML pages. If the $remove option is set to true, HTML content detected is removed rather than rendered as HTML entities:

$badString = <font size="99" color="#FF0000">HEY</font><script>...</script>; echo Sanitize::html($badString); // output: &lt;font size=&quot;99&quot; color=&quot;#FF0000&quot;&gt;HEY&lt;/font&gt;&

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echo Sanitize::html($badString, array(remove => true)); // output: HEY...

Escaping HTML content using h is often a better strategy than sanitization, as it has less room for error, and isnt vulnerable to new types of attacks, the stripping function does not know about. static Sanitize::paranoid($string, $allowedChars) Parameters $string (string) Data to clean. $allowedChars (array) An array of non alpha numeric characters allowed. This function strips anything out of the target $string that is not a plain-jane alphanumeric character. The function can be made to overlook certain characters by passing them in $allowedChars array:
$badString = ";:<script><html>< // >@@#"; echo Sanitize::paranoid($badString); // output: scripthtml echo Sanitize::paranoid($badString, array( , @)); // output: scripthtml @@

Folder & File The Folder and File utilities are convenience classes to help you read, write, and append to les; list les within a folder and other common directory related tasks.
Basic usage

Ensure the classes are loaded using App::uses():

<?php App::uses(Folder, Utility); App::uses(File, Utility);

Then we can setup a new folder instance:

<?php $dir = new Folder(/path/to/folder);

and search for all .ctp les within that folder using regex:
<?php $files = $dir->find(.*\.ctp);

Now we can loop through the les and read, write or append to the contents or simply delete the le:
<?php foreach ($files as $file) { $file = new File($dir->pwd() . DS . $file); $contents = $file->read();

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// $file->write(I am overwriting the contents of this file); // $file->append(I am adding to the bottom of this file.); // $file->delete(); // I am deleting this file $file->close(); // Be sure to close the file when youre done }

Folder API

class Folder(string $path = false, boolean $create = false, mixed $mode = false)
<?php // Create a new folder with 0755 permissions $dir = new Folder(/path/to/folder, true, 0755);

property Folder::$path Current path to the folder. Folder::pwd() will return the same information. property Folder::$sort Whether or not the list results should be sorted by name. property Folder::$mode Mode to be used when creating folders. Defaults to 0755. Does nothing on windows machines. static Folder::addPathElement($path, $element) Return type string Returns $path with $element added, with correct slash in-between:
<?php $path = Folder::addPathElement(/a/path/for, testing); // $path equals /a/path/for/testing

Folder::cd($path) Return type string Change directory to $path. Returns false on failure:
<?php $folder = new Folder(/foo); echo $folder->path; // Prints /foo $folder->cd(/bar); echo $folder->path; // Prints /bar $false = $folder->cd(/non-existent-folder);

Folder::chmod($path, $mode = false, $recursive = true, $exceptions = array ( )) Return type boolean Change the mode on a directory structure recursively. This includes changing the mode on les as well:

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<?php $dir = new Folder(); $dir->chmod(/path/to/folder, 0755, true, array(skip_me.php));

Folder::copy($options = array ( )) Return type boolean Recursively copy a directory. The only parameter $options can either be a path into copy to or an array of options:
<?php $folder1 = new Folder(/path/to/folder1); $folder1->copy(/path/to/folder2); // Will put folder1 and all its contents into folder2 $folder = new Folder(/path/to/folder); $folder->copy(array( to => /path/to/new/folder, from => /path/to/copy/from, // will cause a cd() to occur mode => 0755, skip => array(skip-me.php, .git), scheme => Folder::SKIP // Skip directories/files that already exist. ));

There are 3 supported schemes: Folder::SKIP skip copying/moving les & directories that exist in the destination directory. Folder::MERGE merge the source/destination directories. Files in the source directory will replace les in the target directory. Directory contents will be merged. Folder::OVERWRITE overwrite existing les & directories in the target directory with those in the source directory. If both the target and destination contain the same subdirectory, the target directorys contents will be removed and replaced with the sources. Changed in version 2.3: The merge, skip and overwrite schemes were added to copy() static Folder::correctSlashFor($path) Return type string Returns a correct set of slashes for given $path. (\ for Windows paths and / for other paths.) Folder::create($pathname, $mode = false) Return type boolean Create a directory structure recursively. /foo/bar/baz/shoe/horn: Can be used to create deep path structures like

<?php $folder = new Folder(); if ($folder->create(foo . DS . bar . DS . baz . DS . shoe . DS . horn)) { // Successfully created the nested folders }

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Folder::delete($path = NULL) Return type boolean Recursively remove directories if the system allows:
<?php $folder = new Folder(foo); if ($folder->delete()) { // Successfully deleted foo its nested folders }

Folder::dirsize() Return type integer Returns the size in bytes of this Folder and its contents. Folder::errors() Return type array Get error from latest method. Folder::find($regexpPattern = .*, $sort = false) Return type array Returns an array of all matching les in current directory:
<?php // Find all .png in your app/webroot/img/ folder and sort the results $dir = new Folder(WWW_ROOT . img); $files = $dir->find(.*\.png, true); /* Array ( [0] => cake.icon.png [1] => test-error-icon.png [2] => test-fail-icon.png [3] => test-pass-icon.png [4] => test-skip-icon.png ) */

Note: The folder nd and ndRecursive methods will only nd les. If you would like to get folders and les see Folder::read() or Folder::tree() Folder::findRecursive($pattern = .*, $sort = false) Return type array Returns an array of all matching les in and below current directory:
<?php // Recursively find files beginning with test or index

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$dir = new Folder(WWW_ROOT); $files = $dir->findRecursive((test|index).*); /* Array ( [0] => /var/www/cake/app/webroot/index.php [1] => /var/www/cake/app/webroot/test.php [2] => /var/www/cake/app/webroot/img/test-skip-icon.png [3] => /var/www/cake/app/webroot/img/test-fail-icon.png [4] => /var/www/cake/app/webroot/img/test-error-icon.png [5] => /var/www/cake/app/webroot/img/test-pass-icon.png ) */

Folder::inCakePath($path = ) Return type boolean Returns true if the File is in a given CakePath. Folder::inPath($path = , $reverse = false) Return type boolean Returns true if the File is in given path:
<?php $Folder = new Folder(WWW_ROOT); $result = $Folder->inPath(APP); // $result = true, /var/www/example/app/ is in /var/www/example/app/webroot/

$result = $Folder->inPath(WWW_ROOT . img . DS, true); // $result = true, /var/www/example/app/webroot/ is in /var/www/example/app/webroot/im

static Folder::isAbsolute($path) Return type boolean Returns true if given $path is an absolute path. static Folder::isSlashTerm($path) Return type boolean Returns true if given $path ends in a slash (i.e. is slash-terminated):
<?php $result = Folder::isSlashTerm(/my/test/path); // $result = false $result = Folder::isSlashTerm(/my/test/path/); // $result = true

static Folder::isWindowsPath($path) Return type boolean Returns true if given $path is a Windows path.

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Folder::messages() Return type array Get messages from latest method. Folder::move($options) Return type boolean Recursive directory move. static Folder::normalizePath($path) Return type string Returns a correct set of slashes for given $path. (\ for Windows paths and / for other paths.) Folder::pwd() Return type string Return current path. Folder::read($sort = true, $exceptions = false, $fullPath = false) Return type mixed Parameters $sort (boolean) If true will sort results. $exceptions (mixed) An array of les and folder names to ignore. If true or . this method will ignore hidden or dot les. $fullPath (boolean) If true will return results using absolute paths. Returns an array of the contents of the current directory. The returned array holds two arrays: One of directories and one of les:
<?php $dir = new Folder(WWW_ROOT); $files = $dir->read(true, array(files, index.php)); /* Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => css [1] => img [2] => js ) [1] => Array ( [0] => .htaccess [1] => favicon.ico [2] => test.php )

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) */

Folder::realpath($path) Return type string Get the real path (taking .. and such into account). static Folder::slashTerm($path) Return type string Returns $path with added terminating slash (corrected for Windows or other OS). Folder::tree($path = NULL, $exceptions = true, $type = NULL) Return type mixed Returns an array of nested directories and les in each directory.
File API

class File(string $path, boolean $create = false, integer $mode = 493)

<?php // Create a new file with 0644 permissions $file = new File(/path/to/file.php, true, 0644);

property File::$Folder The Folder object of the le. property File::$name The name of the le with the extension. Differs from File::name() which returns the name without the extension. property File::$info An array of le info. Use File::info() instead. property File::$handle Holds the le handler resource if the le is opened. property File::$lock Enable locking for le reading and writing. property File::$path Current les absolute path. File::append($data, $force = false) Return type boolean Append given data string to this File. File::close() Return type boolean 440 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Closes the current le if it is opened. File::copy($dest, $overwrite = true) Return type boolean Copy the File to $dest File::create() Return type boolean Creates the File. File::delete() Return type boolean Deletes the File. File::executable() Return type boolean Returns true if the File is executable. File::exists() Return type boolean Returns true if the File exists. File::ext() Return type string Returns the File extension. File::Folder() Return type Folder Returns the current folder. File::group() Return type integer Returns the Files group. File::info() Return type string Returns the File info. Changed in version 2.1: File::info() now includes lesize & mimetype information. File::lastAccess() Return type integer Returns last access time.

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File::lastChange() Return type integer Returns last modied time. File::md5($maxsize = 5) Return type string Get md5 Checksum of le with previous check of Filesize File::name() Return type string Returns the File name without extension. File::offset($offset = false, $seek = 0) Return type mixed Sets or gets the offset for the currently opened le. File::open($mode = r, $force = false) Return type boolean Opens the current le with a given $mode File::owner() Return type integer Returns the Files owner. File::perms() Return type string Returns the chmod (permissions) of the File. static File::prepare($data, $forceWindows = false) Return type string Prepares a ascii string for writing. Converts line endings to the correct terminator for the current platform. If windows rn will be used all other platforms will use n File::pwd() Return type string Returns the full path of the File. File::read($bytes = false, $mode = rb, $force = false) Return type mixed Return the contents of this File as a string or return false on failure. File::readable()

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Return type boolean Returns true if the File is readable. File::safe($name = NULL, $ext = NULL) Return type string Makes lename safe for saving. File::size() Return type integer Returns the Filesize. File::writable() Return type boolean Returns true if the File is writable. File::write($data, $mode = w, $force = false) Return type boolean Write given data to this File. New in version 2.1: File::mime() File::mime() Return type mixed Get the les mimetype, returns false on failure. HttpSocket class HttpSocket(mixed $cong = array()) CakePHP includes an HttpSocket class which can be used easily for making requests. It is a great way to communicate with external webservices, or remote apis.
Making a request

You can use HttpSocket to create most kinds of HTTP requests with the different HTTP methods. HttpSocket::get($uri, $query, $request) The $query parameter, can either be a query string, or an array of keys and values. The get method makes a simple HTTP GET request returning the results:
App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); $HttpSocket = new HttpSocket(); // string query

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$results = $HttpSocket->get(http://www.google.com/search, q=cakephp); // array query $results = $HttpSocket->get(http://www.google.com/search, array(q => cakephp));

HttpSocket::post($uri, $data, $request) The post method makes a simple HTTP POST request returning the results. The parameters for the post method are almost the same as the get method, $uri is the web address where the request is being made; $query is the data to be posted, either as s string, or as an array of keys and values:
App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); $HttpSocket = new HttpSocket(); // string data $results = $HttpSocket->post( http://example.com/add, name=test&type=user ); // array data $data = array(name => test, type => user); $results = $HttpSocket->post(http://example.com/add, $data);

HttpSocket::put($uri, $data, $request) The put method makes a simple HTTP PUT request returning the results. The parameters for the put method is the same as the post() method. HttpSocket::delete($uri, $query, $request) The put method makes a simple HTTP PUT request returning the results. The parameters for the delete method is the same as the get() method. The $query parameter can either be a string or an array of query string arguments for the request. HttpSocket::patch($uri, $data, $request) The patch method makes a simple HTTP PATCH request returning the results. The parameters for the patch method is the same as the post() method. New in version 2.4. HttpSocket::request($request) The base request method, which is called from all the wrappers (get, post, put, delete). Returns the results of the request. $request is a keyed array of various options. Here is the format and default settings:
public $request = array( method => GET, uri => array( scheme => http, host => null, port => 80, user => null,

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pass => null, path => null, query => null, fragment => null ), auth => array( method => Basic, user => null, pass => null ), version => 1.1, body => , line => null, header => array( Connection => close, User-Agent => CakePHP ), raw => null, redirect => false, cookies => array() );

Handling the response

Responses from requests made with HttpSocket are instances of HttpResponse. This object gives you a few accessor methods to access the contents of an HTTP response. This class implements the ArrayAccess (http://php.net/manual/en/class.arrayaccess.php) and __toString() (http://www.php.net/manual/en/language.oop5.magic.php#language.oop5.magic.tostring), so you can continue using the $http->response as array and the return of request methods as string:
App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); $http = new HttpSocket(); $response = $http->get(http://www.cakephp.org); // Check the body for the presence of a title tag. $titlePos = strpos($response->body, <title>); // Get the status code for the response. $code = $response->code;

The HttpResponse has the following attributes: body returns body of HTTP response (normally the HTML). headers returns array with headers. cookies returns array with new cookies (cookies from others request are not stored here). httpVersion returns string with HTTP version (from rst line in response). code returns the integer with HTTP code.

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reasonPhrase returns the string with HTTP code response. raw returns the unchanged response from server. The HttpResponse also exposes the following methods: body() returns the body isOk() returns if code is 200; isRedirect() returns if code is 301, 302, 303 or 307 and the Location header is set. getHeader() allows you to fetch headers, see the next section. Getting headers from a response Following others places in core, the HttpSocket does not change the casing of headers. RFC 2616 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2616.html) states that headers are case insensitive, and HttpSocket preserves the values the remote host sends:
HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2007 04:14:16 GMT server: CakeHttp Server content-tyPe: text/html

Your $response->headers (or $response[header]) will contain the exact keys sent. In order to safely access the header elds, its best to use getHeader(). If your headers looks like:
Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2007 04:14:16 GMT server: CakeHttp Server content-tyPe: text/html

You could fetch the above headers by calling:

// $response is an instance of HttpResponse // get the Content-Type header. $response->getHeader(Content-Type); // get the date $response->getHeader(date);

Headers can be fetched case-insensitively. Automatically handling a redirect response When the response has a valid redirect status code (see HttpResponse::isRedirect), an extra request can be automatically done according to the received Location header:
<?php App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http);

$HttpSocket = new HttpSocket(); $response = $HttpSocket->get(http://example.com/redirecting_url, array(), array(redirect

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integer : the set value is the maximum number of redirections allowed (after reaching it, the redirect value is considered as false) false (default) : no consequent request will be red The returned $response will be the nal one, according to the settings. Handling SSL certicates When making requests to SSL services HttpSocket will attempt to validate the SSL certifcate using peer validation. If the certicate fails peer validation or does not match the hostname being accessed the connection will fail, and an exception will be thrown. By default HttpSocket will use the mozilla certicate authority le to verify SSL certicates. You can use the following options to congure how SSL certicates are handled: ssl_verify_peer Set to false to disable SSL verication. This is not recommended. ssl_verify_host Set to false if you wish to ignore hostname match errors when validating certicates. ssl_allow_self_signed Set to true to enable self-signed certicates to be accepted. This requires ssl_verify_peer to be enabled. ssl_cafile Set to the absolute path of the Certicate Authority le that you wish to use for verifying SSL certicates. These options are provided as constructor arguments:
$socket = new HttpSocket(array( ssl_allow_self_signed => true ));

Would allow self-signed certicates for all requests made with the created socket. New in version 2.3: SSL certicate validation was added in 2.3. Creating a custom response class You can create your own response class to use with HttpSocket. You could create the le app/Lib/Network/Http/YourResponse.php with the content:
App::uses(HttpResponse, Network/Http); class YourResponse extends HttpResponse { public function parseResponse($message) { parent::parseResponse($message); // Make what you want } }

Before your request youll need to change the responseClass property:

App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); $http = new HttpSocket(); $http->responseClass = YourResponse;

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Changed in version 2.3: As of 2.3.0 you should extend HttpSocketResponse instead. This avoids a common issue with the http pecl extension. Downloading the results HttpSocket has a new method called setContentResource(). By setting a resource with this method, the content will be written to this resource, using fwrite(). To you download a le, you can do:
App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); $http = new HttpSocket(); $f = fopen(TMP . bakery.xml, w); $http->setContentResource($f); $http->get(http://bakery.cakephp.org/comments.rss); fclose($f);

Note: The headers are not included in le, you will only get the body content written to your resource. To disable saving into the resource, use $http->setContentResource(false).

Using authentication

HttpSocket supports a HTTP Basic and Digest authentication methods out of the box. You can also create custom authentication objects to support protocols like OAuth. To use any authentication system you need to congure the HttpSocket instance:
App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http); $http = new HttpSocket(); $http->configAuth(Basic, user, password);

The above would congure the HttpSocket instance to use Basic authentication using user and password as the credentials. Creating a custom authentication object You can now create your thentication method to use with HttpSocket. You could create app/Lib/Network/Http/YourMethodAuthentication.php with the content:
class YourMethodAuthentication { /** * Authentication * * @param HttpSocket $http * @param array $authInfo * @return void */ public static function authentication(HttpSocket $http, &$authInfo) { // Do something, for example set $http->request[header][Authentication] value }

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To congure HttpSocket to use your auth conguration, you can use the new method configAuth():
$http->configAuth(YourMethod, array(config1 => value1, config2 => value2)); $http->get(http://secure.your-site.com);

The authentication() method will be called to append the request headers. Using a HttpSocket with a proxy As part of auth conguration, you can congure proxy authentication. You can create your customized method to proxy authentication in the same class of authentication. For example:
class YourMethodAuthentication { /** * Authentication * * @param HttpSocket $http * @param array $authInfo * @return void */ public static function authentication(HttpSocket $http, &$authInfo) { // Do something, for example set $http->request[header][Authentication] value }

/** * Proxy Authentication * * @param HttpSocket $http * @param array $proxyInfo * @return void */ public static function proxyAuthentication(HttpSocket $http, &$proxyInfo) { // Do something, for example set $http->request[header][Proxy-Authentication] v } }

Note: To use a proxy, you must call the HttpSocket::configProxy() similar to HttpSocket::configAuth().

Inector class Inflector The Inector class takes a string and can manipulate it to handle word variations such as pluralizations or camelizing and is normally accessed statically. Example: Inflector::pluralize(example) returns examples. Utilities 449

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static Inflector::pluralize($singular) Input: Apple, Orange, Person, Man Output: Apples, Oranges, People, Men static Inflector::singularize($plural) Input: Apples, Oranges, People, Men Output: Apple, Orange, Person, Man static Inflector::camelize($underscored) Input: Apple_pie, some_thing, people_person Output: ApplePie, SomeThing, PeoplePerson static Inflector::underscore($camelCase) It should be noted that underscore will only convert camelCase formatted words. Words that contains spaces will be lower-cased, but will not contain an underscore. Input: applePie, someThing Output: apple_pie, some_thing static Inflector::humanize($underscored) Input: apple_pie, some_thing, people_person Output: Apple Pie, Some Thing, People Person static Inflector::tableize($camelCase) Input: Apple, UserProleSetting, Person Output: apples, user_prole_settings, people static Inflector::classify($underscored) Input: apples, user_prole_settings, people Output: Apple, UserProleSetting, Person static Inflector::variable($underscored) Input: apples, user_result, people_people Output: apples, userResult, peoplePeople static Inflector::slug($word, $replacement = _) Slug converts special characters into latin versions and converting unmatched characters and spaces to underscores. The slug method expects UTF-8 encoding. Input: apple pure Output: apple_puree static Inflector::reset Resets Inector back to its initial state, useful in testing. static Inflector::rules($type, $rules, $reset = false) Dene new inection and transliteration rules for Inector to use. See Inection Conguration for more information. 450 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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Internationalization & Localization One of the best ways for your applications to reach a larger audience is to cater for multiple languages. This can often prove to be a daunting task, but the internationalization and localization features in CakePHP make it much easier. First, its important to understand some terminology. Internationalization refers to the ability of an application to be localized. The term localization refers to the adaptation of an application to meet specic language (or culture) requirements (i.e., a locale). Internationalization and localization are often abbreviated as i18n and l10n respectively; 18 and 10 are the number of characters between the rst and last character.
Internationalizing Your Application

There are only a few steps to go from a single-language application to a multi-lingual application, the rst of which is to make use of the __() function in your code. Below is an example of some code for a single-language application:
<h2>Posts</h2>

To internationalize your code, all you need to do is to wrap strings in __() like so:
<h2><?php echo __(Posts); ?></h2>

If you do nothing further, these two code examples are functionally identical - they will both send the same content to the browser. The __() function will translate the passed string if a translation is available, or return it unmodied. It works similar to other Gettext (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettext) implementations (as do the other translate functions, such as __d() , __n() etc) With your code ready to be multilingual, the next step is to create your pot le (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettext), which is the template for all translatable strings in your application. To generate your pot le(s), all you need to do is run the i18n console task, which will look for where youve used a translate function in your code and generate your pot le(s) for you. You can and should re-run this console task any time you change the translations in your code. The pot le(s) themselves are not used by CakePHP, they are the templates used to create or update your po les (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettext), which contain the translations. Cake will look for your po les in the following location:
/app/Locale/<locale>/LC_MESSAGES/<domain>.po

The default domain is default, therefore your locale folder would look something like this:
/app/Locale/eng/LC_MESSAGES/default.po (English) /app/Locale/fra/LC_MESSAGES/default.po (French) /app/Locale/por/LC_MESSAGES/default.po (Portuguese)

To create or edit your po les its recommended that you do not use your favorite editor. To create a po le for the rst time it is possible to copy the pot le to the correct location and change the extension however unless youre familiar with their format, its quite easy to create an invalid po le or to save it as the wrong charset (if youre editing manually, use UTF-8 to avoid problems). There are free tools such as PoEdit

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(http://www.poedit.net) which make editing and updating your po les an easy task; especially for updating an existing po le with a newly updated pot le. The three-character locale codes conform to the ISO 639-2 (http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso6392/php/code_list.php) standard, although if you create regional locales (en_US, en_GB, etc.) cake will use them if appropriate. Warning: In 2.3 and 2.4 some language codes have been corrected to meet the ISO standard. Please see the corresponding migration guides for details. Remember that po les are useful for short messages, if you nd you want to translate long paragraphs, or even whole pages - you should consider implementing a different solution. e.g.:
// App Controller Code. public function beforeFilter() { $locale = Configure::read(Config.language); if ($locale && file_exists(VIEWS . $locale . DS . $this->viewPath)) { // e.g. use /app/View/fra/Pages/tos.ctp instead of /app/View/Pages/tos.ctp $this->viewPath = $locale . DS . $this->viewPath; } }

or:
// View code echo $this->element(Configure::read(Config.language) . /tos);

Internationalizing CakePHP Plugins

If you want to include translation les within your application youll need to follow a few conventions. Instead of __() and __n() you will have to use __d() and __dn(). The D means domain. So if you have a plugin called DebugKit you would have to do this:
__d(debug_kit, My example text);

Using the underscored syntax is important, if you dont use it CakePHP wont nd your translation le. Your translation le for this example should go into:
/app/Plugin/DebugKit/Locale/<locale>/LC_MESSAGES/<domain>.po

And for other languages than the default:

/app/Plugin/DebugKit/Locale/eng/LC_MESSAGES/debug_kit.po (English) /app/Plugin/DebugKit/Locale/fra/LC_MESSAGES/debug_kit.po (French) /app/Plugin/DebugKit/Locale/por/LC_MESSAGES/debug_kit.po (Portuguese)

The reason for that is that CakePHP will use the lower cased and underscored plugin name to compare it to the translation domain and is going to look into the plugin if there is a match for the given translation le.

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Localization in CakePHP

To change or set the language for your application, all you need to do is the following:
Configure::write(Config.language, fra);

This tells Cake which locale to use (if you use a regional locale, such as fr_FR, it will use the ISO 639-2 (http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_list.php) locale as a fallback if it doesnt exist), you can change the language at any time during a request. e.g. in your bootstrap if youre setting the application default language, in your (app) controller beforeFilter if its specic to the request or user, or in fact anytime at all before you want a message in a different language. To set the language for the current user, you can store the setting in the Session object, like this:
$this->Session->write(Config.language, fra);

At the beginning of each request in your controllers beforeFilter you should congure Configure as well:
class AppController extends Controller { public function beforeFilter() { if ($this->Session->check(Config.language)) { Configure::write(Config.language, $this->Session->read(Config.language)); } } }

Doing this will ensure that both I18n and TranslateBehavior access the same language value. Its a good idea to serve up public content available in multiple languages from a unique url - this makes it easy for users (and search engines) to nd what theyre looking for in the language they are expecting. There are several ways to do this, it can be by using language specic subdomains (en.example.com, fra.example.com, etc.), or using a prex to the url such as is done with this application. You may also wish to glean the information from the browsers user-agent, among other things. As mentioned in the previous section, displaying localized content is done using the __() convenience function, or one of the other translation functions all of which are globally available, but probably be best utilized in your views. The rst parameter of the function is used as the msgid dened in the .po les. CakePHP will automatically assume that all model validation error messages in your $validate array are intended to be localized. When running the i18n shell these strings will also be extracted. Theres one other aspect of localizing your application which is not covered by the use of the translate functions, and that is date/money formats. Dont forget that CakePHP is PHP :), therefore to set the formats for these things you need to use setlocale (http://www.php.net/setlocale). If you pass a locale that doesnt exist on your computer to setlocale (http://www.php.net/setlocale) it will have no effect. You can nd the list of available locales by running the command locale -a in a terminal.
Translating model validation errors

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in your model:
class User extends AppModel { public $validationDomain = validation_errors; }

Additional parameters dened in the validation rule are passed to the translation function. This allows you to create dynamic validation messages:
class User extends AppModel { public $validationDomain = validation; public $validate = array( username => array( length => array( rule => array(between, 2, 10), message => Username should be between %d and %d characters ) ) ) }

Which will do the following internal call:

__d(validation, Username should be between %d and %d characters, array(2, 10));

Logging While CakePHP core Congure Class settings can really help you see whats happening under the hood, there are certain times that youll need to log data to the disk in order to nd out whats going on. In a world that is becoming more dependent on technologies like SOAP and AJAX, debugging can be rather difcult. Logging can also be a way to nd out whats been going on in your application over time. What search terms are being used? What sorts of errors are my users being shown? How often is a particular query being executed? Logging data in CakePHP is easy - the log() function is a part of the Object class, which is the common ancestor for almost all CakePHP classes. If the context is a CakePHP class (Model, Controller, Component... almost anything), you can log your data. You can also use CakeLog::write() directly. See Writing to logs
Creating and conguring log streams

Log stream handlers can be part of your application, or part of plugins. If for example you had a database logger called DatabaseLog. As part of your application it would be placed in app/Lib/Log/Engine/DatabaseLog.php. As part of a plugin it would be placed in app/Plugin/LoggingPack/Lib/Log/Engine/DatabaseLog.php. When congured CakeLog will attempt to load Conguring log streams is done by calling CakeLog::config(). Conguring our DatabaseLog would look like: 454 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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// for app/Lib CakeLog::config(otherFile, array( engine => Database, model => LogEntry, // ... )); // for plugin called LoggingPack CakeLog::config(otherFile, array( engine => LoggingPack.Database, model => LogEntry, // ... ));

When conguring a log stream the engine parameter is used to locate and load the log handler. All of the other conguration properties are passed to the log streams constructor as an array.:
App::uses(CakeLogInterface, Log); class DatabaseLog implements CakeLogInterface { public function __construct($options = array()) { // ... } public function write($type, $message) { // write to the database. } }

CakePHP has no requirements for Log streams other than that they must implement a write method. This write method must take two parameters $type, $message in that order. $type is the string type of the logged message, core values are error, warning, info and debug. In addition you can dene your own types by using them when you call CakeLog::write. New in version 2.4. As of 2.4 FileLog engine takes two new congurations:
- size Used to implement basic log file rotation. If log file size reaches specified size the existing file is renamed by appending timestamp to filename and new log file is created. Can be integer bytes value or human reabable string values like 10MB, 100KB etc. Defaults to 10MB. - rotate Log files are rotated specified times before being removed. If value is 0, old versions are removed rather then rotated. Defaults to 10.

Warning: Prior to 2.4 you had to include the sufx Log in your conguration (LoggingPack.DatabaseLog). This is now not necessary anymore. If you have been using a Log engine like DatabaseLogger that does not follow the convention to use a sufx Log for your class name you have to adjust your class name to DatabaseLog. You should also avoid class names like SomeLogLog which include the sufx twice at the end.

Note: Always congure loggers in app/Config/bootstrap.php Trying to use Application or plugin loggers in core.php will cause issues, as application paths are not yet congured.

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Error and Exception logging

Errors and Exceptions can also be logged. By conguring the co-responding values in your core.php le. Errors will be displayed when debug > 0 and logged when debug == 0. Set Exception.log to true to log uncaught exceptions. See Conguration for more information.
Interacting with log streams

You can introspect the congured streams with CakeLog::configured(). The return of configured() is an array of all the currently congured streams. You can remove streams using CakeLog::drop(). Once a log stream has been dropped it will no longer receive messages.
Using the default FileLog class

While CakeLog can be congured to write to a number of user congured logging adapters, it also comes with a default logging conguration. The default logging conguration will be used any time there are no other logging adapters congured. Once a logging adapter has been congured you will need to also congure FileLog if you want le logging to continue. As its name implies FileLog writes log messages to les. The type of log message being written determines the name of the le the message is stored in. If a type is not supplied, LOG_ERROR is used which writes to the error log. The default log location is app/tmp/logs/$type.log:
// Executing this inside a CakePHP class $this->log("Something didnt work!"); // Results in this being appended to app/tmp/logs/error.log // 2007-11-02 10:22:02 Error: Something didnt work!

You can specify a custom log name using the rst parameter. The default built-in FileLog class will treat this log name as the le you wish to write logs to:
// called statically CakeLog::write(activity, A special message for activity logging); // Results in this being appended to app/tmp/logs/activity.log (rather than error.log) // 2007-11-02 10:22:02 Activity: A special message for activity logging

The congured directory must be writable by the web server user in order for logging to work correctly. You can congure additional/alternate FileLog locations using CakeLog::config(). FileLog accepts a path which allows for custom paths to be used:
CakeLog::config(custom_path, array( engine => File, path => /path/to/custom/place/ ));

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Logging to Syslog

New in version 2.4. In production environments it is highly recommended that you setup your system to use syslog instead of the les logger. This will perform much better as any writes will be done in a (almost) nonblocking fashion and your operating system logger can be congured separately to rotate les, pre-process writes or use a completely different storage for your logs. Using syslog is pretty much like using the default FileLog engine, you just need to specify SysloLog as the engine to be used for logging. The following conguration snippet will replace the default logger with syslog, this should be done in the bootstrap.php le.
CakeLog::config(default, array( engine => Syslog ));

The conguration array accepted for the Syslog logging engine understands the following keys: format: An sprintf template strings with two placeholders, the rst one for the error type, and the second for the message itself. This key is useful to add additional information about the server or process in the logged message. For example: %s - Web Server 1 - %s will look like error - Web Server 1 - An error occurred in this request after replacing the placeholders. prex: An string that will be prexed to every logged message. ag: An integer ag to be used for opening the connection to the logger, by default LOG_ODELAY will be used. See openlog documentation for more options facility: The logging slot to use in syslog. By default LOG_USER is used. See syslog documentation for more options
Writing to logs

Writing to the log les can be done in 2 different ways. The rst is to use the static CakeLog::write() method:
CakeLog::write(debug, Something did not work);

The second is to use the log() shortcut function available on any class that extends Object. Calling log() will internally call CakeLog::write():
// Executing this inside a CakePHP class: $this->log("Something did not work!", debug);

All congured log streams are written to sequentially each time CakeLog::write() is called. You do not need to congure a stream in order to use logging. If no streams are congured when the log is written to, a default stream using the core FileLog class will be congured to output into app/tmp/logs/ just as CakeLog did in previous versions.

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Logging Scopes

New in version 2.2. Often times youll want to congure different logging behavior for different subsystems or parts of your application. Take for example an e-commerce shop. Youll probably want to handle logging for orders and payments differently than you do other less critical logs. CakePHP exposes this concept as logging scopes. When log messages are written you can include a scope name. If there is a congured logger for that scope, the log messages will be directed to those loggers. If a log message is written to an unknown scope, loggers that handle that level of message will log the message. For example:
// configure tmp/logs/shops.log to receive all types (log levels), but only // those with orders and payments scope CakeLog::config(shops, array( engine => FileLog, types => array(warning, error), scopes => array(orders, payments), file => shops.log, )); // configure tmp/logs/payments.log to receive all types, but only // those with payments scope CakeLog::config(payments, array( engine => SyslogLog, types => array(info, error, warning), scopes => array(payments) )); CakeLog::warning(this gets written only to shops stream, orders); CakeLog::warning(this gets written to both shops and payments streams, payments); CakeLog::warning(this gets written to both shops and payments streams, unknown);

In order for scopes to work correctly, you must dene the accepted types on all loggers you want to use scopes with.
CakeLog API

class CakeLog A simple class for writing to logs. static CakeLog::config($name, $cong) Parameters $name (string) Name for the logger being connected, used to drop a logger later on. $cong (array) Array of conguration information and constructor arguments for the logger. Connect a new logger to CakeLog. Each connected logger receives all log messages each time a log message is written.

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static CakeLog::configured Returns An array of congured loggers. Get the names of the congured loggers. static CakeLog::drop($name) Parameters $name (string) Name of the logger you wish to no longer receive messages. static CakeLog::write($level, $message, $scope = array()) Write a message into all the congured loggers. $level indicates the level of log message being created. $message is the message of the log entry being written to. Changed in version 2.2: $scope was added New in version 2.2: Log levels and scopes static CakeLog::levels Call this method without arguments, eg: CakeLog::levels() to obtain current level conguration. To append the additional levels user0 and user1 to the default log levels use:
CakeLog::levels(array(user0, user1)); // or CakeLog::levels(array(user0, user1), true);

Calling CakeLog::levels() will result in:

array( 0 => emergency, 1 => alert, // ... 8 => user0, 9 => user1, );

To set/replace an existing conguration, pass an array with the second argument set to false:
CakeLog::levels(array(user0, user1), false);

Calling CakeLog::levels() will result in:

array( 0 => user0, 1 => user1, );

static CakeLog::defaultLevels Returns An array of the default log levels values. Resets log levels to their original values:

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array( emergency alert critical error warning notice info debug );

=> => => => => => => =>

LOG_EMERG, LOG_ALERT, LOG_CRIT, LOG_ERR, LOG_WARNING, LOG_NOTICE, LOG_INFO, LOG_DEBUG,

static CakeLog::enabled($streamName) Returns boolean Checks whether $streamName has been enabled. static CakeLog::enable($streamName) Returns void Enable the stream $streamName. static CakeLog::disable($streamName) Returns void Disable the stream $streamName. static CakeLog::stream($streamName) Returns Instance of BaseLog or false if not found. Gets $streamName from the active streams. Convenience methods New in version 2.2. The following convenience methods were added to log $message with the appropriate log level. static CakeLog::emergency($message, $scope = array()) static CakeLog::alert($message, $scope = array()) static CakeLog::critical($message, $scope = array()) static CakeLog::notice($message, $scope = array()) static CakeLog::debug($message, $scope = array()) static CakeLog::info($message, $scope = array()) Router Router can be used to parse urls into arrays containing indexes for the controller, action, and any parameters, and the opposite: to convert url arrays (eg. array(controller => posts, action => index)) to string urls. Read more about ways to congure the Router and the Router class.

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Security class Security The security library (http://api20.cakephp.org/class/security) handles basic security measures such as providing methods for hashing and encrypting data.
Security API

static Security::cipher($text, $key) Return type string Encrypts/Decrypts a text using the given key.:
// Encrypt your text with my_key $secret = Security::cipher(hello world, my_key); // Later decrypt your text $nosecret = Security::cipher($secret, my_key);

cipher() uses a weak XOR cipher and should not be used for important or sensitive data. static Security::rijndael($text, $key, $mode) Parameters $text (string) The text to encrypt $key (string) The key to use for encryption. This must be longer than 32 bytes. $mode (string) The mode to use, either encrypt or decrypt Encrypts/Decrypts text using the rijndael-256 cipher. (http://php.net/mcrypt) to be installed: This requires the mcrypt extension

// Encrypt some data. $encrypted = Security::rijndael(a secret, Configure::read(Security.key), encrypt

// Later decrypt it. $decrypted = Security::rijndael($encrypted, Configure::read(Security.key), decrypt

rijndael() can be used to store data you need to decrypt later, like the contents of cookies. It should never be used to store passwords. Instead you should use the one way hashing methods provided by hash() New in version 2.2: Security::rijndael() was added in 2.2. static Security::generateAuthKey() Return type string Generate authorization hash. static Security::getInstance()

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Return type object Singleton implementation to get object instance. static Security::hash($string, $type = NULL, $salt = false) Return type string Create a hash from string using given method. Fallback on next available method. If $salt is set to true, the applications salt value will be used:
// Using the applications salt value $sha1 = Security::hash(CakePHP Framework, sha1, true); // Using a custom salt value $md5 = Security::hash(CakePHP Framework, md5, my-salt); // Using the default hash algorithm $hash = Security::hash(CakePHP Framework);

hash() also supports more secure hashing algorithms like bcrypt. When using bcrypt, you should be mindful of the slightly different usage. Creating an initial hash works the same as other algorithms:
// Create a hash using bcrypt Security::setHash(blowfish); $hash = Security::hash(CakePHP Framework);

Unlike other hash types comparing plain text values to hashed values should be done as follows:
// $storedPassword, is a previously generated bcrypt hash. $newHash = Security::hash($newPassword, blowfish, $storedPassword);

When comparing values hashed with bcrypt, the original hash should be provided as the $salt parameter. This allows bcrypt to reuse the same cost and salt values, allowing the generated hash to end up with the same resulting hash given the same input value. Changed in version 2.3: Support for bcrypt was added in 2.3 static Security::inactiveMins() Return type integer Get allowed minutes of inactivity based on security level.:
$mins = Security::inactiveMins(); // If your config Security.level is set to medium then $mins will equal 100

static Security::setHash($hash) Return type void Sets the default hash method for the Security object. This affects all objects using Security::hash(). static Security::validateAuthKey($authKey) Return type boolean Validate authorization hash.

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Hash class Hash New in version 2.2. Array management, if done right, can be a very powerful and useful tool for building smarter, more optimized code. CakePHP offers a very useful set of static utilities in the Hash class that allow you to do just that. CakePHPs Hash class can be called from any model or controller in the same way Inector is called. Example: Hash::combine().
Hash path syntax

The path syntax described below is used by all the methods in Hash. Not all parts of the path syntax are available in all methods. A path expression is made of any number of tokens. Tokens are composed of two groups. Expressions, are used to traverse the array data, while matchers are used to qualify elements. You apply matchers to expression elements. Expression {n} {s} Foo Denition Represents a numeric key. Will match any string or numeric key. Represents a string. Will match any any string value including numeric string values. Matches keys with the exact same value.

All expression elements are supported all methods. In addition to expression elements you can use attribute matching with methods like extract(). Matcher [id] [id=2] [id!=2] [id>2] [id>=2] [id<2] [id<=2] [text=/.../] Denition Match elements with a given array key. Match elements with id equal to 2. Match elements with id not equal to 2. Match elements with id greater than 2. Match elements with id greater than or equal to 2. Match elements with id less than 2 Match elements with id less than or equal to 2. Match elements that have values matching the regular expression inside ....

static Hash::get(array $data, $path) Return type mixed get() is a simplied version of extract(), it only supports direct path expressions. Paths with {n}, {s} or matchers are not supported. Use get() when you want exactly one value out of an array. static Hash::extract(array $data, $path) Return type array Hash::extract() supports all expression, and matcher components of Hash path syntax. You can use extract to retrieve data from arrays, along arbitrary paths quickly without having to loop through the data structures. Instead you use path expressions to qualify which elements you want returned

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// Common Usage: $users = $this->User->find("all"); $results = Hash::extract($users, {n}.User.id); // $results equals: // array(1,2,3,4,5,...);

static Hash::insert(array $data, $path, $values = null) Return type array Inserts $data into an array as dened by $path. This method only supports the expression types of Hash path syntax:
$a = array( pages => array(name => page) ); $result = Hash::insert($a, files, array(name => files)); // $result now looks like: Array ( [pages] => Array ( [name] => page ) [files] => Array ( [name] => files ) )

You can use paths using {n} and {s} to insert data into multiple points:
$users = $this->User->find(all); $users = Hash::insert($users, {n}.User.new, value);

static Hash::remove(array $data, $path = null) Return type array Removes all elements from an array that match $path. This method supports all the expression elements of Hash path syntax:
$a = array( pages => array(name => page), files => array(name => files) ); $result = Hash::remove($a, files); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [pages] => Array ( [name] => page )

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) */

Using {n} and {s} will allow you to remove multiple values at once. static Hash::combine(array $data, $keyPath = null, $valuePath = null, $groupPath = null) Return type array Creates an associative array using a $keyPath as the path to build its keys, and optionally $valuePath as path to get the values. If $valuePath is not specied, or doesnt match anything, values will be initialized to null. You can optionally group the values by what is obtained when following the path specied in $groupPath.:
$a = array( array( User => array( id => 2, group_id => 1, Data => array( user => mariano.iglesias, name => Mariano Iglesias ) ) ), array( User => array( id => 14, group_id => 2, Data => array( user => phpnut, name => Larry E. Masters ) ) ), ); $result = Hash::combine($a, {n}.User.id); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => [14] => ) */ $result = Hash::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => Array ( [user] => mariano.iglesias [name] => Mariano Iglesias

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) [14] => Array ( [user] => phpnut [name] => Larry E. Masters ) ) */ $result = Hash::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data.name); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => Mariano Iglesias [14] => Larry E. Masters ) */ $result = Hash::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data, {n}.User.group_id); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [1] => Array ( [2] => Array ( [user] => mariano.iglesias [name] => Mariano Iglesias ) ) [2] => Array ( [14] => Array ( [user] => phpnut [name] => Larry E. Masters ) ) ) */

$result = Hash::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data.name, {n}.User.group_id); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [1] => Array ( [2] => Mariano Iglesias ) [2] => Array ( [14] => Larry E. Masters )

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You can provide arrays for both $keyPath and $valuePath. If you do this, the rst value will be used as a format string, for values extracted by the other paths:
$result = Hash::combine( $a, {n}.User.id, array(%s: %s, {n}.User.Data.user, {n}.User.Data.name), {n}.User.group_id ); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [1] => Array ( [2] => mariano.iglesias: Mariano Iglesias ) [2] => Array ( [14] => phpnut: Larry E. Masters ) ) */ $result = Hash::combine( $a, array(%s: %s, {n}.User.Data.user, {n}.User.Data.name), {n}.User.id ); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [mariano.iglesias: Mariano Iglesias] => 2 [phpnut: Larry E. Masters] => 14 ) */

static Hash::format(array $data, array $paths, $format) Return type array Returns a series of values extracted from an array, formatted with a format string:
$data = array( array( Person => array( first_name => Nate, last_name => Abele, city => Boston, state => MA, something => 42 )

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), array( Person => array( first_name => Larry, last_name => Masters, city => Boondock, state => TN, something => {0} ) ), array( Person => array( first_name => Garrett, last_name => Woodworth, city => Venice Beach, state => CA, something => {1} ) ) );

$res = Hash::format($data, array({n}.Person.first_name, {n}.Person.something), %2 /* Array ( [0] => 42, Nate [1] => 0, Larry [2] => 0, Garrett ) */

$res = Hash::format($data, array({n}.Person.first_name, {n}.Person.something), %1 /* Array ( [0] => Nate, 42 [1] => Larry, 0 [2] => Garrett, 0 ) */

static Hash::contains(array $data, array $needle) Return type boolean Determines if one Hash or array contains the exact keys and values of another:
$a = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name ); $b = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name => main), => about)

=> main), => about),

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2 => array(name => contact), a => b ); $result = Hash::contains($a, $a); // true $result = Hash::contains($a, $b); // false $result = Hash::contains($b, $a); // true

static Hash::check(array $data, string $path = null) Return type boolean Checks if a particular path is set in an array:
$set = array( My Index 1 => array(First => The first item) ); $result = Hash::check($set, My Index 1.First); // $result == True $result = Hash::check($set, My Index 1); // $result == True $set = array( My Index 1 => array(First => array(Second => array(Third => array(Fourth => Heavy. Nesting.)))) ); $result = Hash::check($set, My Index 1.First.Second); // $result == True $result = Hash::check($set, My Index 1.First.Second.Third); // $result == True $result = Hash::check($set, My Index 1.First.Second.Third.Fourth); // $result == True $result = Hash::check($set, My Index 1.First.Seconds.Third.Fourth); // $result == False

static Hash::filter(array $data, $callback = array(Hash, lter)) Return type array Filters empty elements out of array, excluding 0. You can also supply a custom $callback to lter the array elements. You callback should return false to remove elements from the resulting array:
$data = array( 0, false, true,

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0, array(one thing, I can tell you, is you got to be, false) ); $res = Hash::filter($data); /* $data now looks like: Array ( [0] => 0 [2] => true [3] => 0 [4] => Array ( [0] => one thing [1] => I can tell you [2] => is you got to be ) ) / *

static Hash::flatten(array $data, string $separator = .) Return type array Collapses a multi-dimensional array into a single dimension:
$arr = array( array( Post => array(id => 1, title => First Post), Author => array(id => 1, user => Kyle), ), array( Post => array(id => 2, title => Second Post), Author => array(id => 3, user => Crystal), ), ); $res = Hash::flatten($arr); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [0.Post.id] => 1 [0.Post.title] => First Post [0.Author.id] => 1 [0.Author.user] => Kyle [1.Post.id] => 2 [1.Post.title] => Second Post [1.Author.id] => 3 [1.Author.user] => Crystal ) */

static Hash::expand(array $data, string $separator = .) Return type array Expands an array that was previously attened with Hash::flatten():

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$data = array( 0.Post.id => 1, 0.Post.title => First Post, 0.Author.id => 1, 0.Author.user => Kyle, 1.Post.id => 2, 1.Post.title => Second Post, 1.Author.id => 3, 1.Author.user => Crystal, ); $res = Hash::expand($data); /* $res now looks like: array( array( Post => array(id => 1, title => First Post), Author => array(id => 1, user => Kyle), ), array( Post => array(id => 2, title => Second Post), Author => array(id => 3, user => Crystal), ), ); */

static Hash::merge(array $data, array $merge[, array $n ]) Return type array This function can be thought of as a hybrid between PHPs array_merge and array_merge_recursive. The difference to the two is that if an array key contains another array then the function behaves recursive (unlike array_merge) but does not do if for keys containing strings (unlike array_merge_recursive). Note: This function will work with an unlimited amount of arguments and typecasts non-array parameters into arrays.
$array = array( array( id => 48c2570e-dfa8-4c32-a35e-0d71cbdd56cb, name => mysql raleigh-workshop-08 < 2008-09-05.sql , description => Importing an sql dump ), array( id => 48c257a8-cf7c-4af2-ac2f-114ecbdd56cb, name => pbpaste | grep -i Unpaid | pbcopy, description => Remove all lines that say "Unpaid"., ) ); $arrayB = 4; $arrayC = array(0 => "test array", "cats" => "dogs", "people" => 1267); $arrayD = array("cats" => "felines", "dog" => "angry"); $res = Hash::merge($array, $arrayB, $arrayC, $arrayD);

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/* $res now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 48c2570e-dfa8-4c32-a35e-0d71cbdd56cb [name] => mysql raleigh-workshop-08 < 2008-09-05.sql [description] => Importing an sql dump ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 48c257a8-cf7c-4af2-ac2f-114ecbdd56cb [name] => pbpaste | grep -i Unpaid | pbcopy [description] => Remove all lines that say "Unpaid". ) [2] => 4 [3] => test array [cats] => felines [people] => 1267 [dog] => angry ) */

static Hash::numeric(array $data) Return type boolean Checks to see if all the values in the array are numeric:
$data = array(one); $res = Hash::numeric(array_keys($data)); // $res is true $data = array(1 => one); $res = Hash::numeric($data); // $res is false

static Hash::dimensions(array $data) Return type integer Counts the dimensions of an array. This method will only consider the dimension of the rst element in the array:
$data = array(one, 2, three); $result = Hash::dimensions($data); // $result == 1 $data = array(1 => 1.1, 2, 3); $result = Hash::dimensions($data); // $result == 1 $data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), 2, 3 => array(3.1 => 3.1.1)); $result = Hash::dimensions($data);

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// $result == 2 $data = array(1 => 1.1, 2, 3 => array(3.1 => 3.1.1)); $result = Hash::dimensions($data); // $result == 1

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), 2, 3 => array(3.1 => array(3.1.1 $result = Hash::countDim($data); // $result == 2

static Hash::maxDimensions(array $data) Similar to dimensions(), however this method returns, the deepest number of dimensions of any element in the array:
$data = array(1 => 1.1, 2, 3 => array(3.1 => 3.1.1)); $result = Hash::dimensions($data, true); // $result == 2

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), 2, 3 => array(3.1 => array(3.1.1 $result = Hash::countDim($data, true); // $result == 3

static Hash::map(array $data, $path, $function) Creates a new array, by extracting $path, and mapping $function across the results. You can use both expression and matching elements with this method. static Hash::reduce(array $data, $path, $function) Creates a single value, by extracting $path, and reducing the extracted results with $function. You can use both expression and matching elements with this method. static Hash::sort(array $data, $path, $dir, $type = regular) Return type array Sorts an array by any value, determined by a Hash path syntax Only expression elements are supported by this method:
$a = array( 0 => array(Person => array(name => Jeff)), 1 => array(Shirt => array(color => black)) ); $result = Hash::sort($a, {n}.Person.name, asc); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [Shirt] => Array ( [color] => black ) ) [1] => Array

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( [Person] => Array ( [name] => Jeff ) ) ) */

$dir can be either asc or desc. $type can be one of the following values: regular for regular sorting. numeric for sorting values as their numeric equivalents. string for sorting values as their string value. natural for sorting values in a human friendly way. Will sort foo10 below foo2 as an example. Natural sorting requires PHP 5.4 or greater. static Hash::diff(array $data, array $compare) Return type array Computes the difference between two arrays:
$a = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name ); $b = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name 2 => array(name ); => main), => about)

=> main), => about), => contact)

$result = Hash::diff($a, $b); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => Array ( [name] => contact ) ) */

static Hash::mergeDiff(array $data, array $compare) Return type array This function merges two arrays and pushes the differences in data to the bottom of the resultant array. Example 1

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$array1 = array(ModelOne => array(id => 1001, field_one => a1.m1.f1, field_tw $array2 = array(ModelOne => array(id => 1003, field_one => a3.m1.f1, field_tw $res = Hash::mergeDiff($array1, $array2); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [ModelOne] => Array ( [id] => 1001 [field_one] => a1.m1.f1 [field_two] => a1.m1.f2 [field_three] => a3.m1.f3 ) ) */

Example 2
$array1 = array("a" => "b", 1 => 20938, "c" => "string"); $array2 = array("b" => "b", 3 => 238, "c" => "string", array("extra_field")); $res = Hash::mergeDiff($array1, $array2); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [a] => b [1] => 20938 [c] => string [b] => b [3] => 238 [4] => Array ( [0] => extra_field ) ) */

static Hash::normalize(array $data, $assoc = true) Return type array Normalizes an array. If $assoc is true, the resulting array will be normalized to be an associative array. Numeric keys with values, will be converted to string keys with null values. Normalizing an array, makes using the results with Hash::merge() easier:
$a = array(Tree, CounterCache, Upload => array( folder => products, fields => array(image_1_id, image_2_id) ) ); $result = Hash::normalize($a); /* $result now looks like: Array

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( [Tree] => null [CounterCache] => null [Upload] => Array ( [folder] => products [fields] => Array ( [0] => image_1_id [1] => image_2_id ) ) ) */ $b = array( Cacheable => array(enabled => false), Limit, Bindable, Validator, Transactional ); $result = Hash::normalize($b); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [Cacheable] => Array ( [enabled] => false ) [Limit] => null [Bindable] => null [Validator] => null [Transactional] => null ) */

static Hash::nest(array $data, array $options = array()) Takes a at array set, and creates a nested, or threaded data structure. Used by methods like Model::find(threaded). Options: children The key name to use in the result set for children. Defaults to children. idPath The path to a key that identies each entry. Hash::extract(). Defaults to {n}.$alias.id Should be compatible with

parentPath The path to a key that identies the parent of each entry. Should be compatible with Hash::extract(). Defaults to {n}.$alias.parent_id root The id of the desired top-most result. Example: 476 Chapter 7. Core Libraries

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$data = array( array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName );

=> => => => => => => => => =>

array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id

=> => => => => => => => => =>

1, parent_id => null)), 2, parent_id => 1)), 3, parent_id => 1)), 4, parent_id => 1)), 5, parent_id => 1)), 6, parent_id => null)), 7, parent_id => 6)), 8, parent_id => 6)), 9, parent_id => 6)), 10, parent_id => 6))

$result = Hash::nest($data, array(root => 6)); /* $result now looks like: array( (int) 0 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 6, parent_id => null ), children => array( (int) 0 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 7, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ), (int) 1 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 8, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ), (int) 2 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 9, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ), (int) 3 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 10, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ) ) ) )

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*/

Set class Set Array management, if done right, can be a very powerful and useful tool for building smarter, more optimized code. CakePHP offers a very useful set of static utilities in the Set class that allow you to do just that. CakePHPs Set class can be called from any model or controller in the same way Inector is called. Example: Set::combine(). Deprecated since version 2.2: The Set class has been deprecated in 2.2 in favour of the Hash class. It offers a more consistent interface and API.
Set-compatible Path syntax

The Path syntax is used by (for example) sort, and is used to dene a path. Usage example (using Set::sort()):
$a = array( 0 => array(Person => array(name => 1 => array(Person => array(name => 2 => array(Person => array(name => ); $result = Set::sort($a, {n}.Person.name, /* result now looks like array( 0 => array(Person => array(name => 1 => array(Person => array(name => 2 => array(Person => array(name => ); */

Jeff), Friend => array(array(name => Nate Tracy),Friend => array(array(name => Lind Adam),Friend => array(array(name => Bob) asc);

Adam),Friend => array(array(name => Bob) Jeff), Friend => array(array(name => Nate Tracy),Friend => array(array(name => Lind

As you can see in the example above, some things are wrapped in {}s, others not. In the table below, you can see which options are available. Expression {n} {s} Foo {[a-z]+} Denition Represents a numeric key Represents a string Any string (without enclosing brackets) is treated like a string literal. Any string enclosed in brackets (besides {n} and {s}) is interpreted as a regular expression.

static Set::apply($path, $array, $callback, $options = array()) Return type mixed Apply a callback to the elements of an array extracted by a Set::extract compatible path:
$data = array( array(Movie => array(id => 1, title => movie 3, rating => 5)), array(Movie => array(id => 1, title => movie 1, rating => 1)),

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array(Movie => array(id => 1, title => movie 2, rating => 3)), ); $result = Set::apply(/Movie/rating, $data, array_sum); // result equals 9

$result = Set::apply(/Movie/title, $data, strtoupper, array(type => map)); // result equals array(MOVIE 3, MOVIE 1, MOVIE 2) // $options are: - type : can be pass uses call_user_func_array(), map uses array_

static Set::check($data, $path = null) Return type boolean/array Checks if a particular path is set in an array. If $path is empty, $data will be returned instead of a boolean value:
$set = array( My Index 1 => array(First => The first item) ); $result = Set::check($set, My Index 1.First); // $result == True $result = Set::check($set, My Index 1); // $result == True $result = Set::check($set, array()); // $result == array(My Index 1 => array(First => The first item)) $set = array( My Index 1 => array(First => array(Second => array(Third => array(Fourth => Heavy. Nesting.)))) ); $result = Set::check($set, My Index 1.First.Second); // $result == True $result = Set::check($set, My Index 1.First.Second.Third); // $result == True $result = Set::check($set, My Index 1.First.Second.Third.Fourth); // $result == True $result = Set::check($set, My Index 1.First.Seconds.Third.Fourth); // $result == False

static Set::classicExtract($data, $path = null) Return type array Gets a value from an array or object that is contained in a given path using an array path syntax, i.e.: {n}.Person.{[a-z]+} - Where {n} represents a numeric key, Person represents a string literal {[a-z]+} (i.e. any string literal enclosed in brackets besides {n} and {s}) is interpreted as a regular expression. Example 1

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$a = array( array(Article => array(id array(Article => array(id array(Article => array(id ); $result = Set::classicExtract($a, /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => 1 [1] => 2 [2] => 3 ) */ $result = Set::classicExtract($a, /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Article 1 [1] => Article 2 [2] => Article 3 ) */ $result = Set::classicExtract($a, // $result == "Article 2"

=> 1, title => Article 1)), => 2, title => Article 2)), => 3, title => Article 3)) {n}.Article.id);

{n}.Article.title);

1.Article.title);

$result = Set::classicExtract($a, 3.Article.title); // $result == null

Example 2
$a = array( 0 => array(pages => array(name => page)), 1 => array(fruites => array(name => fruit)), test => array(array(name => jippi)), dot.test => array(array(name => jippi)) ); $result = Set::classicExtract($a, {n}.{s}.name); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => page ) [1] => Array ( [0] => fruit ) ) */ $result = Set::classicExtract($a, {s}.{n}.name);

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/* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => jippi ) [1] => Array ( [0] => jippi ) ) */ $result = Set::classicExtract($a,{\w+}.{\w+}.name); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [pages] => page ) [1] => Array ( [fruites] => fruit ) [test] => Array ( [0] => jippi ) [dot.test] => Array ( [0] => jippi ) ) / * $result = Set::classicExtract($a,{\d+}.{\w+}.name); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [pages] => page ) [1] => Array ( [fruites] => fruit ) ) / * $result = Set::classicExtract($a,{n}.{\w+}.name); /* $result now looks like: Array (

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[0] => Array ( [pages] => page ) [1] => Array ( [fruites] => fruit ) ) / * $result = Set::classicExtract($a,{s}.{\d+}.name); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => jippi ) [1] => Array ( [0] => jippi ) ) / * $result = Set::classicExtract($a,{s}); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => jippi ) ) [1] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => jippi ) ) ) / * $result = Set::classicExtract($a,{[a-z]}); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [test] => Array ( [0] => Array (

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[name] => jippi ) ) [dot.test] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => jippi ) ) ) / * $result = Set::classicExtract($a, {dot\.test}.{n}); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [dot.test] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => jippi ) ) ) */

static Set::combine($data, $path1 = null, $path2 = null, $groupPath = null) Return type array Creates an associative array using a $path1 as the path to build its keys, and optionally $path2 as path to get the values. If $path2 is not specied, all values will be initialized to null (useful for Set::merge). You can optionally group the values by what is obtained when following the path specied in $groupPath.:
$result = Set::combine(array(), {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data); // $result == array(); $result = Set::combine(, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data); // $result == array(); $a = array( array( User => array( id => 2, group_id => 1, Data => array( user => mariano.iglesias, name => Mariano Iglesias ) ) ), array(

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User => array( id => 14, group_id => 2, Data => array( user => phpnut, name => Larry E. Masters ) ) ), array( User => array( id => 25, group_id => 1, Data => array( user => gwoo, name => The Gwoo ) ) ) ); $result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => [14] => [25] => ) */ $result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.non-existent); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => [14] => [25] => ) */ $result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => Array ( [user] => mariano.iglesias [name] => Mariano Iglesias ) [14] => Array ( [user] => phpnut [name] => Larry E. Masters

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) [25] => Array ( [user] => gwoo [name] => The Gwoo ) ) */ $result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data.name); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => Mariano Iglesias [14] => Larry E. Masters [25] => The Gwoo ) */ $result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data, {n}.User.group_id); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [1] => Array ( [2] => Array ( [user] => mariano.iglesias [name] => Mariano Iglesias ) [25] => Array ( [user] => gwoo [name] => The Gwoo ) ) [2] => Array ( [14] => Array ( [user] => phpnut [name] => Larry E. Masters ) ) ) */ $result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id, {n}.User.Data.name, {n}.User.group_id); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [1] => Array (

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[2] => Mariano Iglesias [25] => The Gwoo ) [2] => Array ( [14] => Larry E. Masters ) ) */

$result = Set::combine($a, {n}.User.id, array({0}: {1}, {n}.User.Data.user, {n} /* $result now looks like: Array ( [1] => Array ( [2] => mariano.iglesias: Mariano Iglesias [25] => gwoo: The Gwoo ) [2] => Array ( [14] => phpnut: Larry E. Masters ) ) / *

$result = Set::combine($a, array({0}: {1}, {n}.User.Data.user, {n}.User.Data.name /* $result now looks like: Array ( [mariano.iglesias: Mariano Iglesias] => 2 [phpnut: Larry E. Masters] => 14 [gwoo: The Gwoo] => 25 ) */

$result = Set::combine($a, array({1}: {0}, {n}.User.Data.user, {n}.User.Data.name /* $result now looks like: Array ( [Mariano Iglesias: mariano.iglesias] => 2 [Larry E. Masters: phpnut] => 14 [The Gwoo: gwoo] => 25 ) */

$result = Set::combine($a, array(%1$s: %2$d, {n}.User.Data.user, {n}.User.id), /* $result now looks like: Array ( [mariano.iglesias: 2] => Mariano Iglesias [phpnut: 14] => Larry E. Masters

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[gwoo: 25] => The Gwoo ) */

$result = Set::combine($a, array(%2$d: %1$s, {n}.User.Data.user, {n}.User.id), /* $result now looks like: Array ( [2: mariano.iglesias] => Mariano Iglesias [14: phpnut] => Larry E. Masters [25: gwoo] => The Gwoo ) */

static Set::contains($val1, $val2 = null) Return type boolean Determines if one Set or array contains the exact keys and values of another:
$a = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name ); $b = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name 2 => array(name a => b ); => main), => about)

=> main), => about), => contact),

$result = Set::contains($a, $a); // True $result = Set::contains($a, $b); // False $result = Set::contains($b, $a); // True

static Set::countDim($array = null, $all = false, $count = 0) Return type integer Counts the dimensions of an array. If $all is set to false (which is the default) it will only consider the dimension of the rst element in the array:
$data = array(one, 2, three); $result = Set::countDim($data); // $result == 1 $data = array(1 => 1.1, 2, 3); $result = Set::countDim($data); // $result == 1 $data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), 2, 3 => array(3.1 => 3.1.1)); $result = Set::countDim($data);

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// $result == 2 $data = array(1 => 1.1, 2, 3 => array(3.1 => 3.1.1)); $result = Set::countDim($data); // $result == 1 $data = array(1 => 1.1, 2, 3 => array(3.1 => 3.1.1)); $result = Set::countDim($data, true); // $result == 2

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), 2, 3 => array(3.1 => array(3.1.1 $result = Set::countDim($data); // $result == 2

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), 2, 3 => array(3.1 => array(3.1.1 $result = Set::countDim($data, true); // $result == 3

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), array(2 => array(2.1 => array(2.1.1 $result = Set::countDim($data, true); // $result == 4

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), array(2 => array(2.1 => array(2.1.1 $result = Set::countDim($data, true); // $result == 5

$data = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), array(2 => array(2.1 => array(2.1.1 $result = Set::countDim($data, true); // $result == 5

$set = array(1 => array(1.1 => 1.1.1), array(2 => array(2.1 => array(2.1.1 $result = Set::countDim($set, false, 0); // $result == 2 $result = Set::countDim($set, true); // $result == 5

static Set::diff($val1, $val2 = null) Return type array Computes the difference between a Set and an array, two Sets, or two arrays:
$a = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name ); $b = array( 0 => array(name 1 => array(name 2 => array(name ); => main), => about)

=> main), => about), => contact)

$result = Set::diff($a, $b);

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/* $result now looks like: Array ( [2] => Array ( [name] => contact ) ) */ $result = Set::diff($a, array()); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => main ) [1] => Array ( [name] => about ) ) / * $result = Set::diff(array(), $b); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => main ) [1] => Array ( [name] => about ) [2] => Array ( [name] => contact ) ) / * $b = array( 0 => array(name => me), 1 => array(name => about) ); $result = Set::diff($a, $b); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array (

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[name] => main ) ) */

static Set::enum($select, $list = null) Return type string The enum method works well when using html select elements. It returns a value from an array list if the key exists. If a comma separated $list is passed arrays are numeric with the key of the rst being 0 $list = no, yes would translate to $list = array(0 => no, 1 => yes); If an array is used, keys can be strings example: array(no => 0, yes => 1); $list defaults to 0 = no 1 = yes if param is not passed:
$res = Set::enum(1, one, two); // $res is two $res = Set::enum(no, array(no => 0, yes => 1)); // $res is 0 $res = Set::enum(first, array(first => one, second => two)); // $res is one

static Set::extract($path, $data = null, $options = array()) Return type array Set::extract uses basic XPath 2.0 syntax to return subsets of your data from a nd or a nd all. This function allows you to retrieve your data quickly without having to loop through multi dimensional arrays or traverse through tree structures. Note: If $path does not contain a / the call will be delegated to Set::classicExtract()
// Common Usage: $users = $this->User->find("all"); $results = Set::extract(/User/id, $users); // results returns: // array(1,2,3,4,5,...);

Currently implemented selectors:

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Selector Note /User/id Similar to the classic {n}.User.id /User[2]/name Selects the name of the second User /User[id<2] Selects all Users with an id < 2 /User[id>2][<5] Selects all Users with an id > 2 but 5 /Post/Comment[author_name=john]/../name Selects the name of all Posts that have at least one Comment written by john /Posts[title] Selects all Posts that have a title key /Comment/.[1] Selects the contents of the rst comment /Comment/.[:last] Selects the last comment /Comment/.[:rst] Selects the rst comment /ComSelects all comments that have a text matching the regex /cakephp/i ment[text=/cakephp/i] /Comment/@* Selects the key names of all comments Currently only absolute paths starting with a single / are supported. Please report any bugs as you nd them. Suggestions for additional features are welcome. To learn more about Set::extract() refer to /lib/Cake/Test/Case/Utility/SetTest.php. static Set::filter($var, $isArray = null) Return type array Filters empty elements out of a route array, excluding 0: the function testExtract() in

$res = Set::filter(array(0, false, true, 0, array(one thing, I can tell you, is /* $res now Array ( [0] [2] [3] [4] looks like: => => => => ( 0 1 0 Array [0] => one thing [1] => I can tell you [2] => is you got to be ) ) */

static Set::flatten($data, $separator = .) Return type array Collapses a multi-dimensional array into a single dimension:
$arr = array( array( Post => array(id => 1, title => First Post), Author => array(id => 1, user => Kyle), ), array(

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Post => array(id => 2, title => Second Post), Author => array(id => 3, user => Crystal), ), ); $res = Set::flatten($arr); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [0.Post.id] => 1 [0.Post.title] => First Post [0.Author.id] => 1 [0.Author.user] => Kyle [1.Post.id] => 2 [1.Post.title] => Second Post [1.Author.id] => 3 [1.Author.user] => Crystal ) */

static Set::format($data, $format, $keys) Return type array Returns a series of values extracted from an array, formatted in a format string:

$data = array( array(Person => array(first_name => Nate, last_name => Abele, city => array(Person => array(first_name => Larry, last_name => Masters, city array(Person => array(first_name => Garrett, last_name => Woodworth, ci );

$res = Set::format($data, {1}, {0}, array({n}.Person.first_name, {n}.Person.last_ /* Array ( [0] => Abele, Nate [1] => Masters, Larry [2] => Woodworth, Garrett ) */

$res = Set::format($data, {0}, {1}, array({n}.Person.city, {n}.Person.state)); /* Array ( [0] => Boston, MA [1] => Boondock, TN [2] => Venice Beach, CA ) */ $res = Set::format($data, {{0}, {1}}, array({n}.Person.city, {n}.Person.state)); /* Array ( [0] => {Boston, MA}

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[1] => {Boondock, TN} [2] => {Venice Beach, CA}

) */ $res = Set::format($data, {%2$d, %1$s}, array({n}.Person.something, {n}.Person.so /* Array ( [0] => {42, 42} [1] => {0, {0}} [2] => {0, {1}} ) */ $res = Set::format($data, %2$d, %1$s, array({n}.Person.first_name, {n}.Person.som /* Array ( [0] => 42, Nate [1] => 0, Larry [2] => 0, Garrett ) */ $res = Set::format($data, %1$s, %2$d, array({n}.Person.first_name, {n}.Person.som /* Array ( [0] => Nate, 42 [1] => Larry, 0 [2] => Garrett, 0 ) */

static Set::insert($list, $path, $data = null) Return type array Inserts $data into an array as dened by $path.:
$a = array( pages => array(name => page) ); $result = Set::insert($a, files, array(name => files)); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [pages] => Array ( [name] => page ) [files] => Array ( [name] => files ) )

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*/ $a = array( pages => array(name => page) ); $result = Set::insert($a, pages.name, array()); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [pages] => Array ( [name] => Array ( ) ) ) / * $a = array( pages => array( 0 => array(name => main), 1 => array(name => about) ) ); $result = Set::insert($a, pages.1.vars, array(title => page title)); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [pages] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => main ) [1] => Array ( [name] => about [vars] => Array ( [title] => page title ) ) ) ) / *

static Set::map($class = stdClass, $tmp = stdClass) Return type object This method Maps the contents of the Set object to an object hierarchy while maintaining numeric keys as arrays of objects. Basically, the map function turns array items into initialized class objects. By default it turns

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an array into a stdClass Object, however you can map values into any type of class. Example: Set::map($array_of_values, nameOfYourClass);:
$data = array( array( "IndexedPage" => array( "id" => 1, "url" => http://blah.com/, hash => 68a9f053b19526d08e36c6a9ad150737933816a5, get_vars => , redirect => , created => "1195055503", updated => "1195055503", ) ), array( "IndexedPage" => array( "id" => 2, "url" => http://blah.com/, hash => 68a9f053b19526d08e36c6a9ad150737933816a5, get_vars => , redirect => , created => "1195055503", updated => "1195055503", ), ) ); $mapped = Set::map($data); /* $mapped now looks like: Array ( [0] => stdClass Object ( [_name_] => IndexedPage [id] => 1 [url] => http://blah.com/ [hash] => 68a9f053b19526d08e36c6a9ad150737933816a5 [get_vars] => [redirect] => [created] => 1195055503 [updated] => 1195055503 ) [1] => stdClass Object ( [_name_] => IndexedPage [id] => 2 [url] => http://blah.com/ [hash] => 68a9f053b19526d08e36c6a9ad150737933816a5 [get_vars] => [redirect] => [created] => 1195055503

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[updated] => 1195055503 ) ) */

Using Set::map() with a custom class for second parameter:

class MyClass { public function sayHi() { echo Hi!; } } $mapped = Set::map($data, MyClass); //Now you can access all the properties as in the example above, //but also you can call MyClasss methods $mapped->[0]->sayHi();

static Set::matches($conditions, $data = array(), $i = null, $length = null) Return type boolean Set::matches can be used to see if a single item or a given xpath match certain conditions.:
$a = array( array(Article => array(id => 1, title => Article 1)), array(Article => array(id => 2, title => Article 2)), array(Article => array(id => 3, title => Article 3)) ); $res = Set::matches(array(id>2), $a[1][Article]); // returns false $res = Set::matches(array(id>=2), $a[1][Article]); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(id>=3), $a[1][Article]); // returns false $res = Set::matches(array(id<=2), $a[1][Article]); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(id<2), $a[1][Article]); // returns false $res = Set::matches(array(id>1), $a[1][Article]); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(id>1, id<3, id!=0), $a[1][Article]); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(3), null, 3); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(5), null, 5); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(id), $a[1][Article]); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(id, title), $a[1][Article]); // returns true $res = Set::matches(array(non-existent), $a[1][Article]);

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// returns false $res = Set::matches(/Article[id=2], $a); // returns true $res = Set::matches(/Article[id=4], $a); // returns false $res = Set::matches(array(), $a); // returns true

static Set::merge($arr1, $arr2 = null) Return type array This function can be thought of as a hybrid between PHPs array_merge and array_merge_recursive. The difference to the two is that if an array key contains another array then the function behaves recursive (unlike array_merge) but does not do if for keys containing strings (unlike array_merge_recursive). See the unit test for more information. Note: This function will work with an unlimited amount of arguments and typecasts non-array parameters into arrays.
$arry1 = array( array( id => 48c2570e-dfa8-4c32-a35e-0d71cbdd56cb, name => mysql raleigh-workshop-08 < 2008-09-05.sql , description => Importing an sql dump ), array( id => 48c257a8-cf7c-4af2-ac2f-114ecbdd56cb, name => pbpaste | grep -i Unpaid | pbcopy, description => Remove all lines that say "Unpaid"., ) ); $arry2 = 4; $arry3 = array(0 => test array, cats => dogs, people => 1267); $arry4 = array(cats => felines, dog => angry); $res = Set::merge($arry1, $arry2, $arry3, $arry4); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 48c2570e-dfa8-4c32-a35e-0d71cbdd56cb [name] => mysql raleigh-workshop-08 < 2008-09-05.sql [description] => Importing an sql dump ) [1] => Array ( [id] => 48c257a8-cf7c-4af2-ac2f-114ecbdd56cb [name] => pbpaste | grep -i Unpaid | pbcopy [description] => Remove all lines that say "Unpaid".

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) [2] => 4 [3] => test array [cats] => felines [people] => 1267 [dog] => angry ) */

static Set::nest($data, $options = array()) Return type array Takes in a at array and returns a nested array:
$data = array( array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName array(ModelName ); => => => => => => => => => => array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id array(id => => => => => => => => => => 1, parent_id => null)), 2, parent_id => 1)), 3, parent_id => 1)), 4, parent_id => 1)), 5, parent_id => 1)), 6, parent_id => null)), 7, parent_id => 6)), 8, parent_id => 6)), 9, parent_id => 6)), 10, parent_id => 6))

$result = Set::nest($data, array(root => 6)); /* $result now looks like: array( (int) 0 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 6, parent_id => null ), children => array( (int) 0 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 7, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ), (int) 1 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 8, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ), (int) 2 => array(

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ModelName => array( id => (int) 9, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ), (int) 3 => array( ModelName => array( id => (int) 10, parent_id => (int) 6 ), children => array() ) ) ) ) */

static Set::normalize($list, $assoc = true, $sep = , , $trim = true) Return type array Normalizes a string or array list.:

$a = array( Tree, CounterCache, Upload => array( folder => products, fields => array(image_1_id, image_2_id, image_3_id, image_4_id, ima ) ); $b = array( Cacheable => array(enabled => false), Limit, Bindable, Validator, Transactional ); $result = Set::normalize($a); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [Tree] => [CounterCache] => [Upload] => Array ( [folder] => products [fields] => Array ( [0] => image_1_id [1] => image_2_id [2] => image_3_id [3] => image_4_id [4] => image_5_id

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) ) ) */ $result = Set::normalize($b); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [Cacheable] => Array ( [enabled] => ) [Limit] => [Bindable] => [Validator] => [Transactional] => ) / * $result = Set::merge($a, $b); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [0] => Tree [1] => CounterCache [Upload] => Array ( [folder] => products [fields] => Array ( [0] => image_1_id [1] => image_2_id [2] => image_3_id [3] => image_4_id [4] => image_5_id ) ) [Cacheable] => Array ( [enabled] => ) [2] => Limit [3] => Bindable [4] => Validator [5] => Transactional ) */ $result = Set::normalize(Set::merge($a, $b)); // Now merge the two and normalize /* $result now looks like: Array ( [Tree] =>

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[CounterCache] => [Upload] => Array ( [folder] => [fields] => ( [0] [1] [2] [3] [4] ) ) [Cacheable] => Array ( [enabled] => ) [Limit] => [Bindable] => [Validator] => [Transactional] => ) */

products Array => => => => => image_1_id image_2_id image_3_id image_4_id image_5_id

static Set::numeric($array=null) Return type boolean Checks to see if all the values in the array are numeric:
$data = array(one); $res = Set::numeric(array_keys($data)); // $res is true $data = array(1 => one); $res = Set::numeric($data); // $res is false $data = array(one); $res = Set::numeric($data); // $res is false $data = array(one => two); $res = Set::numeric($data); // $res is false $data = array(one => 1); $res = Set::numeric($data);

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// $res is true $data = array(0); $res = Set::numeric($data); // $res is true $data = array(one, two, three, four, five); $res = Set::numeric(array_keys($data)); // $res is true $data = array(1 => one, 2 => two, 3 => three, 4 => four, 5 => five); $res = Set::numeric(array_keys($data)); // $res is true $data = array(1 => one, 2 => two, 3 => three, 4 => four, 5 => five); $res = Set::numeric(array_keys($data)); // $res is true $data = array(one, 2 => two, 3 => three, 4 => four, a => five); $res = Set::numeric(array_keys($data)); // $res is false

static Set::pushDiff($array1, $array2) Return type array This function merges two arrays and pushes the differences in array2 to the bottom of the resultant array. Example 1

$array1 = array(ModelOne => array(id => 1001, field_one => a1.m1.f1, field_tw $array2 = array(ModelOne => array(id => 1003, field_one => a3.m1.f1, field_tw $res = Set::pushDiff($array1, $array2); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [ModelOne] => Array ( [id] => 1001 [field_one] => a1.m1.f1 [field_two] => a1.m1.f2 [field_three] => a3.m1.f3 ) ) / *

Example 2

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$array1 = array("a" => "b", 1 => 20938, "c" => "string"); $array2 = array("b" => "b", 3 => 238, "c" => "string", array("extra_field")); $res = Set::pushDiff($array1, $array2); /* $res now looks like: Array ( [a] => b [1] => 20938 [c] => string [b] => b [3] => 238 [4] => Array ( [0] => extra_field ) ) */

static Set::remove($list, $path = null) Return type array Removes an element from a Set or array as dened by $path:
$a = array( pages => array(name => page), files => array(name => files) ); $result = Set::remove($a, files); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [pages] => Array ( [name] => page ) ) */

static Set::reverse($object) Return type array Set::reverse is basically the opposite of Set::map. It converts an object into an array. If $object is not an object, reverse will simply return $object.:
$result = Set::reverse(null); // Null $result = Set::reverse(false); // false $a = array( Post => array(id => 1, title => First Post), Comment => array(

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array(id => 1, title => First Comment), array(id => 2, title => Second Comment) ), Tag => array( array(id => 1, title => First Tag), array(id => 2, title => Second Tag) ), ); $map = Set::map($a); // Turn $a /* $map now looks like: stdClass Object ( [_name_] => Post [id] => 1 [title] => First Post [Comment] => Array ( [0] => stdClass ( [id] => [title] ) [1] => stdClass ( [id] => [title] ) ) [Tag] => Array ( [0] => stdClass ( [id] => [title] ) [1] => stdClass ( [id] => [title] ) ) ) */ into a class object

Object 1 => First Comment Object 2 => Second Comment

Object 1 => First Tag Object 2 => Second Tag

$result = Set::reverse($map); /* $result now looks like: Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => First Post [Comment] => Array

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( [0] => Array ( [id] => [title] ) [1] => Array ( [id] => [title] ) ) [Tag] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => [title] ) [1] => Array ( [id] => [title] ) ) ) ) */ $result = Set::reverse($a[Post]); // Just return the array /* $result now looks like: Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => First Post ) */

1 => First Comment

2 => Second Comment

1 => First Tag

2 => Second Tag

static Set::sort($data, $path, $dir) Return type array Sorts an array by any value, determined by a Set-compatible path:
$a = array( 0 => array(Person => array(name => 1 => array(Person => array(name => 2 => array(Person => array(name => ); $result = Set::sort($a, {n}.Person.name, /* $result now looks like: array( 0 => array(Person => array(name => 1 => array(Person => array(name =>

Jeff), Friend => array(array(name => Tracy),Friend => array(array(name => Adam),Friend => array(array(name => asc);

Adam),Friend => array(array(name => Jeff), Friend => array(array(name =>

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2 => array(Person => array(name => Tracy),Friend => array(array(name => ); */ $result = Set::sort($a, {n}.Person.name, /* $result now looks like: array( 2 => array(Person => array(name => 1 => array(Person => array(name => 0 => array(Person => array(name => ); */ desc);

Tracy),Friend => array(array(name => Jeff), Friend => array(array(name => Adam),Friend => array(array(name =>

String class String The String class includes convenience methods for creating and manipulating strings and is normally accessed statically. Example: String::uuid(). If you need TextHelper functionalities outside of a View, use the String class:
class UsersController extends AppController { public $components = array(Auth);

public function afterLogin() { App::uses(String, Utility); $message = $this->User->find(new_message); if (!empty($message)) { // notify user of new message $this->Session->setFlash(__(You have a new message: %s, String::truncate($mes } } }

Changed in version 2.1: Several methods from TextHelper have been moved to String class. static String::uuid The uuid method is used to generate unique identiers as per RFC 4122 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc4122.html). The uuid is a 128bit string in the format of 485fc381-e790-47a3-9794-1337c0a8fe68.
String::uuid(); // 485fc381-e790-47a3-9794-1337c0a8fe68

static String::tokenize($data, $separator = , , $leftBound = (, $rightBound = )) Tokenizes a string using $separator, ignoring any instance of $separator that appears between $leftBound and $rightBound. This method can be useful when splitting up data in that has regular formatting such as tag lists:

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$data = "cakephp great framework php"; $result = String::tokenize($data, , "", ""); // result contains array(cakephp, "great framework", php);

static String::insert($string, $data, $options = array()) The insert method is used to create string templates and to allow for key/value replacements:

String::insert(My name is :name and I am :age years old., array(name => Bob, ag // generates: "My name is Bob and I am 65 years old."

static String::cleanInsert($string, $options = array()) Cleans up a String::insert formatted string with given $options depending on the clean key in $options. The default method used is text but html is also available. The goal of this function is to replace all whitespace and unneeded markup around placeholders that did not get replaced by Set::insert. You can use the following options in the options array:
$options = array( clean => array( method => text, // or html ), before => , after => );

static String::wrap($text, $options = array()) Wraps a block of text to a set width, and indent blocks as well. Can intelligently wrap text so words are not sliced across lines:
$text = This is the song that never ends.; $result = String::wrap($text, 22); // returns This is the song that never ends.

You can provide an array of options that control how wrapping is done. The supported options are: width The width to wrap to. Defaults to 72. wordWrap Whether or not to wrap whole words. Defaults to true. indent The character to indent lines with. Defaults to . indentAt The line number to start indenting text. Defaults to 0. String::highlight(string $haystack, string $needle, array $options = array()) Parameters $haystack (string) The string to search. $needle (string) The string to nd.

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$options (array) An array of options, see below. Highlights $needle in $haystack using the $options[format] string specied or a default string. Options: format - string The piece of html with that the phrase will be highlighted html - bool If true, will ignore any HTML tags, ensuring that only the correct text is highlighted Example:

// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->highlight($lastSentence, using, array(format => <span class="hi

// called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::highlight($lastSentence, using, array(format => <span class="highlig

Output:
Highlights $needle in $haystack <span class="highlight">using</span> the $options[format] string specified or a default string.

String::stripLinks($text) Strips the supplied $text of any HTML links. String::truncate(string $text, int $length=100, array $options) Parameters $text (string) The text to truncate. $length (int) The length to trim to. $options (array) An array of options to use. Cuts a string to the $length and adds a sufx with ellipsis if the text is longer than $length. If exact is passed as false, the truncation will occur after the next word ending. If html is passed as true, html tags will be respected and will not be cut off. $options is used to pass all extra parameters, and has the following possible keys by default, all of which are optional:
array( ellipsis => ..., exact => true, html => false )

Example:
// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->truncate( The killer crept forward and tripped on the rug., 22,

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array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) ); // called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::truncate( The killer crept forward and tripped on the rug., 22, array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) );

Output:
The killer crept...

Changed in version 2.3: ending has been replaced by ellipsis. ending is still used in 2.2.1 String::tail(string $text, int $length=100, array $options) Parameters $text (string) The text to truncate. $length (int) The length to trim to. $options (array) An array of options to use. Cuts a string to the $length and adds a prex with ellipsis if the text is longer than $length. If exact is passed as false, the truncation will occur before the next word ending. $options is used to pass all extra parameters, and has the following possible keys by default, all of which are optional:
array( ellipsis => ..., exact => true )

New in version 2.3. Example:

// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->tail( I packed my bag and in it I put a PSP, a PS3, a TV, a C# program that can divide 70, array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) );

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// called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::tail( I packed my bag and in it I put a PSP, a PS3, a TV, a C# program that can divide 70, array( ellipsis => ..., exact => false ) );

Output:
...a TV, a C# program that can divide by zero, death metal t-shirts

String::excerpt(string $haystack, string $needle, integer $radius=100, string $ellipsis=...) Parameters $haystack (string) The string to search. $needle (string) The string to excerpt around. $radius (int) The number of characters on either side of $needle you want to include. $ellipsis (string) Text to append/prepend to the beginning or end of the result. Extracts an excerpt from $haystack surrounding the $needle with a number of characters on each side determined by $radius, and prex/sufx with $ellipsis. This method is especially handy for search results. The query string or keywords can be shown within the resulting document.:
// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->excerpt($lastParagraph, method, 50, ...); // called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::excerpt($lastParagraph, method, 50, ...);

Output:
... by $radius, and prefix/suffix with $ellipsis. This method is especially handy for search results. The query...

String::toList(array $list, $and=and) Parameters $list (array) Array of elements to combine into a list sentence. $and (string) The word used for the last join. Creates a comma-separated list where the last two items are joined with and.:
// called as TextHelper echo $this->Text->toList($colors);

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// called as String App::uses(String, Utility); echo String::toList($colors);

Output:
red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet

Xml class Xml The Xml class was all refactored. As PHP 5 have SimpleXML (http://php.net/simplexml) and DOMDocument (http://php.net/domdocument), the CakePHP doesnt need to re-implement an XML parser. The new XML class will basically transform an array into SimpleXMLElement or DOMDocument objects, and vice versa.
Importing data to Xml class

In CakePHP 1.3 you can pass array, XML as string, URL or le path to the constructor of Xml class to import data. In CakePHP 2.0 you can do it using Xml::build(). Unless the return is an Xml object, it will return a SimpleXMLElement or DOMDocument object (depending of your options parameter - default is SimpleXMLElement). Below the samples how to import data from URL:
// Old method: $xml = new Xml(http://bakery.cakephp.org/articles/rss); // New method using SimpleXML $xml = Xml::build(http://bakery.cakephp.org/articles/rss); // $xml now is a instance of SimpleXMLElement

//or $xml = Xml::build(http://bakery.cakephp.org/articles/rss, array(return => simplexml)) // $xml now is a instance of SimpleXMLElement

// New method using DOMDocument $xml = Xml::build(http://bakery.cakephp.org/articles/rss, array(return => domdocument // $xml now is a instance of DOMDocument

You can use Xml::build() to build XML objects from a variety of sources. You can use XML to build objects from string data:
$text = <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <post> <id>1</id> <title>Best post</title> <body> ... </body> </post>; $xml = Xml::build($text);

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You can also build Xml objects from either local les, or remote les. Remote les will be fetched with HttpSocket:
// local file $xml = Xml::build(/home/awesome/unicorns.xml); // remote file $xml = Xml::build(http://bakery.cakephp.org/articles/rss);

You can also build Xml objects using an array:

$data = array( post => array( id => 1, title => Best post, body => ... ) ); $xml = Xml::build($data);

If your input is invalid the Xml class will throw a Exception:

$xmlString = What is XML? try { $xmlObject = Xml::build($xmlString); // Here will throw a Exception } catch (XmlException $e) { throw new InternalErrorException(); }

Note: DOMDocument (http://php.net/domdocument) and SimpleXML (http://php.net/simplexml) implement different APIs. Be sure to use the correct methods on the object you request from Xml.

Transforming a XML string in array

Converting XML strings into arrays is simple with the Xml class as well. By default youll get a SimpleXml object back:
//Old method: $xmlString = <?xml version="1.0"?><root><child>value</child></root>; $xmlObject = new Xml($xmlString); $xmlArray = $xmlObject->toArray(); // New method: $xmlString = <?xml version="1.0"?><root><child>value</child></root>; $xmlArray = Xml::toArray(Xml::build($xmlString));

If your XML is invalid it will throw a Exception.

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Transforming an array into a string of XML // Old method: $xmlArray = array(root => array(child => value)); $xmlObject = new Xml($xmlArray, array(format => tags)); $xmlString = $xmlObject->toString();

// New method: $xmlArray = array(root => array(child => value)); $xmlObject = Xml::fromArray($xmlArray, array(format => tags)); // You can use Xml::buil $xmlString = $xmlObject->asXML();

Your array must have only one element in the top level and it can not be numeric. If the array is not in this format, Xml will throw a Exception. Examples of invalid arrays:
// Top level with numeric key array( array(key => value) ); // Multiple keys in top level array( key1 => first value, key2 => other value );

Warning: The default format option was changed from attributes to tags. This was done to make the Xml that the Xml class generates more compatible with XML in the wild. Be careful if you depend of this. In the new version you can create a mixed array with tags, attributes and value, just use format as tags (or do not say anything, because it is the default value) and prex keys that are supposed to be attributes with @. For value text, use @ as the key.
$xmlArray = array( project => array( @id => 1, name => Name of project, as tag, @ => Value of project ) ); $xmlObject = Xml::fromArray($xmlArray); $xmlString = $xmlObject->asXML();

The content of $xmlString will be:

<?xml version="1.0"?> <project id="1">Value of project<name>Name of project, as tag</name></project>

Note: The structure of array was changed. Now the child must have in a sub-tree and not in the same tree. Moreover, the strings not will be changed by Inflector. See the sample below:

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$oldArray = array( Projects => array( array( Project => array(id => 1, title Industry => array(id => 1, name ), array( Project => array(id => 2, title Industry => array(id => 2, name ) ) ); $newArray = array( projects => array( project => array( array( id => 1, title => Project industry => array(id => 1, ), array( id => 2, title => Project industry => array(id => 2, ) ) ) );

=> Project 1), => Industry 1)

=> Project 2), => Industry 2)

1, name => Industry 1)

2, name => Industry 2)

The both will result the below XML:

<?xml version="1.0"?> <projects> <project> <id>1</id> <title>Project 1</title> <industry> <id>1</id> <name>Industry 1</name> </industry> </project> <project> <id>2</id> <title>Project 2</title> <industry> <id>2</id> <name>Industry 2</name> </industry> </project> </projects>

Using Namespaces To use XML Namespaces, in your array you must create a key with name xmlns: to generic namespace or input the prex xmlns: in a custom namespace. See the samples:

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$xmlArray = array( root => array( xmlns: => http://cakephp.org, child => value ) ); $xml1 = Xml::fromArray($xmlArray); $xmlArray( root => array( tag => array( xmlns:pref => http://cakephp.org, pref:item => array( item 1, item 2 ) ) ) ); $xml2 = Xml::fromArray($xmlArray);

The value of $xml1 and $xml2 will be, respectively:

<?xml version="1.0"?> <root xmlns="http://cakephp.org"><child>value</child>

<?xml version="1.0"?> <root><tag xmlns:pref="http://cakephp.org"><pref:item>item 1</pref:item><pref:item>item 2</

Creating a child The Xml class of CakePHP 2.0 doesnt provide the manipulation of content, this must be made using SimpleXMLElement or DOMDocument. But, how CakePHP is so sweet, below has the steps to do for create a child node:
// CakePHP 1.3 $myXmlOriginal = <?xml version="1.0"?><root><child>value</child></root>; $xml = new Xml($myXmlOriginal, array(format => tags)); $xml->children[0]->createNode(young, new value); // CakePHP 2.0 - Using SimpleXML $myXmlOriginal = <?xml version="1.0"?><root><child>value</child></root>; $xml = Xml::build($myXmlOriginal); $xml->root->addChild(young, new value); // CakePHP 2.0 - Using DOMDocument $myXmlOriginal = <?xml version="1.0"?><root><child>value</child></root>; $xml = Xml::build($myXmlOriginal, array(return => domdocument)); $child = $xml->createElement(young, new value); $xml->firstChild->appendChild($child);

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Tip: After manipulate your XML using SimpleXMLElement or DomDocument you can use Xml::toArray() without problem.

Xml API

A factory and conversion class for creating SimpleXml or DOMDocument objects from a number of sources including strings, arrays and remote urls. static Xml::build($input, $options = array()) Initialize SimpleXMLElement or DOMDocument from a given XML string, le path, URL or array Building XML from a string:
$xml = Xml::build(<example>text</example>);

Building XML from string (output DOMDocument):

$xml = Xml::build(<example>text</example>, array(return => domdocument));

Building XML from a le path:

$xml = Xml::build(/path/to/an/xml/file.xml);

Building from a remote URL:

$xml = Xml::build(http://example.com/example.xml);

Building from an array:

$value = array( tags => array( tag => array( array( id => 1, name => defect ), array( id => 2, name => enhancement ) ) ) ); $xml = Xml::build($value);

When building XML from an array ensure that there is only one top level element. static Xml::toArray($obj) Convert either a SimpleXml or DOMDocument object into an array.

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CHAPTER 8

Plugins

CakePHP allows you to set up a combination of controllers, models, and views and release them as a packaged application plugin that others can use in their CakePHP applications. Have a sweet user management module, simple blog, or web services module in one of your applications? Package it as a CakePHP plugin so you can pop it into other applications. The main tie between a plugin and the application it has been installed into, is the applications conguration (database connection, etc.). Otherwise, it operates in its own little space, behaving much like it would if it were an application on its own.

Installing a Plugin
To install a plugin, start by simply dropping the plugin folder in your app/Plugin folder. If youre installing a plugin named ContactManager then you should have a folder in app/Plugin named ContactManager under which are the plugins View, Model, Controller, webroot, and any other directories. New for CakePHP 2.0, plugins need to be loaded manually in app/Cong/bootstrap.php. You can either load them one by one or all of them in a single call:
CakePlugin::loadAll(); // Loads all plugins at once CakePlugin::load(ContactManager); //Loads a single plugin

loadAll loads all plugins available, while allowing you to set certain settings for specic plugins. load() works similarly, but only loads the plugins you explicitly specify.

Plugin conguration
There is a lot you can do with the load and loadAll methods to help with plugin conguration and routing. Perhaps you want to load all plugins automatically, while specifying custom routes and bootstrap les for certain plugins. No problem: 517

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CakePlugin::loadAll(array( Blog => array(routes => true), ContactManager => array(bootstrap => true), WebmasterTools => array(bootstrap => true, routes => true), ));

With this style of conguration, you no longer need to manually include() or require() a plugins conguration or routes leIt happens automatically at the right time and place. The exact same parameters could have also been supplied to the load() method, which would have loaded only those three plugins, and not the rest. Finally, you can also specify a set of defaults for loadAll which will apply to every plugin that doesnt have a more specic conguration. Load the bootstrap le from all plugins, and the routes from the Blog plugin:
CakePlugin::loadAll(array( array(bootstrap => true), Blog => array(routes => true) ));

Note that all les specied should actually exist in the congured plugin(s) or PHP will give warnings for each le it cannot load. This is especially important to remember when specifying defaults for all plugins. Some plugins additionally need to create one or more tables in your database. In those cases, they will often include a schema le which you can call from the cake shell like this:
user@host $ cake schema create --plugin ContactManager

Most plugins will indicate the proper procedure for conguring them and setting up the database in their documentation. Some plugins will require more setup than others.

Advanced bootstrapping
If you like to load more than one bootstrap le for a plugin. You can specify an array of les for the bootstrap conguration key:
CakePlugin::loadAll(array( Blog => array( bootstrap => array( config1, config2 ) ) ));

You can also specify a callable function that needs to be called when the plugin has been loaded:
function aCallableFunction($pluginName, $config) { }

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CakePlugin::loadAll(array( Blog => array( bootstrap => aCallableFunction ) ));

Using a Plugin
You can reference a plugins controllers, models, components, behaviors, and helpers by prexing the name of the plugin before the class name. For example, say you wanted to use the ContactManager plugins ContactInfoHelper to output some pretty contact information in one of your views. In your controller, your $helpers array could look like this:
public $helpers = array(ContactManager.ContactInfo);

You would then be able to access the ContactInfoHelper just like any other helper in your view, such as:
echo $this->ContactInfo->address($contact);

Creating Your Own Plugins

As a working example, lets begin to create the ContactManager plugin referenced above. To start out, well set up our plugins basic directory structure. It should look like this:
/app /Plugin /ContactManager /Controller /Component /Model /Behavior /View /Helper /Layouts

Note the name of the plugin folder, ContactManager. It is important that this folder has the same name as the plugin. Inside the plugin folder, youll notice it looks a lot like a CakePHP application, and thats basically what it is. You dont actually have to include any of those folders if you do not use them. Some plugins might only dene a Component and a Behavior, and in that case they can completely omit the View directory. A plugin can also have basically any of the other directories that your application can, such as Cong, Console, Lib, webroot, etc. Note: If you want to be able to access your plugin with a URL, dening an AppController and AppModel for the plugin is required. These two special classes are named after the plugin, and extend the parent Using a Plugin 519

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applications AppController and AppModel. Heres what they should look like for our ContactManager example:
// /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Controller/ContactManagerAppController.php: class ContactManagerAppController extends AppController { } // /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Model/ContactManagerAppModel.php: class ContactManagerAppModel extends AppModel { }

If you forgot to dene these special classes, CakePHP will hand you Missing Controller errors until youve done so. Please note that the process of creating plugins can be greatly simplied by using the Cake shell. In order to bake a plugin please use the following command:
user@host $ cake bake plugin ContactManager

Now you can bake using the same conventions which apply to the rest of your app. For example - baking controllers:
user@host $ cake bake controller Contacts --plugin ContactManager

Please refer to the chapter Code Generation with Bake if you have any problems with using the command line.

Plugin Controllers
Controllers for our ContactManager plugin will be stored in /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Controller/. Since the main thing well be doing is managing contacts, well need a ContactsController for this plugin. So, we place our new ContactsController in /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Controller and it looks like so:
// app/Plugin/ContactManager/Controller/ContactsController.php class ContactsController extends ContactManagerAppController { public $uses = array(ContactManager.Contact); public function index() { //... } }

Note: This controller extends the plugins AppController (called ContactManagerAppController) rather than the parent applications AppController. Also note how the name of the model is prexed with the name of the plugin. This is required to differentiate between models in the plugin and models in the main application.

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In this case, the $uses array would not be required as ContactManager.Contact would be the default model for this controller, however it is included to demonstrate how to properly prepend the plugin name. If you want to access what weve got going thus far, visit /contact_manager/contacts. You should get a Missing Model error because we dont have a Contact model dened yet.

Plugin Models
Models for the plugin are stored in /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Model. Weve already dened a ContactsController for this plugin, so lets create the model for that controller, called Contact:
// /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Model/Contact.php: class Contact extends ContactManagerAppModel { }

Visiting /contact_manager/contacts now (given youve got a table in your database called contacts) should give us a Missing View error. Lets create that next. Note: If you need to reference a model within your plugin, you need to include the plugin name with the model name, separated with a dot. For example:
// /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Model/Contact.php: class Contact extends ContactManagerAppModel { public $hasMany = array(ContactManager.AltName); }

If you would prefer that the array keys for the association not have the plugin prex on them, use the alternative syntax:
// /app/Plugin/ContactManager/Model/Contact.php: class Contact extends ContactManagerAppModel { public $hasMany = array( AltName => array( className => ContactManager.AltName ) ); }

Plugin Views
Views behave exactly as they do in normal applications. Just place them in the right folder inside of the /app/Plugin/[PluginName]/View/ folder. For our ContactManager plugin, well need a view for our ContactsController::index() action, so lets include that as well:

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// /app/Plugin/ContactManager/View/Contacts/index.ctp: <h1>Contacts</h1> <p>Following is a sortable list of your contacts</p> <!-- A sortable list of contacts would go here....-->

Note: For information on how to use elements from a plugin, look up Elements

Overriding plugin views from inside your application

You can override any plugin views from inside your app using special paths. If you have a plugin called ContactManager you can override the view les of the plugin with more application specic view logic by creating les using the following template app/View/Plugin/[Plugin]/[Controller]/[view].ctp. For the Contacts controller you could make the following le:
/app/View/Plugin/ContactManager/Contacts/index.ctp

Creating this le, would allow you to override /app/Plugin/ContactManager/View/Contacts/index.ctp.

Plugin assets
A plugins web assets (but not PHP les) can be served through the plugins webroot directory, just like the main applications assets:
app/Plugin/ContactManager/webroot/ css/ js/ img/ flash/ pdf/

You may put any type of le in any directory, just like a regular webroot. The only restriction is that MediaView needs to know the mime-type of that asset. But keep in mind that handling static assets, such as images, Javascript and CSS les of plugins, through the Dispatcher is incredibly inefcient. It is strongly recommended to symlink them for production. For example like this:
ln -s app/Plugin/YourPlugin/webroot/css/yourplugin.css app/webroot/css/yourplugin.css

Linking to assets in plugins

Simply prepend /plugin_name/ to the beginning of a request for an asset within that plugin, and it will work as if the asset were in your applications webroot. For example, linking to /contact_manager/js/some_le.js app/Plugin/ContactManager/webroot/js/some_le.js. would serve the asset

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Note: It is important to note the /your_plugin/ prex before the asset path. That makes the magic happen! Changed in version 2.1: Use plugin syntax to request assets. For example in your View: <?php echo $this>Html->css(ContactManager.style); ?>

Components, Helpers and Behaviors

A plugin can have Components, Helpers and Behaviors just like a regular CakePHP application. You can even create plugins that consist only of Components, Helpers or Behaviors which can be a great way to build reusable components that can easily be dropped into any project. Building these components is exactly the same as building it within a regular application, with no special naming convention. Referring to your component from inside or outside of your plugin requires only that you prex the plugin name before the name of the component. For example:
// Component defined in ContactManager plugin class ExampleComponent extends Component { } // within your controllers: public $components = array(ContactManager.Example);

The same technique applies to Helpers and Behaviors. Note: When creating Helpers you may nd AppHelper is not automatically available. You should declare the resources you need with Uses:
// Declare use of AppHelper for your Plugins Helper App::uses(AppHelper, View/Helper);

Expand Your Plugin

This example created a good start for a plugin, but there is a lot more that you can do. As a general rule, anything you can do with your application, you can do inside of a plugin instead. Go ahead, include some third-party libraries in Vendor, add some new shells to the cake console, and dont forget to create test cases so your plugin users can automatically test your plugins functionality! In our ContactManager example, we might create add/remove/edit/delete actions in the ContactsController, implement validation in the Contact model, and implement the functionality one might expect when managing their contacts. Its up to you to decide what to implement in your plugins. Just dont forget to share your code with the community so that everyone can benet from your awesome, reusable components!

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Plugin Tips
Once a plugin has been installed in /app/Plugin, you can access it at the URL /plugin_name/controller_name/action. In our ContactManager plugin example, wed access our ContactsController at /contact_manager/contacts. Some nal tips on working with plugins in your CakePHP applications: When you dont have a [Plugin]AppController and [Plugin]AppModel, youll get missing Controller errors when trying to access a plugin controller. You can dene your own layouts for plugins, inside app/Plugin/[Plugin]/View/Layouts. Otherwise, plugins will use the layouts from the /app/View/Layouts folder by default.

You can do inter-plugin communication by using $this->requestAction(/plugin_name/controller_ in your controllers. If you use requestAction, make sure controller and model names are as unique as possible. Otherwise you might get PHP redened class ... errors.

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CHAPTER 9

Console and Shells

CakePHP features not only a web framework but also a console framework for creating console applications. Console applications are ideal for handling a variety of background tasks such as maintenance, and completing work outside of the request-response cycle. CakePHP console applications allow you to reuse your application classes from the command line. CakePHP comes with a number of console applications out of the box. Some of these applications are used in concert with other CakePHP features (like ACL or i18n), and others are for general use in getting you working faster.

The CakePHP console

This section provides an introduction into CakePHP at the command-line. If youve ever needed access to your CakePHP MVC classes in a cron job or other command-line script, this section is for you. PHP provides a CLI client that makes interfacing with your le system and applications much smoother. The CakePHP console provides a framework for creating shell scripts. The Console uses a dispatcher-type setup to load a shell or task, and hand it its parameters. Note: A command-line (CLI) build of PHP must be available on the system if you plan to use the Console. Before we get into specics, lets make sure we can run the CakePHP Console. First, youll need to bring up a system shell. The examples shown in this section will be in bash, but the CakePHP Console is Windowscompatible as well. Lets execute the Console program from bash. This example assumes that the user is currently logged into a bash prompt and is currently at the root of a CakePHP application. CakePHP applications contain a Console directory that contains all the shells and tasks for an application. It also comes with an executable:
$ cd /path/to/cakephp/app $ Console/cake

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Its often wise to add the core cake executable to your system path so you can use the cake command anywhere. This comes in handy when you are creating new projects. See Adding cake to your system path for how to make cake available systemwide. Running the Console with no arguments produces this help message:
Welcome to CakePHP v2.0.0 Console --------------------------------------------------------------App : app Path: /path/to/cakephp/app/ --------------------------------------------------------------Current Paths: -app: app -working: /path/to/cakephp/app -root: /path/to/cakephp/ -core: /path/to/cakephp/core Changing Paths: your working path should be the same as your application path to change your path use the -app param. Example: -app relative/path/to/cakephp/app or -app /absolute/path/to/cakephp/app Available Shells: acl [CORE] api [CORE] bake [CORE] command_list [CORE] console [CORE] i18n [CORE] import [app] schema [CORE] testsuite [CORE] upgrade [CORE]

To run a command, type cake shell_name [args] To get help on a specific command, type cake shell_name help

The rst information printed relates to paths. This is especially helpful if youre running the console from different parts of the lesystem. Since many users add the CakePHP console to their systems path so it can be accessed easily. Printing out the working, root, app, and core paths allows you to see where the console will be making changes. To change the app folder you wish to work with, you can supply its path as the rst argument to the cake command. This next example shows how to specify an app folder, assuming youve already added the console folder to your PATH:
$ cake -app /path/to/cakephp/app

The path supplied can be relative to the current working directory or supplied as an absolute path.

Adding cake to your system path

If you are on a *nix system (linux, MacOSX) the following steps will let you add the cake executable to your system path. 526 Chapter 9. Console and Shells

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1. Locate where your CakePHP install, and cake executable /Users/mark/cakephp/lib/Cake/Console/cake

are.

For

example

2. Edit your .bashrc or .bash_profile le in your home directory, and add the following:
export PATH="$PATH :/Users/mark/cakephp/lib/Cake/Console"

3. Reload the bash conguration or open a new terminal, and cake should work anywhere. If you are on Windows Vista or 7, you should follow the steps below. 1. Locate where your CakePHP install and cake executable C:\xampp\htdocs\cakephp\lib\Cake\Console are. For example

2. Open System Properties window from My Computer. You want to try the shortcut Windows Key + Pause or Windows Key + Break. Or, from the Desktop, right-click My Computer, click Properties then click Advanced System Settings link in the left column 3. Go under Advanced tab and click on Environment Variables button 4. In the System Variables portion, reach Path variable and double-click on it to Edit 5. Add the cake install path string followed by a semi colon. Result example:
%SystemRoot%\system32;%SystemRoot%;C:\xampp\htdocs\cakephp\lib\Cake\Console;

6. Click Ok and cake should work anywhere.

Creating a shell
Lets create a shell for use in the Console. For this example, well create a simple Hello world shell. In your applications Console/Command directory create HelloShell.php. Put the following code inside it:
class HelloShell extends AppShell { public function main() { $this->out(Hello world.); } }

The conventions for shell classes are that the class name should match the le name, with the sufx of Shell. In our shell we created a main() method. This method is called when a shell is called with no additional commands. Well add some more commands in a bit, but for now lets just run our shell. From your application directory, run:
Console/cake hello

You should see the following output:

Welcome to CakePHP v2.0.0 Console --------------------------------------------------------------App : app Path: /Users/markstory/Sites/cake_dev/app/ --------------------------------------------------------------Hello world.

Creating a shell

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As mentioned before, the main() method in shells is a special method called whenever there are no other commands or arguments given to a shell. You may have also noticed that HelloShell is extending AppShell. Much like The App Controller, AppShell gives you a base class to contain all your common functions or logic. You can dene an AppShell, by creating app/Console/Command/AppShell.php. If you dont have one, CakePHP will use the built-in one. Since our main method wasnt very interesting lets add another command that does something:
class HelloShell extends AppShell { public function main() { $this->out(Hello world.); } public function hey_there() { $this->out(Hey there . $this->args[0]); } }

After saving this le you should be able to run Console/cake hello hey_there your-name and see your name printed out. Any public method not prexed by an _ is allowed to be called from the command line. In our hey_there method we also used $this->args, this property contains an array of all the positional arguments provided to a command. You can also use switches or options on shell applications, these are available at $this->params, but well cover that in a bit. When using a main() method you wont be able to use the positional arguments or parameters. This is because the rst positional argument or option is interpreted as the command name. If you want to use arguments and options, you should use method names other than main.

Using Models in your shells

Youll often need access to your applications business logic in shell utilities; CakePHP makes that super easy. By setting a $uses property, you can dene an array of models you want to have access to in your shell. The dened models are loaded in as properties attached to your shell, just like a controller gets models attached to it:
class UserShell extends AppShell { public $uses = array(User); public function show() { $user = $this->User->findByUsername($this->args[0]); $this->out(print_r($user, true)); } }

The above shell, will fetch a user by username and display the information stored in the database.

Shell tasks
There will be times when building more advanced console applications, youll want to compose functionality into re-usable classes that can be shared across many shells. Tasks allow you to extract commands into

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classes. For example the bake is made almost entirely of tasks. You dene a shells tasks by using the $tasks property:
class UserShell extends AppShell { public $tasks = array(Template); }

You can use tasks from plugins using the standard plugin syntax. Tasks are stored in Console/Command/Task/ in les named after their classes. So if we were to create a new FileGenerator task, you would create Console/Command/Task/FileGeneratorTask.php. Each task must at least implement an execute() method. The ShellDispatcher, will call this method when the task is invoked. A task class looks like:
class FileGeneratorTask extends Shell { public $uses = array(User); public function execute() { } }

A shell can also access its tasks as properties, which makes tasks great for making re-usable chunks of functionality similar to Components:
// found in Console/Command/SeaShell.php class SeaShell extends AppShell { public $tasks = array(Sound); // found in Console/Command/Task/SoundTask.php public function main() { $this->Sound->execute(); } }

You can also access tasks directly from the command line:
$ cake sea sound

Note: In order to access tasks directly from the command line, the task must be included in the shell class $tasks property. Therefore, be warned that a method called sound in the SeaShell class would override the ability to access the functionality in the Sound task specied in the $tasks array.

Loading tasks on the y with TaskCollection

You can load tasks on the y using the Task collection object. You can load tasks that were not declared in $tasks this way:
$Project = $this->Tasks->load(Project);

Would load and return a ProjectTask instance. You can load tasks from plugins using:

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$ProgressBar = $this->Tasks->load(ProgressBar.ProgressBar);

Invoking other shells from your shell

Shells no longer have direct access to the ShellDispatcher any more through $this->Dispatch. There are still many cases where you will want to invoke one shell from another though. Shell::dispatchShell() gives you the ability to call other shells by providing the argv for the sub shell. You can provide arguments and options either as var args or as a string:
// As a string $this->dispatchShell(schema create Blog --plugin Blog); // As an array $this->dispatchShell(schema, create, Blog, --plugin, Blog);

The above shows how you can call the schema shell to create the schema for a plugin from inside your plugins shell.

Console output levels

Shells often need different levels of verbosity. When running as cron jobs, most output is un-necessary. And there are times when you are not interested in everything that a shell has to say. You can use output levels to ag output appropriately. The user of the shell, can then decide what level of detail they are interested in by setting the correct ag when calling the shell. Shell::out() supports 3 types of output by default. QUIET - Only absolutely important information should be marked for quiet output. NORMAL - The default level, and normal usage VERBOSE - Mark messages that may be too noisy for everyday use, but helpful for debugging as VERBOSE You can mark output as follows:
// would appear at all levels. $this->out(Quiet message, 1, Shell::QUIET); // would not appear when quiet output is toggled $this->out(normal message, 1, Shell::NORMAL); $this->out(loud message, 1, Shell::VERBOSE); // would only appear when verbose output is enabled. $this->out(extra message, 1, Shell::VERBOSE);

You can control the output level of shells, by using the --quiet and --verbose options. These options are added by default, and allow you to consistently control output levels inside your CakePHP shells.

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Styling output
Styling output is done by including tags - just like html - in your output. ConsoleOutput will replace these tags with the correct ansi code sequence, or remove the tags if you are on a console that doesnt support ansi codes. There are several built in styles, and you can create more. The built in ones are error Error messages. Red underlined text. warning Warning messages. Yellow text. info Informational messages. Cyan text. comment Additional text. Blue text. question Text that is a question, added automatically by shell. You can create additional styles using $this->stdout->styles(). To declare a new output style you could do:
$this->stdout->styles(flashy, array(text => magenta, blink => true));

This would then allow you to use a <flashy> tag in your shell output, and if ansi colours are enabled, the following would be rendered as blinking magenta text $this->out(<flashy>Whoooa</flashy> Something went wrong);. When dening styles you can use the following colours for the text and background attributes: black red green yellow blue magenta cyan white You can also use the following options as boolean switches, setting them to a truthy value enables them. bold underline blink reverse Adding a style makes it available on all instances of ConsoleOutput as well, so you dont have to redeclare styles for both stdout and stderr objects.

Turning off colouring

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$this->output->outputAs(ConsoleOutput::RAW);

The above will put the output object into raw output mode. In raw output mode, no styling is done at all. There are three modes you can use. ConsoleOutput::RAW - Raw output, no styling or formatting will be done. This is a good mode to use if you are outputting XML or, want to debug why your styling isnt working. ConsoleOutput::PLAIN - Plain text output, known style tags will be stripped from the output. ConsoleOutput::COLOR - Output with color escape codes in place. By default on *nix systems ConsoleOutput objects default to colour output. On windows systems, plain output is the default unless the ANSICON environment variable is present.

Conguring options and generating help

class ConsoleOptionParser Console option parsing in CakePHP has always been a little bit different from everything else on the command line. In 2.0 ConsoleOptionParser helps provide a more familiar command line option and argument parser. OptionParsers allow you to accomplish two goals at the same time. First they allow you to dene the options and arguments, separating basic input validation and your code. Secondly, it allows you to provide documentation, that is used to generate well formatted help le. The console framework gets your shells option parser by calling $this->getOptionParser(). Overriding this method allows you to congure the OptionParser to match the expected inputs of your shell. You can also congure subcommand option parsers, which allow you to have different option parsers for subcommands and tasks. The ConsoleOptionParser implements a uent interface and includes methods for easily setting multiple options/arguments at once.:
public function getOptionParser() { $parser = parent::getOptionParser(); //configure parser return $parser; }

Conguring an option parser with the uent interface

All of the methods that congure an option parser can be chained, allowing you to dene an entire option parser in one series of method calls:
public function getOptionParser() { $parser = parent::getOptionParser(); $parser->addArgument(type, array( help => Either a full path or type of class. ))->addArgument(className, array( help => A CakePHP core class name (e.g: Component, HtmlHelper).

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))->addOption(method, array( short => m, help => __(The specific method you want help on.) ))->description(__(Lookup doc block comments for classes in CakePHP.)); return $parser; }

The methods that allow chaining are: description() epilog() command() addArgument() addArguments() addOption() addOptions() addSubcommand() addSubcommands() ConsoleOptionParser::description($text = null) Gets or sets the description for the option parser. The description displays above the argument and option information. By passing in either an array or a string, you can set the value of the description. Calling with no arguments will return the current value:
// Set multiple lines at once $parser->description(array(line one, line two)); // read the current value $parser->description();

ConsoleOptionParser::epilog($text = null) Gets or sets the epilog for the option parser. The epilog is displayed after the argument and option information. By passing in either an array or a string, you can set the value of the epilog. Calling with no arguments will return the current value:
// Set multiple lines at once $parser->epilog(array(line one, line two)); // read the current value $parser->epilog();

Adding arguments
ConsoleOptionParser::addArgument($name, $params = array())

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Positional arguments are frequently used in command line tools, and ConsoleOptionParser allows you to dene positional arguments as well as make them required. You can add arguments one at a time with $parser->addArgument(); or multiple at once with $parser->addArguments();:
$parser->addArgument(model, array(help => The model to bake));

You can use the following options when creating an argument: help The help text to display for this argument. required Whether this parameter is required. index The index for the arg, if left undened the argument will be put onto the end of the arguments. If you dene the same index twice the rst option will be overwritten. choices An array of valid choices for this argument. If left empty all values are valid. An exception will be raised when parse() encounters an invalid value. Arguments that have been marked as required will throw an exception when parsing the command if they have been omitted. So you dont have to handle that in your shell. ConsoleOptionParser::addArguments(array $args) If you have an array with multiple arguments you can use $parser->addArguments() to add multiple arguments at once.:
$parser->addArguments(array( node => array(help => The node to create, required => true), parent => array(help => The parent node, required => true) ));

As with all the builder methods on ConsoleOptionParser, addArguments can be used as part of a uent method chain.

Validating arguments
When creating positional arguments, you can use the required ag, to indicate that an argument must be present when a shell is called. Additionally you can use choices to force an argument to be from a list of valid choices:
$parser->addArgument(type, array( help => The type of node to interact with., required => true, choices => array(aro, aco) ));

The above will create an argument that is required and has validation on the input. If the argument is either missing, or has an incorrect value an exception will be raised and the shell will be stopped.

Adding Options
ConsoleOptionParser::addOption($name, $options = array())

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Options or ags are also frequently used in command line tools. ConsoleOptionParser supports creating options with both verbose and short aliases, supplying defaults and creating boolean switches. Options are created with either $parser->addOption() or $parser->addOptions().:
$parser->addOption(connection, array( short => c, help => connection, default => default, ));

The above would allow you to use either cake myshell --connection=other, cake myshell --connection other, or cake myshell -c other when invoking the shell. You can also create boolean switches, these switches do not consume values, and their presence just enables them in the parsed parameters.:
$parser->addOption(no-commit, array(boolean => true));

With this option, when calling a shell like cake myshell --no-commit something the no-commit param would have a value of true, and something would be a treated as a positional argument. The built-in --help, --verbose, and --quiet options use this feature. When creating options you can use the following options to dene the behavior of the option: short - The single letter variant for this option, leave undened for none. help - Help text for this option. Used when generating help for the option. default - The default value for this option. If not dened the default will be true. boolean - The option uses no value, its just a boolean switch. Defaults to false. choices An array of valid choices for this option. If left empty all values are valid. An exception will be raised when parse() encounters an invalid value. ConsoleOptionParser::addOptions(array $options) If you have an array with multiple options you can use $parser->addOptions() to add multiple options at once.:
$parser->addOptions(array( node => array(short => n, help => The node to create), parent => array(short => p, help => The parent node) ));

As with all the builder methods on ConsoleOptionParser, addOptions is can be used as part of a uent method chain.

Validating options
Options can be provided with a set of choices much like positional arguments can be. When an option has dened choices, those are the only valid choices for an option. All other values will raise an InvalidArgumentException:

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$parser->addOption(accept, array( help => What version to accept., choices => array(working, theirs, mine) ));

Using boolean options

Options can be dened as boolean options, which are useful when you need to create some ag options. Like options with defaults, boolean options always include themselves into the parsed parameters. When the ags are present they are set to true, when they are absent false:
$parser->addOption(verbose, array( help => Enable verbose output., boolean => true ));

The following option would result in $this->params[verbose] always being available. This lets you omit empty() or isset() checks for boolean ags:
if ($this->params[verbose]) { // do something }

Since the boolean options are always dened as true or false you can omit additional check methods.

Adding subcommands
ConsoleOptionParser::addSubcommand($name, $options = array()) Console applications are often made of subcommands, and these subcommands may require special option parsing and have their own help. A perfect example of this is bake. Bake is made of many separate tasks that all have their own help and options. ConsoleOptionParser allows you to dene subcommands and provide command specic option parsers so the shell knows how to parse commands for its tasks:
$parser->addSubcommand(model, array( help => Bake a model, parser => $this->Model->getOptionParser() ));

The above is an example of how you could provide help and a specialized option parser for a shells task. By calling the Tasks getOptionParser() we dont have to duplicate the option parser generation, or mix concerns in our shell. Adding subcommands in this way has two advantages. First it lets your shell easily document its subcommands in the generated help, and it also allows easy access to the subcommand help. With the above subcommand created you could call cake myshell --help and see the list of subcommands, and also run cake myshell model --help to view the help for just the model task. When dening a subcommand you can use the following options: help - Help text for the subcommand.

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parser - A ConsoleOptionParser for the subcommand. This allows you to create method specic option parsers. When help is generated for a subcommand, if a parser is present it will be used. You can also supply the parser as an array that is compatible with ConsoleOptionParser::buildFromArray() Adding subcommands can be done as part of a uent method chain.

Building a ConsoleOptionParser from an array

ConsoleOptionParser::buildFromArray($spec) As previously mentioned, when creating subcommand option parsers, you can dene the parser spec as an array for that method. This can help make building subcommand parsers easier, as everything is an array:
$parser->addSubcommand(check, array( help => __(Check the permissions between an ACO and ARO.), parser => array( description => array( __("Use this command to grant ACL permissions. Once executed, the ARO "), __("specified (and its children, if any) will have ALLOW access to the"), __("specified ACO action (and the ACOs children, if any).") ), arguments => array( aro => array(help => __(ARO to check.), required => true), aco => array(help => __(ACO to check.), required => true), action => array(help => __(Action to check)) ) ) ));

Inside the parser spec, you can dene keys for definition, arguments, options, and epilog. You cannot dene subcommands inside an array style builder. The values for arguments, and options, should follow the format that ConsoleOptionParser::addArguments() and ConsoleOptionParser::addOptions() use. You can also use buildFromArray on its own, to build an option parser:
public function getOptionParser() { return ConsoleOptionParser::buildFromArray(array( description => array( __("Use this command to grant ACL permissions. Once executed, the ARO "), __("specified (and its children, if any) will have ALLOW access to the"), __("specified ACO action (and the ACOs children, if any).") ), arguments => array( aro => array(help => __(ARO to check.), required => true), aco => array(help => __(ACO to check.), required => true), action => array(help => __(Action to check)) ) )); }

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Getting help from shells

With the addition of ConsoleOptionParser getting help from shells is done in a consistent and uniform way. By using the --help or -h option you can view the help for any core shell, and any shell that implements a ConsoleOptionParser:
cake bake --help cake bake -h

Would both generate the help for bake. If the shell supports subcommands you can get help for those in a similar fashion:
cake bake model --help cake bake model -h

This would get you the help specic to bakes model task.

Getting help as XML

When building automated tools or development tools that need to interact with CakePHP shells, its nice to have help available in a machine parse-able format. The ConsoleOptionParser can provide help in xml by setting an additional argument:
cake bake --help xml cake bake -h xml

The above would return an XML document with the generated help, options, arguments and subcommands for the selected shell. A sample XML document would look like:

<?xml version="1.0"?> <shell> <command>bake fixture</command> <description>Generate fixtures for use with the test suite. You can use bake fixture all to bake all fixtures.</description> <epilog>Omitting all arguments and options will enter into an interactive mode.</epilog <subcommands/> <options> <option name="--help" short="-h" boolean="1"> <default/> <choices/> </option> <option name="--verbose" short="-v" boolean="1"> <default/> <choices/> </option> <option name="--quiet" short="-q" boolean="1"> <default/> <choices/> </option> <option name="--count" short="-n" boolean=""> <default>10</default> <choices/>

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</option> <option name="--connection" short="-c" boolean=""> <default>default</default> <choices/> </option> <option name="--plugin" short="-p" boolean=""> <default/> <choices/> </option> <option name="--records" short="-r" boolean="1"> <default/> <choices/> </option> </options> <arguments> <argument name="name" help="Name of the fixture to bake. Can use Plugin.name to bake plugin fixtures." required=""> <choices/> </argument> </arguments> </shell>

Shell API
class AppShell AppShell can be used as a base class for all your shells. It should extend Shell, and be located in Console/Command/AppShell.php class Shell($stdout = null, $stderr = null, $stdin = null) Shell is the base class for all shells, and provides a number of functions for interacting with user input, outputting text a generating errors. property Shell::$tasks An array of tasks you want loaded for this shell/task. property Shell::$uses An array of models that should be loaded for this shell/task. Shell::clear() Clears the current output being displayed. Shell::createFile($path, $contents) Parameters $path (string) Absolute path to the le you want to create. $contents (string) Contents to put in the le. Creates a le at a given path. If the Shell is interactive, a warning will be generated, and the user asked if they want to overwrite the le if it already exists. If the shells interactive property is false, no question will be asked and the le will simply be overwritten.

Shell API

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Shell::dispatchShell() Dispatch a command to another Shell. Similar to Controller::requestAction() but intended for running shells from other shells. See Invoking other shells from your shell. Shell::err($message = null, $newlines = 1) Parameters $method (string) The message to print. $newlines (integer) The number of newlines to follow the message. Outputs a method to stderr, works similar to Shell::out() Shell::error($title, $message = null) Parameters $title (string) Title of the error $message (string) An optional error message Displays a formatted error message and exits the application with status code 1 Shell::getOptionParser() Should return a ConsoleOptionParser object, with any sub-parsers for the shell. Shell::hasMethod($name) Check to see if this shell has a callable method by the given name. Shell::hasTask($task) Check to see if this shell has a task with the provided name. Shell::hr($newlines = 0, $width = 63) Parameters $newlines (int) The number of newlines to precede and follow the line. $width (int) The width of the line to draw. Create a horizontal line preceded and followed by a number of newlines. Shell::in($prompt, $options = null, $default = null) Parameters $prompt (string) The prompt to display to the user. $options (array) An array of valid choices the user can pick from. Picking an invalid option will force the user to choose again. $default (string) The default option if there is one. This method helps you interact with the user, and create interactive shells. It will return the users answer to the prompt, and allows you to provide a list of valid options the user can choose from:

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$selection = $this->in(Red or Green?, array(R, G), R);

The selection validation is case-insensitive. Shell::initialize() Initializes the Shell acts as constructor for subclasses allows conguration of tasks prior to shell execution. Shell::loadTasks() Loads tasks dened in public Shell::$tasks Shell::nl($multiplier = 1) :param int $multiplier Number of times the linefeed sequence should be repeated Returns a number of linefeed sequences. Shell::out($message = null, $newlines = 1, $level = Shell::NORMAL) Parameters $method (string) The message to print. $newlines (integer) The number of newlines to follow the message. $level (integer) The highest Console output levels this message should display at. The primary method for generating output to the user. By using levels, you can limit how verbose a shell is. out() also allows you to use colour formatting tags, which will enable coloured output on systems that support it. There are several built in styles for colouring text, and you can dene your own. error Error messages. warning Warning messages. info Informational messages. comment Additional text. question Magenta text used for user prompts By formatting messages with style tags you can display styled output:
$this->out(<warning>This will remove data from the filesystems.</warning>);

By default on *nix systems ConsoleOutput objects default to colour output. On windows systems, plain output is the default unless the ANSICON environment variable is present. Shell::runCommand($command, $argv) Runs the Shell with the provided argv. Delegates calls to Tasks and resolves methods inside the class. Commands are looked up with the following order: Method on the shell. Matching task name. Shell API 541

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main() method. If a shell implements a main() method, all missing method calls will be sent to main() with the original method name in the argv. Shell::shortPath($le) Makes absolute le path easier to read. Shell::startup() Starts up the Shell and displays the welcome message. Allows for checking and conguring prior to command or main execution. Override this method if you want to remove the welcome information, or otherwise modify the precommand ow. Shell::wrapText($text, $options = array()) Wrap a block of text. Allows you to set the width, and indenting on a block of text. Parameters $text (string) The text to format $options (array) width The width to wrap to. Defaults to 72 wordWrap Only wrap on words breaks (spaces) Defaults to true. indent Indent the text with the string provided. Defaults to null.

More topics
Running Shells as cronjobs
A common thing to do with a shell is making it run as a cronjob to clean up the database once in a while or send newsletters. However, when you have added the console path to the PATH variable via ~/.profile, it will be unavailable to the cronjob. The following BASH script will call your shell and append the needed paths to $PATH. Copy and save this to your Console folder as cakeshell and dont forget to make it executable. (chmod +x cakeshell)
#!/bin/bash TERM=dumb export TERM cmd="cake" while [ $ # -ne 0 ]; do if [ "$1" = "-cli" ] || [ "$1" = "-console" ]; then PATH=$PATH: $ 2 shift else cmd="${cmd} $1" fi shift

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done $cmd

You can call it like:

$ ./Console/cakeshell myshell myparam -cli /usr/bin -console /cakes/2.x.x/lib/Cake/Console

The -cli parameter takes a path which points to the php cli executable and the -console parameter takes a path which points to the CakePHP console. As a cronjob this would look like:

# m h dom mon dow command */5 * * * * /full/path/to/cakeshell myshell myparam -cli /usr/bin -console /cakes/2.x

A simple trick to debug a crontab is to set it up to dump its output to a logle. You can do this like:

# m h dom mon dow command */5 * * * * /full/path/to/cakeshell myshell myparam -cli /usr/bin -console /cakes/2.x

Code Generation with Bake

CakePHPs Bake console is another effort to get you up and running in CakePHP fast. The Bake console can create any of CakePHPs basic ingredients: models, views and controllers. And we arent just talking skeleton classes: Bake can create a fully functional application in just a few minutes. In fact, Bake is a natural step to take once an application has been scaffolded. Those new to Bake (especially Windows users) may nd the Bake screencast (http://tv.cakephp.org/video/gwoo/2010/12/24/setting_up_the_cakephp_console_on_windows) helpful in setting things up before continuing. Depending on the conguration of your setup, you may have to set execute rights on the cake bash script or call it using ./cake bake. The cake console is run using the PHP CLI (command line interface). If you have problems running the script, ensure that you have the PHP CLI installed and that it has the proper modules enabled (eg: MySQL) Users also might have issues if the database host is localhost and should try 127.0.0.1 instead. This could cause issues with PHP CLI. When running Bake for the rst time, youll be prompted to create a Database Conguration le, if you havent created one already. After youve created a Database Conguration le, running Bake will present you with the following options:
--------------------------------------------------------------App : app Path: /path-to/project/app --------------------------------------------------------------Interactive Bake Shell --------------------------------------------------------------[D]atabase Configuration [M]odel [V]iew

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[C]ontroller [P]roject [F]ixture [T]est case [Q]uit What would you like to Bake? (D/M/V/C/P/F/T/Q) >

Alternatively, you can run any of these commands directly from the command line:
$ cake bake db_config $ cake bake model $ cake bake view $ cake bake controller $ cake bake project $ cake bake fixture $ cake bake test $ cake bake plugin plugin_name $ cake bake all

Modify default HTML produced by baked templates If you wish to modify the default HTML output produced by the bake command, follow these simple steps:
For baking custom views

1. Go into: lib/Cake/Console/Templates/default/views 2. Notice the 4 les there 3. Copy them to your: app/Console/Templates/[themename]/views 4. Make changes to the HTML output to control the way bake builds your views The [themename] path segment should be the name of the bake theme that you are creating. Bake theme names need to be unique, so dont use default.
For baking custom projects

Go into: lib/Cake/Console/Templates/skel Notice the base application les there Copy them to your: app/Console/Templates/skel Make changes to the HTML output to control the way bake builds your views Pass the skeleton path parameter to the project task
cake bake project -skel Console/Templates/skel

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Note: You must run the specic project task cake bake project so that the path parameter can be passed. The template path is relative to the current path of the Command Line Interface. Since the full path to the skeleton needs to be manually entered, you can specify any directory holding your template build you want, including using multiple templates. (Unless Cake starts supporting overriding the skel folder like it does for views)

Bake improvements in 1.3 For 1.3 bake has had a signicant overhaul, and a number of features and enhancements have been built in. Two new tasks (FixtureTask and TestTask) are accessible from the main bake menu A third task (TemplateTask) has been added for use in your shells. All the different bake tasks now allow you to use connections other than default for baking. Using the -connection parameter. Plugin support has been greatly improved. Plugin.class. You can use either -plugin PluginName or

Questions have been claried, and made easier to understand. Multiple validations on models has been added. Self Associated models using parent_id are now detected. For example if your model is named Thread, a ParentThread and ChildThread association will be created. Fixtures and Tests can be baked separately. Baked Tests include as many xtures as they know about, including plugin detection (plugin detection does not work on PHP4). So with the laundry list of features, well take some time to look at some of the new commands, new parameters and updated features. New FixtureTask, TestTask and TemplateTask. Fixture and test baking were a bit of a pain in the past. You could only generate tests when baking the classes, and xtures could only be generated when baking models. This made adding tests to your applications later or even regenerating xtures with new schemas a bit painful. For 1.3 weve separated out Fixture and Test making them separate tasks. This allows you to re-run them and regenerate tests and xtures at any point in your development process. In addition to being rebuildable at any time, baked tests are now attempt to nd as many xtures as possible. In the past getting into testing often involved ghting through numerous Missing Table errors. With more advanced xture detection we hope to make testing easier and more accessible.

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Test cases also generate skeleton test methods for every non-inherited public method in your classes. Saving you one extra step. TemplateTask is a behind the scenes task, and it handles le generation from templates. In previous versions of CakePHP baked views were template based, but all other code was not. With 1.3 almost all the content in the les generated by bake are controlled by templates and the TemplateTask. The FixtureTask not only generates xtures with dummy data, but using the interactive options or the -records option you can enable xture generation using live data. New bake command New commands have been added to make baking easier and faster. Controller, Model, View baking all feature an all subcommand, that builds everything at once and makes speedy rebuilds easy.
cake bake model all

Would bake all the models for an application in one shot. Similarly cake bake controller all would bake all controllers and cake bake view all would generate all view les. Parameters on the ControllerTask have changed as well. cake bake controller scaffold is now cake bake controller public. ViewTask has had an -admin ag added, using -admin will allow you to bake views for actions that begin with Routing.admin As mentioned before cake bake fixture and cake bake test are new, and have several subcommands each. cake bake fixture all will regenerate all the basic xtures for your application. The -count parameter allows you to set the number of fake records that are created. By running xture task interactively you can generate xtures using the data in your live tables. You can use cake bake test <type> <class> to create test cases for already created objects in your app. Type should be one of the standard CakePHP types (component, controller, model, helper, behavior) but doesnt have to be. Class should be an existing object of the chosen type. Templates Galore New in bake for 1.3 is the addition of more templates. In 1.2 baked views used templates that could be changed to modify the view les bake generated. In 1.3 templates are used to generate all output from bake. There are separate templates for controllers, controller action sets, xtures, models, test cases, and the view les from 1.2. As well as more templates, you can also have multiple template sets or, bake themes. Bake themes can be provided in your app, or as part of plugins. An example plugin path for bake theme would be app/Plugin/BakeTheme/Console/Templates/dark_red/. An app bake theme called blue_bunny would be placed in app/Console/Templates/blue_bunny. You can look at lib/Cake/Console/Templates/default/ to see what directories and les are required of a bake theme. However, like view les, if your bake theme doesnt implement a template, other installed themes will be checked until the correct template is found. Additional plugin support. New in 1.3 are additional ways to specify plugin names when using bake. In addition to cake bake plugin Todo controller Posts, there are two new forms. cake bake controller Todo.Posts and cake bake controller Posts -plugin Todo. The plugin parameter can be while using interactive bake as well. cake bake controller -plugin Todo, for example will allow you to use interactive bake to add controllers to your Todo plugin. Additional / multiple plugin paths are supported as well. In the past bake required your plugin to be in app/plugins. In 1.3 bake will nd which of the pluginPaths the named plugin is located on, and add the les there.

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Schema management and migrations

The SchemaShell provides a functionality to create schema objects, schema sql dumps as well as create snapshots and restore database snapshots. Generating and using Schema les A generated schema le allows you to easily transport a database agnostic schema. You can generate a schema le of your database using:
$ Console/cake schema generate

This will generate a schema.php le in your app/Config/Schema directory. Note: The schema shell will only process tables for which there are models dened. To force the schema shell to process all the tables, you must add the -f option in the command line. To later rebuild the database schema from your previously made schema.php le run:
$ Console/cake schema create

This will drop and create the tables based on the contents of the schema.php. Schema les can also be used to generate sql dump les. To generate a sql le containing the CREATE TABLE statements, run:
$ Console/cake schema dump --write filename.sql

Where lename.sql is the desired lename for the sql dump. If you omit lename.sql the sql dump will be output to the console but not written to a le. CakeSchema callbacks After generating a schema you might want to insert data on some tables to get your app started. This can be achieved through CakeSchema callbacks. Every schema le is generated with a before($event = array()) and a after($event = array()) method. The $event param holds an array with two keys. One to tell if a table is being dropped or created and another for errors. Examples:
array(drop => posts, errors => null) array(create => posts, errors => null)

Adding data to a posts table for example would like this:

App::uses(Post, Model); public function after($event = array()) { if (isset($event[create])) {

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switch ($event[create]) { case posts: App::uses(ClassRegistry, Utility); $post = ClassRegistry::init(Post); $post->create(); $post->save( array(Post => array(title => CakePHP Schema Files) ) ); break; } } }

The before() and after() callbacks run each time a table is created or dropped on the current schema. When inserting data to more than one table youll need to ush the database cache after each table is created. Cache can be disable by setting $db->cacheSources = false in the before action().
public $connection = default; public function before($event = array()) { $db = ConnectionManager::getDataSource($this->connection); $db->cacheSources = false; return true; }

Migrations with CakePHP schema shell Migrations allow for versioning of your database schema, so that as you develop features you have an easy and database agnostic way to distribute database changes. Migrations are achieved through either SCM controlled schema les or schema snapshots. Versioning a schema le with the schema shell is quite easy. If you already have a schema le created running:
$ Console/cake schema generate

Will bring up the following choices:

Generating Schema... Schema file exists. [O]verwrite [S]napshot [Q]uit Would you like to do? (o/s/q)

Choosing [s] (snapshot) will create an incremented schema.php. So if you have schema.php, it will create schema_2.php and so on. You can then restore to any of these schema les at any time by running:
$ cake schema update -s 2

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Where 2 is the snapshot number you wish to run. The schema shell will prompt you to conrm you wish to perform the ALTER statements that represent the difference between the existing database the currently executing schema le. You can perform a dry run by adding a --dry to your command. Workow examples
Create schema and commit

On a project which use versioning, the usage of cake schema would follow these steps: 1. Create or modify your database tables 2. Execute cake schema to export a full description of your database 3. Commit the created or updated schema.php le:
$ # once your database has been updated $ Console/cake schema generate $ git commit -a

Note: If the project is not versioned, managing schemas would be done through snapshots. (see previous section to manage snapshots)

Getting the last changes

When you pull the last changes of your repository, and discover changes in the structure of the database (possibly because of an error message saying you are missing a table): 1. Execute cake schema to update your database:
$ git pull $ Console/cake schema create $ Console/cake schema update

All these operations can be done in dry-run mode.

Rolling back

If at some point you need to revert and get back to the state in which you were before updating your database, you should be informed that this is currently not supported by cake schema. More specically, you cant automatically drop your tables once they have been created. Using update will, on the contrary, drop any eld which differ from the schema le:

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$ git revert HEAD $ Console/cake schema update

Will bring up the following choices:

The following statements will run. ALTER TABLE roles DROP position; Are you sure you want to alter the tables? (y/n) [n] >

I18N shell
The i18n features of CakePHP use po les (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_gettext) as their translation source. This makes them easily to integrate with tools like poedit (http://www.poedit.net/) and other common translation tools. The i18n shell provides a quick and easy way to generate po template les. These templates les can then be given to translators so they can translate the strings in your application. Once you have translations done, pot les can be merged with existing translations to help update your translations. Generating POT les POT les can be generated for an existing application using the extract command. This command will scan your entire application for __() style function calls, and extract the message string. Each unique string in your application will be combined into a single POT le:
./Console/cake i18n extract

The above will run the extraction shell. In addition to extracting strings in __() methods, validation messages in models will be extracted as well. The result of this command will be the le app/Locale/default.pot. You use the pot le as a template for creating po les. If you are manually creating po les from the pot le, be sure to correctly set the Plural-Forms header line.
Generating POT les for plugins

You can generate a POT le for a specic plugin using:

./Console/cake i18n extract --plugin <Plugin>

This will generate the required POT les used in the plugins.
Model validation messages

You can set the domain to be used for extracted validation messages in your models. If the model already has a $validationDomain property, the given validation domain will be ignored:

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./Console/cake i18n extract --validation-domain validation_errors

You can also prevent the shell from extracting validation messages:
./Console/cake i18n extract --ignore-model-validation

Excluding folders

You can pass a comma separated list of folders that you wish to be excluded. Any path containing a path segment with the provided values will be ignored:
./Console/cake i18n extract --exclude Test,Vendor

Skipping overwrite warnings for existing POT les

New in version 2.2. By adding overwrite, the shell script will no longer warn you if a POT le already exists and will overwrite by default:
./Console/cake i18n extract --overwrite

Extracting messages from the CakePHP core libraries

New in version 2.2. By default, the extract shell script will ask you if you like to extract the messages used in the CakePHP core libraries. Set extract-core to yes or no to set the default behavior.
./Console/cake i18n extract --extract-core yes or ./Console/cake i18n extract --extract-core no

Create the tables used by TranslateBehavior The i18n shell can also be used to initialize the default tables used by the TranslateBehavior:
./Console/cake i18n initdb

This will create the i18n table used by translate behavior.

ACL Shell
The AclShell is useful for managing and inspecting your Acl databases records. Its often more convenient than adding one time modications to your controllers. Most acl shell subcommands involve referencing aco/aro nodes. As there are two forms of these nodes, there is two notations in the shell: More topics 551

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# A Model + foreign_key reference ./Console/cake acl view aro Model.1 # An alias path reference ./Console/cake acl view aco root/controllers

Using a . indicates that you are going to use a bound record style reference while using a / indicates an alias path. Installing the database tables Before using the database ACL youll need to setup the tables. You can do that using:
./Console/cake acl initdb

Create and delete nodes You can use the create and delete subcommands to create and delete nodes:
./Console/cake acl create aco controllers Posts ./Console/cake acl create aco Posts index

Would create an aco record using an alias path. You could do the following as well:
./Console/cake acl create aro Group.1

To create an aro node for the Group id = 1. Grant and deny access Use the grant command to grant ACL permissions. Once executed, the ARO specied (and its children, if any) will have ALLOW access to the specied ACO action (and the ACOs children, if any):
./Console/cake acl grant Group.1 controllers/Posts

The above would grant all privileges. You could grant only the read privilege using the following:
./Console/cake acl grant Group.1 controllers/Posts read

Denying permission works in the exact same way. The only difference is you switch deny in for grant. Check permissions Use this command to grant ACL permissions. Once executed, the ARO specied (and its children, if any) will have ALLOW access to the specied ACO action (and the ACOs children, if any):
./Console/cake acl check Group.1 controllers/Posts read

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View the node trees The view command will return the ARO or ACO tree. The optional node parameter allows you to return only a portion of the requested tree:
./Console/cake acl view

Test shell
Once youve started writing Tests you can run them using the test shell. For more information on basic usage of the test shell see Running tests from command line. Changed in version 2.1: The test shell was added in 2.1. The 2.0 testsuite shell is still available but the new syntax is preferred.

Upgrade shell
The upgrade shell will do most of the work to upgrade your CakePHP application from 1.3 to 2.0. To run all upgrade steps:
./Console/cake upgrade all

If you would like to see what the shell will do without modifying les perform a dry run rst with dry-run:
./Console/cake upgrade all --dry-run

To upgrade your plugin run the command:

./Console/cake upgrade all --plugin YourPluginName

You are able to run each upgrade step individually. To see all the steps available run the command:
./Console/cake upgrade --help

Or visit the API docs for more info: http://api20.cakephp.org/class/upgrade-shell Upgrade Your App Here is a guide to help you upgrade your CakePHP 1.3 app to 2.x using the upgrade shell. Your 1.3 app structure will likely look like this:
mywebsite/ app/ cake/ plugins/ vendors/ .htaccess index.php <- Your App <- 1.3 Version of CakePHP

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The rst step is to download or git clone the new version of CakePHP into another folder outside of your mywebsite folder, well call it cakephp. We dont want the downloaded app folder to overwrite your app folder. Now is a good time to make a backup of your app folder, eg.: cp -R app app-backup. Copy the cakephp/lib folder to your mywebsite/lib to setup the new CakePHP version in your app, eg.: cp -R ../cakephp/lib .. Symlinking is a good alternative to copy as well, eg.: ln -s /var/www/cakephp/lib. Before we can run the upgrade shell we need the new console scripts Copy the cakephp/app/Console folder into your mywebsite/app, eg.: ../cakephp/app/Console ./app. Your folder structure should look like this now:
mywebsite/ app/ Console/ app-backup/ cake/ lib/ Cake/ plugins/ vendors/ .htaccess index.php <<<<<Your App Copied app/Console Folder Backup Copy of Your App 1.3 Version of CakePHP 2.x Version of CakePHP

as

well. cp -R

Now we can run the upgrade shell by cding into your app folder and running the command:
./Console/cake upgrade all

This will do most of the work to upgrade your app to 2.x. Check things over in your upgraded app folder. If everything looks good then congratulate yourself and delete your mywebsite/cake folder. Welcome to 2.x!

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CHAPTER 10

Development

In this section well cover the various aspects of developing a CakePHP application. Topics like Conguration, handling errors & exceptions, debugging, and testing will be covered.

Conguration
Conguring a CakePHP application is a piece of cake. After you have installed CakePHP, creating a basic web application requires only that you setup a database conguration. There are, however, other optional conguration steps you can take in order to take advantage of CakePHP exible architecture. You can easily add to the functionality inherited from the CakePHP core, congure additional/different URL mappings (routes), and dene additional/different inections.

Database Conguration
CakePHP expects database conguration details to be in a le at app/Config/database.php. An example database conguration le can be found at app/Config/database.php.default. A nished conguration should look something like this:
class DATABASE_CONFIG public $default = datasource persistent host login password database prefix ); } { array( => Database/Mysql, => false, => localhost, => cakephpuser, => c4k3roxx!, => my_cakephp_project, =>

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one, I could use it in my models by creating a new $legacy database connection array similar to the $default array, and by setting public $useDbConfig = legacy; in the appropriate models. Fill out the key/value pairs in the conguration array to best suit your needs. datasource The name of the datasource this conguration array is for. Examples: Database/Mysql, Database/Sqlserver, Database/Postgres, Database/Sqlite. You can use plugin syntax to indicate plugin datasource to use. persistent Whether or not to use a persistent connection to the database. host The database servers hostname (or IP address). login The username for the account. password The password for the account. database The name of the database for this connection to use. prex (optional) The string that prexes every table name in the database. If your tables dont have prexes, set this to an empty string. port (optional) The TCP port or Unix socket used to connect to the server. encoding Indicates the character set to use when sending SQL statements to the server. This defaults to the databases default encoding for all databases other than DB2. If you wish to use UTF-8 encoding with mysql/mysqli connections you must use utf8 without the hyphen. schema Used in PostgreSQL database setups to specify which schema to use. unix_socket Used by drivers that support it to connect via unix socket les. If you are using postgres and want to use unix sockets, leave the host key blank. settings An array of key/value pairs that should be sent to the database server as SET commands when the connection is created. This option is only supported by MySQL, Postgres, and SQLserver at this time. Changed in version 2.4: The settings key was added in 2.4. Note: The prex setting is for tables, not models. For example, if you create a join table for your Apple and Flavor models, you name it prex_apples_avors (not prex_apples_prex_avors), and set your prex setting to prex_. At this point, you might want to take a look at the CakePHP Conventions. The correct naming for your tables (and the addition of some columns) can score you some free functionality and help you avoid conguration. For example, if you name your database table big_boxes, your model BigBox, your controller BigBoxesController, everything just works together automatically. By convention, use underscores, lower case, and plural forms for your database table names - for example: bakers, pastry_stores, and savory_cakes.

Additional Class Paths

Its occasionally useful to be able to share MVC classes between applications on the same system. If you want the same controller in both applications, you can use CakePHPs bootstrap.php to bring these additional classes into view.

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By using App::build() in bootstrap.php we can dene additional paths where CakePHP will look for classes:
App::build(array( Model Model/Behavior Model/Datasource Model/Datasource/Database Model/Datasource/Session Controller Controller/Component Controller/Component/Auth Controller/Component/Acl View View/Helper Console Console/Command Console/Command/Task Lib Locale Vendor Plugin )); => => => => => => => => => => => => => => => => => =>

array(/path/to/models, /next/path/to/models), array(/path/to/behaviors, /next/path/to/behaviors), array(/path/to/datasources, /next/path/to/datasources array(/path/to/databases, /next/path/to/database), array(/path/to/sessions, /next/path/to/sessions), array(/path/to/controllers, /next/path/to/controllers array(/path/to/components, /next/path/to/components) array(/path/to/auths, /next/path/to/auths), array(/path/to/acls, /next/path/to/acls), array(/path/to/views, /next/path/to/views), array(/path/to/helpers, /next/path/to/helpers), array(/path/to/consoles, /next/path/to/consoles), array(/path/to/commands, /next/path/to/commands), array(/path/to/tasks, /next/path/to/tasks), array(/path/to/libs, /next/path/to/libs), array(/path/to/locales, /next/path/to/locales), array(/path/to/vendors, /next/path/to/vendors), array(/path/to/plugins, /next/path/to/plugins),

Note: All additional path conguration should be done at the top of your applications bootstrap.php. This will ensure that the paths are available for the rest of your application.

Core Conguration
Each application in CakePHP contains a conguration le to determine CakePHPs internal behavior. app/Config/core.php. This le is a collection of Congure class variable denitions and constant denitions that determine how your application behaves. Before we dive into those particular variables, youll need to be familiar with Configure, CakePHPs conguration registry class. CakePHP Core Conguration The Configure class is used to manage a set of core CakePHP conguration variables. These variables can be found in app/Config/core.php. Below is a description of each variable and how it affects your CakePHP application. debug Changes CakePHP debugging output. 0 = Production mode. No output. 1 = Show errors and warnings. 2 = Show errors, warnings, and SQL. [SQL log is only shown when you add $this>element(sql_dump) to your view or layout.] Error Congure the Error handler used to handle errors for your application. By default ErrorHandler::handleError() is used. It will display errors using Debugger, when debug > 0 and log errors with CakeLog when debug = 0. Sub-keys: Conguration 557

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handler - callback - The callback to handle errors. You can set this to any callback type, including anonymous functions. level - int - The level of errors you are interested in capturing. trace - boolean - Include stack traces for errors in log les. Exception Congure the Exception handler used for uncaught exceptions. By default, ErrorHandler::handleException() is used. It will display a HTML page for the exception, and while debug > 0, framework errors like Missing Controller will be displayed. When debug = 0, framework errors will be coerced into generic HTTP errors. For more information on Exception handling, see the Exceptions section. App.baseUrl If you dont want or cant get mod_rewrite (or some other compatible module) up and running on your server, youll need to use Cakes built in pretty URLs. In /app/Config/core.php, uncomment the line that looks like:
Configure::write(App.baseUrl, env(SCRIPT_NAME));

Also remove these .htaccess les:

/.htaccess /app/.htaccess /app/webroot/.htaccess

This will make your URLs look like www.example.com/index.php/controllername/actionname/param rather than www.example.com/controllername/actionname/param. If you are installing CakePHP on a webserver besides Apache, you can nd instructions for getting URL rewriting working for other servers under the URL Rewriting section. App.encoding Dene what encoding your application uses. This encoding is used to generate the charset in the layout, and encode entities. It should match the encoding values specied for your database. Routing.prexes Un-comment this denition if youd like to take advantage of CakePHP prexed routes like admin. Set this variable with an array of prex names of the routes youd like to use. More on this later. Cache.disable When set to true, persistent caching is disabled site-wide. This will make all read/writes to Cache fail. Cache.check If set to true, enables view caching. Enabling is still needed in the controllers, but this variable enables the detection of those settings. Session Contains an array of settings to use for session conguration. The defaults key is used to dene a default preset to use for sessions, any settings declared here will override the settings of the default cong. Sub-keys name - The name of the cookie to use. Defaults to CAKEPHP timeout - The number of minutes you want sessions to live for. This timeout is handled by CakePHP cookieTimeout - The number of minutes you want session cookies to live for. 558 Chapter 10. Development

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checkAgent - Do you want the user agent to be checked when starting sessions? You might want to set the value to false, when dealing with older versions of IE, Chrome Frame or certain web-browsing devices and AJAX defaults - The default conguration set to use as a basis for your session. There are four builtins: php, cake, cache, database. handler - Can be used to enable a custom session handler. Expects an array of callables, that can be used with session_save_handler. Using this option will automatically add session.save_handler to the ini array. autoRegenerate - Enabling this setting, turns on automatic renewal of sessions, and sessionids that change frequently. See CakeSession::$requestCountdown. ini - An associative array of additional ini values to set. The built in defaults are: php - Uses settings dened in your php.ini. cake - Saves session les in CakePHPs /tmp directory. database - Uses CakePHPs database sessions. cache - Use the Cache class to save sessions. To dene a custom session handler, save it at app/Model/Datasource/Session/<name>.php. Make sure the class implements CakeSessionHandlerInterface and set Session.handler to <name> To use database sessions, run the app/Config/Schema/sessions.php schema using the cake shell command: cake schema create Sessions Security.salt A random string used in security hashing. Security.cipherSeed A random numeric string (digits only) used to encrypt/decrypt strings. Asset.timestamp Appends a timestamp which is last modied time of the particular le at the end of asset les urls (CSS, JavaScript, Image) when using proper helpers. Valid values: (bool) false - Doesnt do anything (default) (bool) true - Appends the timestamp when debug > 0 (string) force - Appends the timestamp when debug >= 0 Acl.classname, Acl.database Constants used for CakePHPs Access Control List functionality. See the Access Control Lists chapter for more information. Note: Cache conguration is also found in core.php Well be covering that later on, so stay tuned. The Configure class can be used to read and write core conguration settings on the y. This can be especially handy if you want to turn the debug setting on for a limited section of logic in your application, for instance.

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Conguration Constants While most conguration options are handled by Congure, there are a few constants that CakePHP uses during runtime. constant LOG_ERROR Error constant. Used for differentiating error logging and debugging. Currently PHP supports LOG_DEBUG. Core Cache Conguration CakePHP uses two cache congurations internally. _cake_model_ and _cake_core_. _cake_core_ is used to store le paths, and object locations. _cake_model_ is used to store schema descriptions, and source listings for datasources. Using a fast cache storage like APC or Memcached is recommended for these congurations, as they are read on every request. By default both of these congurations expire every 10 seconds when debug is greater than 0. As with all cached data stored in Cache you can clear data using Cache::clear().

Congure Class
class Configure Despite few things needing to be congured in CakePHP, its sometimes useful to have your own conguration rules for your application. In the past you may have dened custom conguration values by dening variable or constants in some les. Doing so forces you to include that conguration le every time you needed to use those values. CakePHPs Congure class can be used to store and retrieve application or runtime specic values. Be careful, this class allows you to store anything in it, then use it in any other part of your code: a sure temptation to break the MVC pattern CakePHP was designed for. The main goal of Congure class is to keep centralized variables that can be shared between many objects. Remember to try to live by convention over conguration and you wont end up breaking the MVC structure weve set in place. This class can be called from anywhere within your application, in a static context:
Configure::read(debug);

static Configure::write($key, $value) Parameters $key (string) The key to write, can use be a dot notation value. $value (mixed) The value to store. Use write() to store data in the applications conguration:
Configure::write(Company.name,Pizza, Inc.); Configure::write(Company.slogan,Pizza for your body and soul);

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Note: The dot notation used in the $key parameter can be used to organize your conguration settings into logical groups. The above example could also be written in a single call:

Configure::write( Company, array(name => Pizza, Inc., slogan => Pizza for your body and sou );

You can use Configure::write(debug, $int) to switch between debug and production modes on the y. This is especially handy for AMF or SOAP interactions where debugging information can cause parsing problems. static Configure::read($key = null) Parameters $key (string) The key to read, can use be a dot notation value Used to read conguration data from the application. Defaults to CakePHPs important debug value. If a key is supplied, the data is returned. Using our examples from write() above, we can read that data back:
Configure::read(Company.name); Configure::read(Company.slogan); Configure::read(Company); //yields: array(name => Pizza, Inc., slogan => Pizza for your body and soul); //yields: Pizza, Inc. //yields: Pizza for your body and soul

If $key is left null, all values in Congure will be returned. static Configure::check($key) Parameters $key (string) The key to check. Used to check if a key/path exists and has not-null value. Configure::check() was added in 2.3 static Configure::delete($key) Parameters $key (string) The key to delete, can use be a dot notation value Used to delete information from the applications conguration:
Configure::delete(Company.name);

New in version 2.3:

static Configure::version Returns the CakePHP version for the current application.

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static Configure::config($name, $reader) Parameters $name (string) The name of the reader being attached. $reader (CongReaderInterface) The reader instance being attached. Attach a conguration reader to Congure. Attached readers can then be used to load conguration les. See Loading conguration les for more information on how to read conguration les. static Configure::configured($name = null) Parameters $name (string) The name of the reader to check, if null a list of all attached readers will be returned. Either check that a reader with a given name is attached, or get the list of attached readers. static Configure::drop($name) Drops a connected reader object.

Reading and writing conguration les

CakePHP comes with two built-in conguration le readers. PhpReader is able to read PHP cong les, in the same format that Congure has historically read. IniReader is able to read ini cong les. See the PHP documentation (http://php.net/parse_ini_le) for more information on the specics of ini les. To use a core cong reader, youll need to attach it to Congure using Configure::config():
App::uses(PhpReader, Configure); // Read config files from app/Config Configure::config(default, new PhpReader()); // Read config files from another path. Configure::config(default, new PhpReader(/path/to/your/config/files/));

You can have multiple readers attached to Congure, each reading different kinds of conguration les, or reading from different types of sources. You can interact with attached readers using a few other methods on Congure. To see check which reader aliases are attached you can use Configure::configured():
// Get the array of aliases for attached readers. Configure::configured(); // Check if a specific reader is attached Configure::configured(default);

You can also remove attached readers. Configure::drop(default) would remove the default reader alias. Any future attempts to load conguration les with that reader would fail. Loading conguration les static Configure::load($key, $cong = default, $merge = true) 562 Chapter 10. Development

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Parameters $key (string) The identier of the conguration le to load. $cong (string) The alias of the congured reader. $merge (boolean) Whether or not the contents of the read le should be merged, or overwrite the existing values. Once youve attached a cong reader to Congure you can load conguration les:
// Load my_file.php using the default reader object. Configure::load(my_file, default);

Loaded conguration les merge their data with the existing runtime conguration in Congure. This allows you to overwrite and add new values into the existing runtime conguration. By setting $merge to true, values will not ever overwrite the existing conguration. Creating or modifying conguration les static Configure::dump($key, $cong = default, $keys = array()) Parameters $key (string) The name of the le/stored conguration to be created. $cong (string) The name of the reader to store the data with. $keys (array) The list of top-level keys to save. Defaults to all keys. Dumps all or some of the data in Congure into a le or storage system supported by a cong reader. The serialization format is decided by the cong reader attached as $cong. For example, if the default adapter is a PhpReader, the generated le will be a PHP conguration le loadable by the PhpReader Given that the default reader is an instance of PhpReader. my_cong.php:
Configure::dump(my_config.php, default);

Save all data in Congure to the le

Save only the error handling conguration:

Configure::dump(error.php, default, array(Error, Exception));

Configure::dump() can be used to either modify or overwrite conguration les that are readable with Configure::load() New in version 2.2: Configure::dump() was added in 2.2. Storing runtime conguration static Configure::store($name, $cacheCong = default, $data = null) Parameters $name (string) The storage key for the cache le.

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$cacheCong (string) The name of the cache conguration to store the conguration data with. $data (mixed) Either the data to store, or leave null to store all data in Congure. You can also store runtime conguration values for use in a future request. Since congure only remembers values for the current request, you will need to store any modied conguration information if you want to use it in subsequent requests:
// Store the current configuration in the user_1234 key in the default cache. Configure::store(user_1234, default);

Stored conguration data is persisted in the Cache class. This allows you to store Conguration information in any storage engine that Cache can talk to. Restoring runtime conguration static Configure::restore($name, $cacheCong = default) Parameters $name (string) The storage key to load. $cacheCong (string) The cache conguration to load the data from. Once youve stored runtime conguration, youll probably need to restore it so you can access it again. Configure::restore() does exactly that:
// restore runtime configuration from the cache. Configure::restore(user_1234, default);

When restoring conguration information its important to restore it with the same key, and cache conguration as was used to store it. Restored information is merged on top of the existing runtime conguration.

Creating your own Conguration readers

Since conguration readers are an extensible part of CakePHP, you can create conguration readers in your application and plugins. Conguration readers need to implement the ConfigReaderInterface. This interface denes a read method, as the only required method. If you really like XML les, you could create a simple Xml cong reader for you application:
// in app/Lib/Configure/XmlReader.php App::uses(Xml, Utility); class XmlReader implements ConfigReaderInterface { public function __construct($path = null) { if (!$path) { $path = APP . Config . DS; } $this->_path = $path; } public function read($key) {

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$xml = Xml::build($this->_path . $key . .xml); return Xml::toArray($xml); } // As of 2.3 a dump() method is also required public function dump($key, $data) { // code to dump data to file } }

In your app/Config/bootstrap.php you could attach this reader and use it:
App::uses(XmlReader, Configure); Configure::config(xml, new XmlReader()); ... Configure::load(my_xml);

The read() method of a cong reader, must return an array of the conguration information that the resource named $key contains. interface ConfigReaderInterface Denes the interface used by classes that read conguration data and store it in Configure ConfigReaderInterface::read($key) Parameters $key (string) The key name or identier to load. This method should load/parse the conguration data identied by $key and return an array of data in the le. ConfigReaderInterface::dump($key) Parameters $key (string) The identier to write to. $data (array) The data to dump. This method should dump/store the provided conguration data to a key identied by $key. New in version 2.3: ConfigReaderInterface::dump() was added in 2.3. exception ConfigureException Thrown when errors occur when loading/storing/restoring conguration data. ConfigReaderInterface implementations should throw this error when they encounter an error. Built-in Conguration readers class PhpReader Allows you to read conguration les that are stored as plain PHP les. You can read either les from

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your app/Config or from plugin congs directories by using plugin syntax. Files must contain a $config variable. An example conguration le would look like:
$config = array( debug => 0, Security => array( salt => its-secret ), Exception => array( handler => ErrorHandler::handleException, renderer => ExceptionRenderer, log => true ) );

Files without $config will cause an ConfigureException Load your custom conguration le by inserting the following in app/Cong/bootstrap.php: Congure::load(customCong); class IniReader Allows you to read conguration les that are stored as plain .ini les. The ini les must be compatible with phps parse_ini_file function, and benet from the following improvements dot separated values are expanded into arrays. boolean-ish values like on and off are converted to booleans. An example ini le would look like:
debug = 0 Security.salt = its-secret [Exception] handler = ErrorHandler::handleException renderer = ExceptionRenderer log = true

The above ini le, would result in the same end conguration data as the PHP example above. Array structures can be created either through dot separated values, or sections. Sections can contain dot separated keys for deeper nesting.

Inection Conguration
Cakes naming conventions can be really nice - you can name your database table big_boxes, your model BigBox, your controller BigBoxesController, and everything just works together automatically. The way CakePHP knows how to tie things together is by inecting the words between their singular and plural forms. There are occasions (especially for our non-English speaking friends) where you may run into situations where CakePHPs inector (the class that pluralizes, singularizes, camelCases, and under_scores) might not

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work as youd like. If CakePHP wont recognize your Foci or Fish, you can tell CakePHP about your special cases. Loading custom inections You can use Inflector::rules() in the le app/Config/bootstrap.php to load custom inections:
Inflector::rules(singular, array( rules => array(/^(bil)er$/i => \1, /^(inflec|contribu)tors$/i => \1ta), uninflected => array(singulars), irregular => array(spins => spinor) ));

or:
Inflector::rules(plural, array(irregular => array(phylum => phyla)));

Will merge the supplied rules into the inection sets dened in lib/Cake/Utility/Inector.php, with the added rules taking precedence over the core rules.

Bootstrapping CakePHP
If you have any additional conguration needs, use CakePHPs bootstrap le, app/Cong/bootstrap.php. This le is executed just after CakePHPs core bootstrapping. This le is ideal for a number of common bootstrapping tasks: Dening convenience functions. Registering global constants. Dening additional model, view, and controller paths. Creating cache congurations. Conguring inections. Loading conguration les. Be careful to maintain the MVC software design pattern when you add things to the bootstrap le: it might be tempting to place formatting functions there in order to use them in your controllers. Resist the urge. Youll be glad you did later on down the line. You might also consider placing things in the AppController class. This class is a parent class to all of the controllers in your application. AppController is a handy place to use controller callbacks and dene methods to be used by all of your controllers. found in

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Routing
Routing is a feature that maps URLs to controller actions. It was added to CakePHP to make pretty URLs more congurable and exible. Using Apaches mod_rewrite is not required for using routes, but it will make your address bar look much more tidy. Routing in CakePHP also encompasses the idea of reverse routing, where an array of parameters can be reversed into a string url. By using reverse routing, you can easily re-factor your applications url structure without having to update all your code.

Routes Conguration
Routes in an application are congured in app/Config/routes.php. This le is included by the Dispatcher when handling routes and allows you to dene application specic routes you want used. Routes declared in this le are processed top to bottom when incoming requests are matched. This means that the order you place routes can affect how routes are parsed. Its generally a good idea to place most frequently visited routes at the top of the routes le if possible. This will save having to check a number of routes that wont match on each request. Routes are parsed and matched in the order they are connected in. If you dene two similar routes, the rst dened route will have higher priority over the one dened latter. After connecting routes you can manipulate the order of routes using Router::promote(). CakePHP also comes with a few default routes to get you started. These can be disabled later on once you are sure you dont need them. See Disabling the default routes on how to disable the default routing.

Default Routing
Before you learn about conguring your own routes, you should know that CakePHP comes congured with a default set of routes. CakePHPs default routing will get you pretty far in any application. You can access an action directly via the URL by putting its name in the request. You can also pass parameters to your controller actions using the URL.:
URL pattern default routes: http://example.com/controller/action/param1/param2/param3

The URL /posts/view maps to the view() action of the PostsController, and /products/view_clearance maps to the view_clearance() action of the ProductsController. If no action is specied in the URL, the index() method is assumed. The default routing setup also allows you to pass parameters to your actions using the URL. A request for /posts/view/25 would be equivalent to calling view(25) on the PostsController, for example. The default routing also provides routes for plugins, and prex routes should you choose to use those features. The built-in routes live in Cake/Config/routes.php. You can disable the default routing by removing them from your applications routes.php le.

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Connecting Routes
Dening your own routes allows you to dene how your application will respond to a given URL. Dene your own routes in the app/Config/routes.php le using the Router::connect() method. The connect() method takes up to three parameters: the URL you wish to match, the default values for your route elements, and regular expression rules to help the router match elements in the URL. The basic format for a route denition is:
Router::connect( URL, array(default => defaultValue), array(option => matchingRegex) );

The rst parameter is used to tell the router what sort of URL youre trying to control. The URL is a normal slash delimited string, but can also contain a wildcard (*) or Route elements. Using a wildcard tells the router that you are willing to accept any additional arguments supplied. Routes without a * only match the exact template pattern supplied. Once youve specied a URL, you use the last two parameters of connect() to tell CakePHP what to do with a request once it has been matched. The second parameter is an associative array. The keys of the array should be named after the route elements in the URL, or the default elements: :controller, :action, and :plugin. The values in the array are the default values for those keys. Lets look at some basic examples before we start using the third parameter of connect():
Router::connect( /pages/*, array(controller => pages, action => display) );

This route is found in the routes.php le distributed with CakePHP. This route matches any URL starting with /pages/ and hands it to the display() action of the PagesController(); The request /pages/products would be mapped to PagesController->display(products). In addition to the greedy star /* there is also the /** trailing star syntax. Using a trailing double star, will capture the remainder of a URL as a single passed argument. This is useful when you want to use an argument that included a / in it:
Router::connect( /pages/**, array(controller => pages, action => show) );

The incoming URL of /pages/the-example-/-and-proof would result in a single passed argument of the-example-/-and-proof. New in version 2.1. You can use the second parameter of Router::connect() to provide any routing parameters that are composed of the default values of the route:
Router::connect( /government, array(controller => pages, action => display, 5) );

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This example shows how you can use the second parameter of connect() to dene default parameters. If you built a site that features products for different categories of customers, you might consider creating a route. This allows you link to /government rather than /pages/display/5. Note: Although you can connect alternate routes, the default routes will continue to work. This could create situations, where content could end up with 2 urls. See Disabling the default routes to disable default routes, and only provide the urls you dene. Another common use for the Router is to dene an alias for a controller. Lets say that instead of accessing our regular URL at /users/some_action/5, wed like to be able to access it by /cooks/some_action/5. The following route easily takes care of that:
Router::connect( /cooks/:action/*, array(controller => users) );

This is telling the Router that any url beginning with /cooks/ should be sent to the users controller. The action called will depend on the value of the :action parameter. By using Route elements, you can create variable routes, that accept user input or variables. The above route also uses the greedy star. The greedy star indicates to Router that this route should accept any additional positional arguments given. These arguments will be made available in the Passed arguments array. When generating urls, routes are used too. Using array(controller => users, action => some_action, 5) as a url will output /cooks/some_action/5 if the above route is the rst match found. If you are planning to use custom named arguments with your route, you have to make the router aware of it using the Router::connectNamed() function. So if you want the above route to match urls like /cooks/some_action/type:chef we do:
Router::connectNamed(array(type)); Router::connect( /cooks/:action/*, array(controller => users) );

Route elements You can specify your own route elements and doing so gives you the power to dene places in the URL where parameters for controller actions should lie. When a request is made, the values for these route elements are found in $this->request->params on the controller. This is different than how named parameters are handled, so note the difference: named parameters (/controller/action/name:value) are found in $this->request->params[named], whereas custom route element data is found in $this->request->params. When you dene a custom route element, you can optionally specify a regular expression - this tells CakePHP how to know if the URL is correctly formed or not. If you choose to not provide a regular expression, any non / will be treated as part of the parameter:

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Router::connect( /:controller/:id, array(action => view), array(id => [0-9]+) );

This simple example illustrates how to create a quick way to view models from any controller by crafting a URL that looks like /controllername/:id. The URL provided to connect() species two route elements: :controller and :id. The :controller element is a CakePHP default route element, so the router knows how to match and identify controller names in URLs. The :id element is a custom route element, and must be further claried by specifying a matching regular expression in the third parameter of connect(). Note: Patterns used for route elements must not contain any capturing groups. If they do, Router will not function correctly. Once this route has been dened, requesting /apples/5 is the same as requesting /apples/view/5. Both would call the view() method of the ApplesController. Inside the view() method, you would need to access the passed ID at $this->request->params[id]. If you have a single controller in your application and you do not want the controller name to appear in the url, you can map all urls to actions in your controller. For example, to map all urls to actions of the home controller, e.g have urls like /demo instead of /home/demo, you can do the following:
Router::connect(/:action, array(controller => home));

If you would like to provide a case insensitive url, you can use regular expression inline modiers:
Router::connect( /:userShortcut, array(controller => teachers, action => profile, 1), array(userShortcut => (?i:principal)) );

One more example, and youll be a routing pro:

Router::connect( /:controller/:year/:month/:day, array(action => index), array( year => [12][0-9]{3}, month => 0[1-9]|1[012], day => 0[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01] ) );

This is rather involved, but shows how powerful routes can really become. The URL supplied has four route elements. The rst is familiar to us: its a default route element that tells CakePHP to expect a controller name. Next, we specify some default values. Regardless of the controller, we want the index() action to be called.

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Finally, we specify some regular expressions that will match years, months and days in numerical form. Note that parenthesis (grouping) are not supported in the regular expressions. You can still specify alternates, as above, but not grouped with parenthesis. Once dened, this route will match /articles/2007/02/01, /posts/2004/11/16, handing the requests to the index() actions of their respective controllers, with the date parameters in $this->request->params. There are several route elements that have special meaning in CakePHP, and should not be used unless you want the special meaning controller Used to name the controller for a route. action Used to name the controller action for a route. plugin Used to name the plugin a controller is located in. prefix Used for Prex Routing ext Used for File extensions routing. Passing parameters to action When connecting routes using Route elements you may want to have routed elements be passed arguments instead. By using the 3rd argument of Router::connect() you can dene which route elements should also be made available as passed arguments:
// SomeController.php public function view($articleId = null, $slug = null) { // some code here... } // routes.php Router::connect( /blog/:id-:slug, // E.g. /blog/3-CakePHP_Rocks array(controller => blog, action => view), array( // order matters since this will simply map ":id" to $articleId in your action pass => array(id, slug), id => [0-9]+ ) );

And now, thanks to the reverse routing capabilities, you can pass in the url array like below and Cake will know how to form the URL as dened in the routes:
// view.ctp // this will return a link to /blog/3-CakePHP_Rocks echo $this->Html->link(CakePHP Rocks, array( controller => blog, action => view, id => 3, slug => CakePHP_Rocks ));

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Per-route named parameters While you can control named parameters on a global scale using Router::connectNamed() you can also control named parameter behavior at the route level using the 3rd argument of Router::connect():
Router::connect( /:controller/:action/*, array(), array( named => array( wibble, fish => array(action => index), fizz => array(controller => array(comments, other)), buzz => val-[\d]+ ) ) );

The above route denition uses the named key to dene how several named parameters should be treated. Lets go through each of the various rules one-by-one: wibble has no additional information. This means it will always parse if found in a url matching this route. sh has an array of conditions, containing the action key. This means that sh will only be parsed as a named parameter if the action is also index. zz also has an array of conditions. However, it contains two controllers, this means that zz will only be parsed if the controller matches one of the names in the array. buzz has a string condition. String conditions are treated as regular expression fragments. Only values for buzz matching the pattern will be parsed. If a named parameter is used and it does not match the provided criteria, it will be treated as a passed argument instead of a named parameter. Prex Routing Many applications require an administration section where privileged users can make changes. This is often done through a special URL such as /admin/users/edit/5. In CakePHP, prex routing can be enabled from within the core conguration le by setting the prexes with Routing.prexes. Note that prexes, although related to the router, are to be congured in app/Config/core.php:
Configure::write(Routing.prefixes, array(admin));

In your controller, any action with an admin_ prex will be called. Using our users example, accessing the url /admin/users/edit/5 would call the method admin_edit of our UsersController passing 5 as the rst parameter. The view le used would be app/View/Users/admin_edit.ctp You can map the url /admin to your admin_index action of pages controller using following route:

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Router::connect(/admin, array(controller => pages, action => index, admin => tr

You can congure the Router to use multiple prexes too. Routing.prefixes. If you set:

By adding additional values to

Configure::write(Routing.prefixes, array(admin, manager));

Cake will automatically generate routes for both the admin and manager prexes. Each congured prex will have the following routes generated for it:

Router::connect("/{$prefix}/:plugin/:controller", array(action => index, prefix => $p Router::connect("/{$prefix}/:plugin/:controller/:action/*", array(prefix => $prefix, $pre Router::connect("/{$prefix}/:controller", array(action => index, prefix => $prefix, $ Router::connect("/{$prefix}/:controller/:action/*", array(prefix => $prefix, $prefix => t

Much like admin routing all prex actions should be prexed with the prex name. /manager/posts/add would map to PostsController::manager_add(). Additionally, the current prex $this->request->prefix will be available from the controller methods

So

through

When using prex routes its important to remember, using the HTML helper to build your links will help maintain the prex calls. Heres how to build this link using the HTML helper:

// Go into a prefixed route. echo $this->Html->link(Manage posts, array(manager => true, controller => posts, a

// leave a prefix echo $this->Html->link(View Post, array(manager => false, controller => posts, act

Plugin routing Plugin routing uses the plugin key. You can create links that point to a plugin, but adding the plugin key to your url array:
echo $this->Html->link(New todo, array(plugin => todo, controller => todo_items,

Conversely if the active request is a plugin request and you want to create a link that has no plugin you can do the following:

echo $this->Html->link(New todo, array(plugin => null, controller => users, action

By setting plugin => null you tell the Router that you want to create a link that is not part of a plugin. File extensions To handle different le extensions with your routes, you need one extra line in your routes cong le:
Router::parseExtensions(html, rss);

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This will tell the router to remove any matching le extensions, and then parse what remains. If you want to create a URL such as /page/title-of-page.html you would create your route as illustrated below:
Router::connect( /page/:title, array(controller => pages, action => view), array( pass => array(title) ) );

Then to create links which map back to the routes simply use:

$this->Html->link( Link title, array(controller => pages, action => view, title => super-article, ext => );

File extensions are used by RequestHandlerComponent to do automatic view switching based on content types. See the RequestHandlerComponent for more information. Using additional conditions when matching routes When creating routes you might want to restrict certain URLs based on specic request/environment settings. A good example of this is REST routing. You can specify additional conditions in the $defaults argument for Router::connect(). By default CakePHP exposes 3 environment conditions, but you can add more using Custom Route classes. The built-in options are: [type] Only match requests for specic content types. [method] Only match requests with specic HTTP verbs. [server] Only match when $_SERVER[SERVER_NAME] matches the given value. Well provide a simple example here of how you can use the [method] option to create a custom RESTful route:
Router::connect( "/:controller/:id", array("action" => "edit", "[method]" => "PUT"), array("id" => "[0-9]+") );

The above route will only match for PUT requests. Using these conditions, you can create custom REST routing, or other request data dependent information.

Passed arguments
Passed arguments are additional arguments or path segments that are used when making a request. They are often used to pass parameters to your controller methods.:

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http://localhost/calendars/view/recent/mark

In the above example, both recent and mark are passed arguments to CalendarsController::view(). Passed arguments are given to your controllers in three ways. First as arguments to the action method called, and secondly they are available in $this->request->params[pass] as a numerically indexed array. Lastly there is $this->passedArgs available in the same way as the second one. When using custom routes you can force particular parameters to go into the passed arguments as well. If you were to visit the previously mentioned url, and you had a controller action that looked like:
CalendarsController extends AppController { public function view($arg1, $arg2) { debug(func_get_args()); } }

You would get the following output:

Array ( [0] => recent [1] => mark )

This same data is also available at $this->request->params[pass] and $this->passedArgs in your controllers, views, and helpers. The values in the pass array are numerically indexed based on the order they appear in the called url:
debug($this->request->params[pass]); debug($this->passedArgs);

Either of the above would output:

Array ( [0] => recent [1] => mark )

Note: $this->passedArgs may also contain named parameters as a named array mixed with Passed arguments. When generating urls, using a routing array you add passed arguments as values without string keys in the array:
array(controller => posts, action => view, 5)

Since 5 has a numeric key, it is treated as a passed argument.

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Named parameters
You can name parameters and send their values using the URL. A request for /posts/view/title:first/category:general would result in a call to the view() action of the PostsController. In that action, youd nd the values of the title and category parameters inside $this->params[named]. They are also available inside $this->passedArgs. In both cases you can access named parameters using their name as an index. If named parameters are omitted, they will not be set. Note: What is parsed as a named parameter is controlled by Router::connectNamed(). If your named parameters are not reverse routing, or parsing correctly, you will need to inform Router about them. Some summarizing examples for default routes might prove helpful:
URL to controller action mapping using default routes: URL: /monkeys/jump Mapping: MonkeysController->jump(); URL: /products Mapping: ProductsController->index(); URL: /tasks/view/45 Mapping: TasksController->view(45); URL: /donations/view/recent/2001 Mapping: DonationsController->view(recent, 2001); URL: /contents/view/chapter:models/section:associations Mapping: ContentsController->view(); $this->passedArgs[chapter] = models; $this->passedArgs[section] = associations; $this->params[named][chapter] = models; $this->params[named][section] = associations;

When making custom routes, a common pitfall is that using named parameters will break your custom routes. In order to solve this you should inform the Router about which parameters are intended to be named parameters. Without this knowledge the Router is unable to determine whether named parameters are intended to actually be named parameters or routed parameters, and defaults to assuming you intended them to be routed parameters. To connect named parameters in the router use Router::connectNamed():
Router::connectNamed(array(chapter, section));

Will ensure that your chapter and section parameters reverse route correctly. When generating urls, using a routing array you add named parameters as values with string keys matching the name:
array(controller => posts, action => view, chapter => association)

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Note: Both named parameters and route elements share the same key-space. Its best to avoid re-using a key for both a route element and a named parameter. Named parameters also support using arrays to generate and parse urls. The syntax works very similar to the array syntax used for GET parameters. When generating urls you can use the following syntax:
$url = Router::url(array( controller => posts, action => index, filter => array( published => 1 frontpage => 1 ) ));

The above would generate the url /posts/index/filter[published]:1/filter[frontpage]:1. The parameters are then parsed and stored in your controllers passedArgs variable as an array, just as you sent them to Router::url:
$this->passedArgs[filter] = array( published => 1 frontpage => 1 );

Arrays can be deeply nested as well, allowing you even more exibility in passing arguments:
$url = Router::url(array( controller => posts, action => search, models => array( post => array( order => asc, filter => array( published => 1 ) ), comment => array( order => desc, filter => array( spam => 0 ) ), ), users => array(1, 2, 3) ));

You would end up with a pretty long url like this (wrapped for easy reading):
posts/search /models[post][order]:asc/models[post][filter][published]:1 /models[comment][order]:desc/models[comment][filter][spam]:0 /users[]:1/users[]:2/users[]:3

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And the resulting array that would be passed to the controller would match that which you passed to the router:
$this->passedArgs[models] = array( post => array( order => asc, filter => array( published => 1 ) ), comment => array( order => desc, filter => array( spam => 0 ) ), );

Controlling named parameters You can control named parameter conguration at the per-route-level or control them globally. Global control is done through Router::connectNamed() The following gives some examples of how you can control named parameter parsing with connectNamed(). Do not parse any named parameters:
Router::connectNamed(false);

Parse only default parameters used for CakePHPs pagination:

Router::connectNamed(false, array(default => true));

Parse only the page parameter if its value is a number:

Router::connectNamed(array(page => [\d]+), array(default => false, greedy => false)

Parse only the page parameter no matter what:

Router::connectNamed(array(page), array(default => false, greedy => false));

Parse only the page parameter if the current action is index:

Router::connectNamed( array(page => array(action => index)), array(default => false, greedy => false) );

Parse only the page parameter if the current action is index and the controller is pages:
Router::connectNamed( array(page => array(action => index, controller => pages)), array(default => false, greedy => false) );

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connectNamed() supports a number of options: greedy Setting this to true will make Router parse all named params. Setting it to false will parse only the connected named params. default Set this to true to merge in the default set of named parameters. reset Set to true to clear existing rules and start fresh. separator Change the string used to separate the key & value in a named parameter. Defaults to :

Reverse routing
Reverse routing is a feature in CakePHP that is used to allow you to easily change your url structure without having to modify all your code. By using routing arrays to dene your urls, you can later congure routes and the generated urls will automatically update. If you create urls using strings like:
$this->Html->link(View, /posts/view/ + $id);

And then later decide that /posts should really be called articles instead, you would have to go through your entire application renaming urls. However, if you dened your link like:
$this->Html->link( View, array(controller => posts, action => view, $id) );

Then when you decided to change your urls, you could do so by dening a route. This would change both the incoming URL mapping, as well as the generated urls. When using array urls, you can dene both query string parameters and document fragments using special keys:
Router::url(array( controller => posts, action => index, ? => array(page => 1), # => top )); // will generate a url like. /posts/index?page=1#top

Redirect routing
Redirect routing allows you to issue HTTP status 30x redirects for incoming routes, and point them at different urls. This is useful when you want to inform client applications that a resource has moved and you dont want to expose two urls for the same content Redirection routes are different from normal routes as they perform an actual header redirection if a match is found. The redirection can occur to a destination within your application or an outside location: 580 Chapter 10. Development

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Router::redirect( /home/*, array(controller => posts, action => view), array(persist => true) // or array(persist=>array(id)) for default routing where );

Redirects /home/* to /posts/view and passes the parameters to /posts/view. Using an array as the redirect destination allows you to use other routes to dene where a url string should be redirected to. You can redirect to external locations using string urls as the destination:
Router::redirect(/posts/*, http://google.com, array(status => 302));

This would redirect /posts/* to http://google.com with a HTTP status of 302.

Disabling the default routes

If you have fully customized all your routes, and want to avoid any possible duplicate content penalties from search engines, you can remove the default routes that CakePHP offers by deleting them from your applications routes.php le. This will cause CakePHP to serve errors, when users try to visit urls that would normally be provided by CakePHP but have not been connected explicitly.

Custom Route classes

Custom route classes allow you to extend and change how individual routes parse requests and handle reverse routing. A route class should extend CakeRoute and implement one or both of match() and/or parse(). parse() is used to parse requests and match() is used to handle reverse routing. You can use a custom route class when making a route by using the routeClass option, and loading the le containing your route before trying to use it:
Router::connect( /:slug, array(controller => posts, action => view), array(routeClass => SlugRoute) );

This route would create an instance of SlugRoute and allow you to implement custom parameter handling.

Router API
class Router Router manages generation of outgoing urls, and parsing of incoming request uris into parameter sets that CakePHP can dispatch. static Router::connect($route, $defaults = array(), $options = array()) Parameters

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$route (string) A string describing the template of the route $defaults (array) An array describing the default route parameters. These parameters will be used by default and can supply routing parameters that are not dynamic. $options (array) An array matching the named elements in the route to regular expressions which that element should match. Also contains additional parameters such as which routed parameters should be shifted into the passed arguments, supplying patterns for routing parameters and supplying the name of a custom routing class. Routes are a way of connecting request urls to objects in your application. At their core routes are a set or regular expressions that are used to match requests to destinations. Examples:
Router::connect(/:controller/:action/*);

The rst parameter will be used as a controller name while the second is used as the action name. The /* syntax makes this route greedy in that it will match requests like /posts/index as well as requests like /posts/edit/1/foo/bar .:

Router::connect(/home-page, array(controller => pages, action => display, h

The above shows the use of route parameter defaults. And providing routing parameters for a static route.:
Router::connect( /:lang/:controller/:action/:id, array(), array(id => [0-9]+, lang => [a-z]{3}) );

Shows connecting a route with custom route parameters as well as providing patterns for those parameters. Patterns for routing parameters do not need capturing groups, as one will be added for each route params. $options offers three special keys. pass, persist and routeClass have special meaning in the $options array. pass is used to dene which of the routed parameters should be shifted into the pass array. Adding a parameter to pass will remove it from the regular route array. Ex. pass => array(slug) persist is used to dene which route parameters should be automatically included when generating new urls. You can override persistent parameters by redening them in a url or remove them by setting the parameter to false. Ex. persist => array(lang) routeClass is used to extend and change how individual routes parse requests and handle reverse routing, via a custom routing class. Ex. routeClass => SlugRoute named is used to congure named parameters at the route level. This key uses the same options as Router::connectNamed()

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static Router::redirect($route, $url, $options = array()) Parameters $route (string) A route template that dictates which urls should be redirected. $url (mixed) Either a routing array or a string url for the destination of the redirect. $options (array) An array of options for the redirect. Connects a new redirection Route in the router. See Redirect routing for more information. static Router::connectNamed($named, $options = array()) Parameters $named (array) A list of named parameters. Key value pairs are accepted where values are either regex strings to match, or arrays. $options (array) Allows control of all settings: separator, greedy, reset, default Species what named parameters CakePHP should be parsing out of incoming urls. By default CakePHP will parse every named parameter out of incoming URLs. See Controlling named parameters for more information. static Router::promote($which = null) Parameters $which (integer) A zero-based array index representing the route to move. For example, if 3 routes have been added, the last route would be 2. Promote a route (by default, the last one added) to the beginning of the list. static Router::url($url = null, $full = false) Parameters $url (mixed) Cake-relative URL, like /products/edit/92 or /presidents/elect/4 or a routing array $full (mixed) If (bool) true, the full base URL will be prepended to the result. If an array accepts the following keys escape - used when making urls embedded in html escapes query string & full - if true the full base URL will be prepended. Generate a URL for the specied action. Returns an URL pointing to a combination of controller and action. $url can be: Empty - the method will nd the address to the actual controller/action. / - the method will nd the base URL of application. A combination of controller/action - the method will nd the url for it. There are a few special parameters that can change the nal URL string that is generated:

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base - Set to false to remove the base path from the generated URL. If your application is not in the root directory, this can be used to generate URLs that are cake relative. Cake relative URLs are required when using requestAction. ? - Takes an array of query string parameters # - Allows you to set URL hash fragments. full_base - If true the value of Router::baseUrl() will be prepended to generated URLs. static Router::mapResources($controller, $options = array()) Creates REST resource routes for the given controller(s). See the REST section for more information. static Router::parseExtensions($types) Used in routes.php to declare which File extensions your application supports. By providing no arguments, all le extensions will be supported. static Router::setExtensions($extensions, $merge = true) New in version 2.2. Set or add valid extensions. To have the extensions parsed, you are still required to call Router::parseExtensions(). static Router::defaultRouteClass($classname) New in version 2.1. Set the default route to be used when connecting routes in the future. static Router::baseUrl($url = null) New in version 2.4. Get or set the baseURL used for generating URLs. When setting this value you should be sure to include the fully qualied domain name including protocol. Setting values with this method will also update App.fullBaseUrl in Configure. class CakeRoute The base class for custom routes to be based on. CakeRoute::parse($url) Parameters $url (string) The string url to parse. Parses an incoming url, and generates an array of request parameters that Dispatcher can act upon. Extending this method allows you to customize how incoming URLs are converted into an array. Return false from URL to indicate a match failure. CakeRoute::match($url) Parameters $url (array) The routing array to convert into a string URL. Attempt to match a URL array. If the URL matches the route parameters and settings, then return a generated string URL. If the URL doesnt match the route parameters, false will be returned. This method handles the reverse routing or conversion of URL arrays into string URLs. CakeRoute::compile() Force a route to compile its regular expression.

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Sessions
CakePHP provides a wrapper and suite of utility features on top of PHPs native session extension. Sessions allow you to identify unique users across the requests and store persistent data for specic users. Unlike Cookies, session data is not available on the client side. Usage of the $_SESSION is generally avoided in CakePHP, and instead usage of the Session classes is preferred.

Session Conguration
Session conguration is stored in Configure, and the session classes will retrieve it from there as needed. Session conguration is stored under the top level Session key, and a number of options are available: Session.cookie - Change the name of the session cookie. Session.timeout - The number of minutes before CakePHPs session handler expires the session. This affects Session.autoRegenerate (below), and is handled by CakeSession. Session.cookieTimeout - The number of minutes before the session cookie expires. If this is undened, it will use the same value as Session.timeout. This affects the session cookie, and is handled by PHP itself. Session.checkAgent - Should the user agent be checked, on each request. If the useragent does not match the session will be destroyed. Session.autoRegenerate - Enabling this setting, turns on automatic renewal of sessions, and sessionids that change frequently. Enabling this value will use the sessions Config.countdown value to keep track of requests. Once the countdown reaches 0, the session id will be regenerated. This is a good option to use for applications that need frequently changing session ids for security reasons. You can control the number of requests needed to regenerate the session by modifying CakeSession::$requestCountdown. Session.defaults - Allows you to use one the built-in default session congurations as a base for your session conguration. Session.handler - Allows you to dene a custom session handler. The core database and cache session handlers use this. This option replaces Session.save in previous versions. See below for additional information on Session handlers. Session.ini - Allows you to set additional session ini settings for your cong. This combined with Session.handler replace the custom session handling features of previous versions CakePHPs defaults to setting session.cookie_secure to true, when your application is on an SSL protocol. If your application serves from both SSL and non-SSL protocols, then you might have problems with sessions being lost. If you need access to the session on both SSL and non-SSL domains you will want to disable this:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => php, ini => array( session.cookie_secure => false ) ));

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Session cookie paths default to / in 2.0, to change this you can use the session.cookie_path ini ag to the directory path of your application:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => php, ini => array( session.cookie_path => /app/dir ) ));

Built-in Session handlers & conguration

CakePHP comes with several built in session congurations. You can either use these as the basis for your session conguration, or you can create a fully custom solution. To use defaults, simply set the defaults key to the name of the default you want to use. You can then override any sub setting by declaring it in your Session cong:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => php ));

The above will use the built-in php session conguration. You could augment part or all of it by doing the following:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => php, cookie => my_app, timeout => 4320 //3 days ));

The above overrides the timeout and cookie name for the php session conguration. The built-in congurations are: php - Saves sessions with the standard settings in your php.ini le. cake - Saves sessions as les inside app/tmp/sessions. This is a good option when on hosts that dont allow you to write outside your own home dir. database - Use the built in database sessions. See below for more information. cache - Use the built in cache sessions. See below for more information. Session Handlers Session handlers can also be dened in the session cong array. When dened they allow you to map the various session_save_handler values to a class or object you want to use for session saving. There are two ways to use the handler. The rst is to provide an array with 5 callables. These callables are then applied to session_set_save_handler:
Configure::write(Session, array( userAgent => false, cookie => my_cookie,

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timeout => 600, handler => array( array(Foo, open), array(Foo, close), array(Foo, read), array(Foo, write), array(Foo, destroy), array(Foo, gc), ), ini => array( cookie_secure => 1, use_trans_sid => 0 ) ));

The second mode is to dene an engine key. This key should be a classname that implements CakeSessionHandlerInterface. Implementing this interface will allow CakeSession to automatically map the methods for the handler. Both the core Cache and Database session handlers use this method for saving sessions. Additional settings for the handler should be placed inside the handler array. You can then read those values out from inside your handler. You can also use session handlers from inside plugins. By setting the engine to something like MyPlugin.PluginSessionHandler. This will load and use the PluginSessionHandler class from inside the MyPlugin of your application. CakeSessionHandlerInterface This interface is used for all custom session handlers inside CakePHP, and can be used to create custom user land session handlers. Simply implement the interface in your class and set Session.handler.engine to the classname youve created. CakePHP will attempt to load the handler from inside app/Model/Datasource/Session/$classname.php. So if your classname is AppSessionHandler the le should be app/Model/Datasource/Session/AppSessionHandler.php. Database sessions The changes in session conguration change how you dene database sessions. Most of the time you will only need to set Session.handler.model in your conguration as well as choose the database defaults:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => database, handler => array( model => CustomSession ) ));

The above will tell CakeSession to use the built in database defaults, and specify that a model called CustomSession will be the delegate for saving session information to the database.

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Cache Sessions The Cache class can be used to store sessions as well. This allows you to store sessions in a cache like APC, memcache, or Xcache. There are some caveats to using cache sessions, in that if you exhaust the cache space, sessions will start to expire as records are evicted. To use Cache based sessions you can congure you Session cong like:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => cache, handler => array( config => session ) ));

This will congure CakeSession to use the CacheSession class as the delegate for saving the sessions. You can use the cong key which cache conguration to use. The default cache conguration is default.

Setting ini directives

The built-in defaults attempt to provide a common base for session conguration. You may need to tweak specic ini ags as well. CakePHP exposes the ability to customize the ini settings for both default congurations, as well as custom ones. The ini key in the session settings, allows you to specify individual conguration values. For example you can use it to control settings like session.gc_divisor:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => php, ini => array( session.gc_divisor => 1000, session.cookie_httponly => true ) ));

Creating a custom session handler

Creating a custom session handler is straightforward in CakePHP. In this example well create a session handler that stores sessions both in the Cache (apc) and the database. This gives us the best of fast IO of apc, without having to worry about sessions evaporating when the cache lls up. First well need to create our custom class and put it in app/Model/Datasource/Session/ComboSession.php. The class should look something like:
App::uses(DatabaseSession, Model/Datasource/Session); class ComboSession extends DatabaseSession implements CakeSessionHandlerInterface { public $cacheKey; public function __construct() { $this->cacheKey = Configure::read(Session.handler.cache);

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parent::__construct(); } // read data from the session. public function read($id) { $result = Cache::read($id, $this->cacheKey); if ($result) { return $result; } return parent::read($id); } // write data into the session. public function write($id, $data) { $result = Cache::write($id, $data, $this->cacheKey); if ($result) { return parent::write($id, $data); } return false; } // destroy a session. public function destroy($id) { $result = Cache::delete($id, $this->cacheKey); if ($result) { return parent::destroy($id); } return false; } // removes expired sessions. public function gc($expires = null) { return Cache::gc($this->cacheKey) && parent::gc($expires); } }

Our class extends the built-in DatabaseSession so we dont have to duplicate all of its logic and behavior. We wrap each operation with a Cache operation. This lets us fetch sessions from the fast cache, and not have to worry about what happens when we ll the cache. Using this session handler is also easy. In your core.php make the session block look like the following:
Configure::write(Session, array( defaults => database, handler => array( engine => ComboSession, model => Session, cache => apc ) )); // Make sure to add a apc cache config Cache::config(apc, array(Engine => Apc));

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Now our application will start using our custom session handler for reading & writing session data. class CakeSession

Reading & writing session data

Depending on the context you are in your application you have different classes that provide access to the session. In controllers you can use SessionComponent. In the view, you can use SessionHelper. In any part of your application you can use CakeSession to access the session as well. Like the other interfaces to the session, CakeSession provides a simple CRUD interface. static CakeSession::read($key) You can read values from the session using Set::classicExtract() compatible syntax:
CakeSession::read(Config.language);

static CakeSession::write($key, $value) $key should be the dot separated path you wish to write $value to:
CakeSession::write(Config.language, eng);

static CakeSession::delete($key) When you need to delete data from the session, you can use delete:
CakeSession::delete(Config.language);

You should also see the documentation on Sessions and SessionHelper for how to access Session data in the controller and view.

Exceptions
Exceptions can be used for a variety of uses in your application. CakePHP uses exceptions internally to indicate logic errors or misuse. All of the exceptions CakePHP raises extend CakeException, and there are class/task specic exceptions that extend this base class. CakePHP also provides a number of exception classes that you can use for HTTP errors. See the section on Built in Exceptions for CakePHP for more information.

Exception conguration
There are a few keys available for conguring exceptions:
Configure::write(Exception, array( handler => ErrorHandler::handleException, renderer => ExceptionRenderer, log => true ));

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handler - callback - The callback to handle exceptions. You can set this to any callback type, including anonymous functions. renderer - string - The class responsible for rendering uncaught exceptions. If you choose a custom class you should place the le for that class in app/Lib/Error. This class needs to implement a render() method. log - boolean - When true, exceptions + their stack traces will be logged to CakeLog. consoleHandler - callback - The callback used to handle exceptions, in a console context. If undened, CakePHPs default handler will be used. Exception rendering by default displays an HTML page, you can customize either the handler or the renderer by changing the settings. Changing the handler, allows you to take full control over the exception handling process, while changing the renderer allows you to easily change the output type/contents, as well as add in application specic exception handling. New in version 2.2: The Exception.consoleHandler option was added in 2.2.

Exception classes
There are a number of exception classes in CakePHP. Each exception replaces a cakeError() error messages from the past. Exceptions offer additional exibility in that they can be extended and contain some logic. The built in exception handling will capture any uncaught exceptions and render a useful page. Exceptions that do not specically use a 400 range code, will be treated as an Internal Server Error.

Built in Exceptions for CakePHP

There are several built-in exceptions inside CakePHP, outside of the internal framework exceptions, there are several exceptions for HTTP methods exception BadRequestException Used for doing 400 Bad Request error. exception ForbiddenException Used for doing a 403 Forbidden error. exception NotFoundException Used for doing a 404 Not found error. exception MethodNotAllowedException Used for doing a 405 Method Not Allowed error. exception InternalErrorException Used for doing a 500 Internal Server Error. exception NotImplementedException Used for doing a 501 Not Implemented Errors. You can throw these exceptions from you controllers to indicate failure states, or HTTP errors. An example use of the HTTP exceptions could be rendering 404 pages for items that have not been found:

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public function view($id) { $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(Could not find that post); } $this->set(post, $post); }

By using exceptions for HTTP errors, you can keep your code both clean, and give RESTful responses to client applications and users. In addition, the following framework layer exceptions are available, and will be thrown from a number of CakePHP core components: exception MissingViewException The chosen view le could not be found. exception MissingLayoutException The chosen layout could not be found. exception MissingHelperException A helper was not found. exception MissingBehaviorException A congured behavior could not be found. exception MissingComponentException A congured component could not be found. exception MissingTaskException A congured task was not found. exception MissingShellException The shell class could not be found. exception MissingShellMethodException The chosen shell class has no method of that name. exception MissingDatabaseException The congured database is missing. exception MissingConnectionException A models connection is missing. exception MissingTableException A models table is missing. exception MissingActionException The requested controller action could not be found. exception MissingControllerException The requested controller could not be found. exception PrivateActionException Private action access. Either accessing private/protected/_ prexed actions, or trying to access prexed routes incorrectly. 592 Chapter 10. Development

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exception CakeException Base exception class in CakePHP. All framework layer exceptions thrown by CakePHP will extend this class. These exception classes all extend CakeException. By extending CakeException, you can create your own framework errors. All of the standard Exceptions that CakePHP will throw also extend CakeException. New in version 2.3: CakeBaseException was added exception CakeBaseException Base exception class in CakePHP. All CakeExceptions and HttpExceptions above extend this class. CakeBaseException::responseHeader($header = null, $value = null) See CakeResponse::header() All Http and Cake exceptions extend the CakeBaseException class, which has a method to add headers to the response. For instance when throwing a 405 MethodNotAllowedException the rfc2616 says: The response MUST include an Allow header containing a list of valid methods for the requested resource.

Using HTTP exceptions in your controllers

You can throw any of the HTTP related exceptions from your controller actions to indicate failure states. For example:
public function view($id) { $post = $this->Post->read(null, $id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(); } $this->set(compact(post)); }

The above would cause the congured Exception.handler to catch and process the NotFoundException. By default this will create an error page, and log the exception.

Exception Renderer
class ExceptionRenderer(Exception $exception) The ExceptionRenderer class with the help of CakeErrorController takes care of rendering the error pages for all the exceptions thrown by you application. The error page views are located at app/View/Errors/. For all 4xx and 5xx errors the view les error400.ctp and error500.ctp are used respectively. You can customize them as per your needs. By default your app/Layouts/default.ctp is used for error pages too. If for eg. you want to use another layout app/Layouts/my_error.ctp for your error pages, then simply edit the error views and add the statement $this->layout = my_error; to the error400.ctp and error500.ctp. Each framework layer exception has its own view le located in the core templates but you really dont need to bother customizing them as they are used only during development. With debug turned off all framework layer exceptions are converted to InternalErrorException.

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Creating your own application exceptions

You can create your own application exceptions using any of the built in SPL exceptions (http://php.net/manual/en/spl.exceptions.php), Exception itself, or CakeException. Application exceptions that extend Exception or the SPL exceptions will be treated as 500 error in production mode. CakeException is special in that all CakeException objects are coerced into into either 500 or 404 errors depending on the code they use. When in development mode CakeException objects simply need a new template that matches the class name in order to provide useful information. If your application contained the following exception:
class MissingWidgetException extends CakeException {};

You could provide nice development errors, by creating app/View/Errors/missing_widget.ctp. When in production mode, the above error would be treated as a 500 error. The constructor for CakeException has been extended, allowing you to pass in hashes of data. These hashes are interpolated into the the messageTemplate, as well as into the view that is used to represent the error in development mode. This allows you to create data rich exceptions, by providing more context for your errors. You can also provide a message template which allows the native __toString() methods to work as normal:
class MissingWidgetException extends CakeException { protected $_messageTemplate = Seems that %s is missing.; } throw new MissingWidgetException(array(widget => Pointy));

When caught by the built in exception handler, you would get a $widget variable in your error view template. In addition if you cast the exception as a string or use its getMessage() method you will get Seems that Pointy is missing.. This allows you easily and quickly create your own rich development errors, just like CakePHP uses internally. Creating custom status codes You can create custom HTTP status codes by changing the code used when creating an exception:
throw new MissingWidgetHelperException(Its not here, 501);

Will create a 501 response code, you can use any HTTP status code you want. In development, if your exception doesnt have a specic template, and you use a code equal to or greater than 500 you will see the error500 template. For any other error code youll get the error400 template. If you have dened an error template for your custom exception, that template will be used in development mode. If youd like your own exception handling logic even in production, see the next section.

Extending and implementing your own Exception handlers

You can implement application specic exception handling in one of a few ways. Each approach gives you different amounts of control over the exception handling process. Set Configure::write(Exception.handler, YourClass::yourMethod); Create AppController::appError(); 594 Chapter 10. Development

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Set Configure::write(Exception.renderer, YourClass); In the next few sections, we will detail the various approaches and the benets each has.

Create your own Exception handler with Exception.handler

Creating your own exception handler gives you full control over the exception handling process. The class you choose should be loaded in your app/Config/bootstrap.php, so its available to handle any exceptions. You can dene the handler as any callback type. By settings Exception.handler CakePHP will ignore all other Exception settings. A sample custom exception handling setup could look like:
// in app/Config/core.php Configure::write(Exception.handler, AppExceptionHandler::handle); // in app/Config/bootstrap.php App::uses(AppExceptionHandler, Lib); // in app/Lib/AppExceptionHandler.php class AppExceptionHandler { public static function handle($error) { echo Oh noes! . $error->getMessage(); // ... } // ... }

You can run any code you wish inside handleException. The code above would simple print Oh noes! plus the exception message. You can dene exception handlers as any type of callback, even an anonymous function if you are using PHP 5.3:
Configure::write(Exception.handler, function ($error) { echo Ruh roh . $error->getMessage(); });

By creating a custom exception handler you can provide custom error handling for application exceptions. In the method provided as the exception handler you could do the following:
// in app/Lib/AppErrorHandler.php class AppErrorHandler { public static function handleException($error) { if ($error instanceof MissingWidgetException) { return self::handleMissingWidget($error); } // do other stuff. } }

Using AppController::appError();
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is called instead of the default exception rendering. It receives the thrown exception as its only argument. You should implement your error handling in that method:
class AppController extends Controller { public function appError($error) { // custom logic goes here. } }

Using a custom renderer with Exception.renderer to handle application exceptions

If you dont want to take control of the exception handling, but want to change how exceptions are rendered you can use Configure::write(Exception.renderer, AppExceptionRenderer); to choose a class that will render exception pages. By default :php:classExceptionRenderer is used. Your custom exception renderer class should be placed in app/Lib/Error. Or an Error directory in any bootstrapped Lib path. In a custom exception rendering class you can provide specialized handling for application specic errors:
// in app/Lib/Error/AppExceptionRenderer.php App::uses(ExceptionRenderer, Error); class AppExceptionRenderer extends ExceptionRenderer { public function missingWidget($error) { echo Oops that widget is missing!; } }

The above would handle any exceptions of the type MissingWidgetException, and allow you to provide custom display/handling logic for those application exceptions. Exception handling methods get the exception being handled as their argument. Note: Your custom renderer should expect an exception in its constructor, and implement a render method. Failing to do so will cause additional errors.

Note: If you are using a custom Exception.handler this setting will have no effect. Unless you reference it inside your implementation.

Creating a custom controller to handle exceptions In your ExceptionRenderer sub-class, you can use the _getController method to allow you to return a custom controller to handle your errors. By default CakePHP uses CakeErrorController which omits a few of the normal callbacks to help ensure errors always display. However, you may need a more custom error handling controller in your application. By implementing _getController in your AppExceptionRenderer class, you can use any controller you want:

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class AppExceptionRenderer extends ExceptionRenderer { protected function _getController($exception) { App::uses(SuperCustomError, Controller); return new SuperCustomErrorController(); } }

Alternatively, you could just override the core CakeErrorController, by including one in app/Controller. If you are using a custom controller for error handling, make sure you do all the setup you need in your constructor, or the render method. As those are the only methods that the built-in ErrorHandler class directly call. Logging exceptions Using the built-in exception handling, you can log all the exceptions that are dealt with by ErrorHandler by setting Exception.log to true in your core.php. Enabling this will log every exception to CakeLog and the congured loggers. Note: If you are using a custom Exception.handler this setting will have no effect. Unless you reference it inside your implementation.

Error Handling
For 2.0 Object::cakeError() has been removed. Instead it has been replaced with a number of exceptions. All of the core classes that previously called cakeError are now throwing exceptions. This lets you either choose to handle the errors in your application code, or let the built in exception handling deal with them. There is more control than ever for error and exception handling in CakePHP 2.0. You can congure which methods you want to set as the default error handler, and exception handler using congure.

Error conguration
Error conguration is done inside your applications app/Config/core.php le. You can dene a callback to be red each time your application triggers any PHP error - exceptions are handled Exceptions separately. The callback can be any PHP callable, including an anonymous function. The default error handling conguration looks like:
Configure::write(Error, array( handler => ErrorHandler::handleError, level => E_ALL & ~E_DEPRECATED, trace => true ));

You have 5 built-in options when conguring error handlers:

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handler - callback - The callback to handle errors. You can set this to any callable type, including anonymous functions. level - int - The level of errors you are interested in capturing. Use the built-in php error constants, and bitmasks to select the level of error you are interested in. trace - boolean - Include stack traces for errors in log les. Stack traces will be included in the log after each error. This is helpful for nding where/when errors are being raised. consoleHandler - callback - The callback used to handle errors when running in the console. If undened, CakePHPs default handlers will be used. ErrorHandler by default, displays errors when debug > 0, and logs errors when debug = 0. The type of errors captured in both cases is controlled by Error.level. The fatal error handler will be called independent of debug level or Error.level conguration, but the result will be different based on debug level. Note: If you use a custom error handler, the trace setting will have no effect, unless you refer to it in your error handling function. New in version 2.2: The Error.consoleHandler option was added in 2.2.Changed in version 2.2: The Error.handler and Error.consoleHandler will receive the fatal error codes as well. The default behavior is show a page to internal server error (debug disabled) or a page with the message, le and line (debug enabled).

Creating your own error handler

You can create an error handler out of any callback type. For example you could use a class called AppError to handle your errors. The following would need to be done:
//in app/Config/core.php Configure::write(Error.handler, AppError::handleError); //in app/Config/bootstrap.php App::uses(AppError, Lib);

//in app/Lib/AppError.php class AppError { public static function handleError($code, $description, $file = null, $line = null, $co echo There has been an error!; } }

This class/method will print out There has been an error! each time an error occurs. Since you can dene an error handler as any callback type, you could use an anonymous function if you are using PHP5.3 or greater.:

Configure::write(Error.handler, function($code, $description, $file = null, $line = null, echo Oh no something bad happened; });

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It is important to remember that errors captured by the congured error handler will be php errors, and that if you need custom error handling, you probably also want to congure Exceptions handling as well.

Changing fatal error behavior

Since CakePHP 2.2 the Error.handler will receive the fatal error codes as well. If you do not want to show the cake error page, you can override it like:
//in app/Config/core.php Configure::write(Error.handler, AppError::handleError); //in app/Config/bootstrap.php App::uses(AppError, Lib);

//in app/Lib/AppError.php class AppError { public static function handleError($code, $description, $file = null, $line = null, $co list(, $level) = ErrorHandler::mapErrorCode($code); if ($level === LOG_ERROR) { // Ignore fatal error. It will keep the PHP error message only return false; } return ErrorHandler::handleError($code, $description, $file, $line, $context); } }

If you want to keep the default fatal error behavior, ErrorHandler::handleFatalError() from your custom handler.

you

can

call

Debugging
Debugging is an inevitable and necessary part of any development cycle. While CakePHP doesnt offer any tools that directly connect with any IDE or editor, CakePHP does provide several tools to assist in debugging and exposing what is running under the hood of your application.

Basic Debugging
debug(mixed $var, boolean $showHtml = null, $showFrom = true) Parameters $var (mixed) The contents to print out. Arrays and objects work well. $showHTML (boolean) Set to true, to enable escaping. Escaping is enabled by default in 2.0 when serving web requests. $showFrom (boolean) Show the line and le the debug() occurred on. The debug() function is a globally available function that works similarly to the PHP function print_r(). The debug() function allows you to show the contents of a variable in a number of different ways. First, if youd Debugging 599

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like data to be shown in an HTML-friendly way, set the second parameter to true. The function also prints out the line and le it is originating from by default. Output from this function is only shown if the core debug variable has been set to a value greater than 0. Changed in version 2.1: The output of debug() more resembles var_dump(), and uses Debugger internally.

Debugger Class
The debugger class was introduced with CakePHP 1.2 and offers even more options for obtaining debugging information. It has several functions which are invoked statically, and provide dumping, logging, and error handling functions. The Debugger Class overrides PHPs default error handling, replacing it with far more useful error reports. The Debuggers error handling is used by default in CakePHP. As with all debugging functions, Configure::debug must be set to a value higher than 0. When an error is raised, Debugger both outputs information to the page and makes an entry in the error.log le. The error report that is generated has both a stack trace and a code excerpt from where the error was raised. Click on the Error link type to reveal the stack trace, and on the Code link to reveal the error-causing lines.

Using the Debugger Class

class Debugger To use the debugger, rst ensure that Congure::read(debug) is set to a value greater than 0. static Debugger::dump($var) Dump prints out the contents of a variable. It will print out all properties and methods (if any) of the supplied variable:
$foo = array(1,2,3); Debugger::dump($foo); // outputs array( 1, 2, 3 ) // simple object $car = new Car(); Debugger::dump($car); // outputs Car Car::colour = red

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Car::make = Toyota Car::model = Camry Car::mileage = 15000 Car::accelerate() Car::decelerate() Car::stop()

Changed in version 2.1: In 2.1 forward the output was updated for readability. Debugger::exportVar()

See

static Debugger::log($var, $level = 7 ) Creates a detailed stack trace log at the time of invocation. The log() method prints out data similar to that done by Debugger::dump(), but to the debug.log instead of the output buffer. Note your app/tmp directory (and its contents) must be writable by the web server for log() to work correctly. static Debugger::trace($options) Returns the current stack trace. Each line of the trace includes the calling method, including which le and line the call originated from.:
//In PostsController::index() pr(Debugger::trace()); //outputs PostsController::index() - APP/Controller/DownloadsController.php, line 48 Dispatcher::_invoke() - CORE/lib/Cake/Routing/Dispatcher.php, line 265 Dispatcher::dispatch() - CORE/lib/Cake/Routing/Dispatcher.php, line 237 [main] - APP/webroot/index.php, line 84

Above is the stack trace generated by calling Debugger::trace() in a controller action. Reading the stack trace bottom to top shows the order of currently running functions (stack frames). In the above example, index.php called Dispatcher::dispatch(), which in-turn called Dispatcher::_invoke(). The _invoke() method then called PostsController::index(). This information is useful when working with recursive operations or deep stacks, as it identies which functions are currently running at the time of the trace(). static Debugger::excerpt($le, $line, $context) Grab an excerpt from the le at $path (which is an absolute lepath), highlights line number $line with $context number of lines around it.:
pr(Debugger::excerpt(ROOT . DS . LIBS . debugger.php, 321, 2));

//will output the following. Array ( [0] => <code><span style="color: #000000"> * @access public</span></code> [1] => <code><span style="color: #000000"> */</span></code> [2] => <code><span style="color: #000000"> function excerpt($file, $line, $cont

[3] => <span class="code-highlight"><code><span style="color: #000000"> $da [4] => <code><span style="color: #000000"> $data = @explode("\n", file_get_ )

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or log entries for custom situations. static Debugger::exportVar($var, $recursion = 0) Converts a variable of any type to a string for use in debug output. This method is also used by most of Debugger for internal variable conversions, and can be used in your own Debuggers as well. Changed in version 2.1: This function generates different output in 2.1 forward. static Debugger::invoke($debugger) Replace the CakePHP Debugger with a new instance. static Debugger::getType($var) Get the type of a variable. Objects will return their classname New in version 2.1.

Using Logging to debug

Logging messages is another good way to debug applications, and you can use CakeLog to do logging in your application. All objects that extend Object have an instance method log() which can be used to log messages:
$this->log(Got here, debug);

The above would write Got here into the debug log. You can use log entries to help debug methods that involve redirects or complicated loops. You can also use CakeLog::write() to write log messages. This method can be called statically anywhere in your application one CakeLog has been loaded:
// in app/Config/bootstrap.php App::uses(CakeLog, Log); // Anywhere in your application CakeLog::write(debug, Got here);

Debug Kit
DebugKit is a plugin that provides a number of good debugging tools. It primarily provides a toolbar in the rendered HTML, that provides a plethora of information about your application and the current request. You can download DebugKit (https://github.com/cakephp/debug_kit) from github.

Testing
CakePHP comes with comprehensive testing support built-in. CakePHP comes with integration for PHPUnit (http://phpunit.de). In addition to the features offered by PHPUnit, CakePHP offers some additional features to make testing easier. This section will cover installing PHPUnit, and getting started with Unit Testing, and how you can use the extensions that CakePHP offers.

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Installing PHPUnit
CakePHP uses PHPUnit as its underlying test framework. PHPUnit is the de-facto standard for unit testing in PHP. It offers a deep and powerful set of features for making sure your code does what you think it does. PHPUnit can be installed through the pear installer (http://pear.php.net). To install PHPUnit run the following:
pear upgrade PEAR pear config-set auto_discover 1 pear install pear.phpunit.de/PHPUnit

Note: Depending on your systems conguration, you may need to run the previous commands with sudo Once PHPUnit is installed with the pear installer, you should conrm that the PHPUnit libraries are on PHPs include_path. You can do this by checking your php.ini le and making sure that the PHPUnit les are in one of the include_path directories. Tip: All output is swallowed when using PHPUnit 3.6+. Add the --debug modier if using the CLI or add &debug=1 to the url if using the web runner to display output.

Test Database Setup

Remember to have a debug level of at least 1 in your app/Config/core.php le before running any tests. Tests are not accessible via the web runner when debug is equal to 0. Before running any tests you should be sure to add a $test database conguration. This conguration is used by CakePHP for xture tables and data:
public $test = array( datasource => Database/Mysql, persistent => false, host => dbhost, login => dblogin, password => dbpassword, database => test_database );

Note: Its a good idea to make the test database and your actual database different databases. This will prevent any embarrassing mistakes later.

Checking the Test Setup

After installing PHPUnit and setting up your $test database conguration you can make sure youre ready to write and run your own tests by running one of the core tests. There are two built-in runners for testing, well start off by using the web runner. The tests can then be accessed by browsing to

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http://localhost/your_app/test.php. You should see a list of the core test cases. Click on the AllCongure test. You should see a green bar with some additional information about the tests run, and number passed. Congratulations, you are now ready to start writing tests!

Test Case Conventions

Like most things in CakePHP, test cases have some conventions. Concerning tests: 1. PHP les containing tests should be in your app/Test/Case/[Type] directories. 2. The lenames of these les should end in Test.php instead of just .php. 3. The classes containing tests should extend CakeTestCase, ControllerTestCase or PHPUnit_Framework_TestCase. 4. Like other classnames, the test case classnames should match the lename. RouterTest.php should contain class RouterTest extends CakeTestCase. 5. The name of any method containing a test (i.e. containing an assertion) should begin with test, as in testPublished(). You can also use the @test annotation to mark methods as test methods. When you have created a test case, you can execute it by browsing to http://localhost/you_app/test.php (depending on how your specic setup looks). Click App test cases, and then click the link to your specic le. You can run tests from the command line using the test shell:
./Console/cake test app Model/Post

For example, would run the tests for your Post model.

Creating Your First Test Case

In the following example, well create a test case for a very simple helper method. The helper were going to test will be formatting progress bar HTML. Our helper looks like:
class ProgressHelper extends AppHelper { public function bar($value) { $width = round($value / 100, 2) * 100; return sprintf( <div class="progress-container"> <div class="progress-bar" style="width: %s%%"></div> </div>, $width); } }

This is a very simple example, but it will be useful to show how you can create a simple test case. After creating and saving our helper, well create the test case le in app/Test/Case/View/Helper/ProgressHelperTest.php. In that le well start with the following:

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App::uses(Controller, Controller); App::uses(View, View); App::uses(ProgressHelper, View/Helper); class ProgressHelperTest extends CakeTestCase { public function setUp() { } public function testBar() { } }

Well esh out this skeleton in a minute. Weve added two methods to start with. First is setUp(). This method is called before every test method in a test case class. Setup methods should initialize the objects needed for the test, and do any conguration needed. In our setup method well add the following:
public function setUp() { parent::setUp(); $Controller = new Controller(); $View = new View($Controller); $this->Progress = new ProgressHelper($View); }

Calling the parent method is important in test cases, as CakeTestCase::setUp() does a number things like backing up the values in Configure and, storing the paths in App. Next, well ll out the test method. Well use some assertions to ensure that our code creates the output we expect:
public function testBar() { $result = $this->Progress->bar(90); $this->assertContains(width: 90%, $result); $this->assertContains(progress-bar, $result); $result = $this->Progress->bar(33.3333333); $this->assertContains(width: 33%, $result); }

The above test is a simple one but shows the potential benet of using test cases. We use assertContains() to ensure that our helper is returning a string that contains the content we expect. If the result did not contain the expected content the test would fail, and we would know that our code is incorrect. By using test cases you can easily describe the relationship between a set of known inputs and their expected output. This helps you be more condent of the code youre writing as you can easily check that the code you wrote fullls the expectations and assertions your tests make. Additionally because tests are code, they are easy to re-run whenever you make a change. This helps prevent the creation of new bugs.

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Running Tests
Once you have PHPUnit installed and some test cases written, youll want to run the test cases very frequently. Its a good idea to run tests before committing any changes to help ensure you havent broken anything. Running tests from a browser CakePHP provides a web interface for running tests, so you can execute your tests through a browser if youre more comfortable in that environment. You can access the web runner by going to http://localhost/your_app/test.php. The exact location of test.php will change depending on your setup. But the le is at the same level as index.php. Once youve loaded up the test runner, you can navigate App, Core and Plugin test suites. Clicking an individual test case will run that test and display the results.
Viewing code coverage

If you have XDebug (http://xdebug.org) installed, you can view code coverage results. Code coverage is useful for telling you what parts of your code your tests do not reach. Coverage is useful for determining where you should add tests in the future, and gives you one measurement to track your testing progress with.

The inline code coverage uses green lines to indicate lines that have been run. If you hover over a green line a tooltip will indicate which tests covered the line. Lines in red did not run, and have not been exercised by your tests. Grey lines are considered unexecutable code by xdebug. 606 Chapter 10. Development

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Running tests from command line CakePHP provides a test shell for running tests. You can run app, core and plugin tests easily using the test shell. It accepts all the arguments you would expect to nd on the normal PHPUnit command line tool as well. From your app directory you can do the following to run tests:
# Run a model tests in the app ./Console/cake test app Model/Article # Run a component test in a plugin ./Console/cake test DebugKit Controller/Component/ToolbarComponent # Run the configure class test in CakePHP ./Console/cake test core Core/Configure

Note: If you are running tests that interact with the session its generally a good idea to use the --stderr option. This will x issues with tests failing because of headers_sent warnings. Changed in version 2.1: The test shell was added in 2.1. The 2.0 testsuite shell is still available but the new syntax is preferred. You can also run test shell in the project root directory. This shows you a full list of all the tests that you currently have. You can then freely choose what test(s) to run:
# Run test in project root directory for application folder called app lib/Cake/Console/cake test app # Run test in project root directory for an application in ./myapp lib/Cake/Console/cake test --app myapp app

Filtering test cases

When you have larger test cases, you will often want to run a subset of the test methods when you are trying to work on a single failing case. With the CLI runner you can use an option to lter test methods:
./Console/cake test core Console/ConsoleOutput --filter testWriteArray

The lter parameter is used as a case-sensitive regular expression for ltering which test methods to run.
Generating code coverage

You can generate code coverage reports from the command line using PHPUnits built-in code coverage tools. PHPUnit will generate a set of static HTML les containing the coverage results. You can generate coverage for a test case by doing the following:
./Console/cake test app Model/Article --coverage-html webroot/coverage

This will put the coverage results in your applications webroot directory. You should be able to view the results by going to http://localhost/your_app/coverage.

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Running tests that use sessions

When running tests on the command line that use sessions youll need to include the --stderr ag. Failing to do so will cause sessions to not work. PHPUnit outputs test progress to stdout by default, this causes PHP to assume that headers have been sent which prevents sessions from starting. By switching PHPUnit to output on stderr, this issue is avoided.

Test Case Lifecycle Callbacks

Test cases have a number of lifecycle callbacks you can use when doing testing: setUp is called before every test method. Should be used to create the objects that are going to be tested, and initialize any data for the test. Always remember to call parent::setUp() tearDown is called after every test method. Should be used to cleanup after the test is complete. Always remember to call parent::tearDown(). setupBeforeClass is called once before test methods in a case are started. This method must be static. tearDownAfterClass is called once after test methods in a case are started. This method must be static.

Fixtures
When testing code that depends on models and the database, one can use xtures as a way to generate temporary data tables loaded with sample data that can be used by the test. The benet of using xtures is that your test has no chance of disrupting live application data. In addition, you can begin testing your code prior to actually developing live content for an application. CakePHP uses the connection named $test in your app/Config/database.php conguration le. If this connection is not usable, an exception will be raised and you will not be able to use database xtures. CakePHP performs the following during the course of a xture based test case: 1. Creates tables for each of the xtures needed. 2. Populates tables with data, if data is provided in xture. 3. Runs test methods. 4. Empties the xture tables. 5. Removes xture tables from database. Creating xtures When creating a xture you will mainly dene two things: how the table is created (which elds are part of the table), and which records will be initially populated to the table. Lets create our rst xture, that will be used to test our own Article model. Create a le named ArticleFixture.php in your app/Test/Fixture directory, with the following content: 608 Chapter 10. Development

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class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture {

/* Optional. Set this property to load fixtures to a different test datasource */ public $useDbConfig = test; public $fields = array( id => array(type => integer, key => primary), title => array(type => string, length => 255, null => false), body => text, published => array(type => integer, default => 0, null => false), created => datetime, updated => datetime ); public $records = array( array(id => 1, title => First Article, body => First Article Body, pub array(id => 2, title => Second Article, body => Second Article Body, p array(id => 3, title => Third Article, body => Third Article Body, pub ); }

The $useDbConfig property denes the datasource of which the xture will use. If your application uses multiple datasources, you should make the xtures match the models datasources but prexed with test_. For example if your model uses the mydb datasource, your xture should use the test_mydb datasource. If the test_mydb connection doesnt exist, your models will use the default test datasource. Fixture datasources must be prexed with test to reduce the possibility of accidentally truncating all your applications data when running tests. We use $fields to specify which elds will be part of this table, and how they are dened. The format used to dene these elds is the same used with CakeSchema. The keys available for table denition are: type CakePHP internal data type. Currently supported: string: maps to VARCHAR text: maps to TEXT integer: maps to INT float: maps to FLOAT datetime: maps to DATETIME timestamp: maps to TIMESTAMP time: maps to TIME date: maps to DATE binary: maps to BLOB key Set to primary to make the eld AUTO_INCREMENT, and a PRIMARY KEY for the table. length Set to the specic length the eld should take. null Set to either true (to allow NULLs) or false (to disallow NULLs).

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default Default value the eld takes. We can dene a set of records that will be populated after the xture table is created. The format is fairly straight forward, $records is an array of records. Each item in $records should be a single row. Inside each row, should be an associative array of the columns and values for the row. Just keep in mind that each record in the $records array must have a key for every eld specied in the $fields array. If a eld for a particular record needs to have a null value, just specify the value of that key as null. Dynamic data and xtures Since records for a xture are declared as a class property, you cannot easily use functions or other dynamic data to dene xtures. To solve this problem, you can dene $records in the init() function of your xture. For example if you wanted all the created and updated timestamps to reect todays date you could do the following:
class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $fields = array( id => array(type => integer, key => primary), title => array(type => string, length => 255, null => false), body => text, published => array(type => integer, default => 0, null => false), created => datetime, updated => datetime ); public function init() { $this->records = array( array( id => 1, title => First Article, body => First Article Body, published => 1, created => date(Y-m-d H:i:s), updated => date(Y-m-d H:i:s), ), ); parent::init(); } }

When overriding init() just remember to always call parent::init(). Importing table information and records Your application may have already working models with real data associated to them, and you might decide to test your application with that data. It would be then a duplicate effort to have to dene the table denition and/or records on your xtures. Fortunately, theres a way for you to dene that table denition and/or records for a particular xture come from an existing model or an existing table.

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Lets start with an example. Assuming you have a model named Article available in your application (that maps to a table named articles), change the example xture given in the previous section (app/Test/Fixture/ArticleFixture.php) to:
class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $import = Article; }

This statement tells the test suite to import your table denition from the table linked to the model called Article. You can use any model available in your application. The statement will only import the Article schema, and does not import records. To import records you can do the following:
class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $import = array(model => Article, records => true); }

If on the other hand you have a table created but no model available for it, you can specify that your import will take place by reading that table information instead. For example:
class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $import = array(table => articles); }

Will import table denition from a table called articles using your CakePHP database connection named default. If you want to use a different connection use:
class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $import = array(table => articles, connection => other); }

Since it uses your CakePHP database connection, if theres any table prex declared it will be automatically used when fetching table information. The two snippets above do not import records from the table. To force the xture to also import its records, change the import to:
class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $import = array(table => articles, records => true); }

You can naturally import your table denition from an existing model/table, but have your records dened directly on the xture as it was shown on previous section. For example:

class ArticleFixture extends CakeTestFixture { public $import = Article; public $records = array( array(id => 1, title => First Article, body => First Article Body, publi array(id => 2, title => Second Article, body => Second Article Body, pub array(id => 3, title => Third Article, body => Third Article Body, publi ); }

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Loading xtures in your test cases After youve created your xtures, youll want to use them in your test cases. In each test case you should load the xtures you will need. You should load a xture for every model that will have a query run against it. To load xtures you dene the $fixtures property in your model:
class ArticleTest extends CakeTestCase { public $fixtures = array(app.article, app.comment); }

The above will load the Article and Comment xtures from the applications Fixture directory. You can also load xtures from CakePHP core, or plugins:
class ArticleTest extends CakeTestCase { public $fixtures = array(plugin.debug_kit.article, core.comment); }

Using the core prex will load xtures from CakePHP, and using a plugin name as the prex, will load the xture from the named plugin. You can control when your xtures are loaded by setting CakeTestCase::$autoFixtures to false and later load them using CakeTestCase::loadFixtures():
class ArticleTest extends CakeTestCase { public $fixtures = array(app.article, app.comment); public $autoFixtures = false; public function testMyFunction() { $this->loadFixtures(Article, Comment); } }

Testing Models
Lets say we already have our Article model dened on app/Model/Article.php, which looks like this:
class Article extends AppModel { public function published($fields = null) { $params = array( conditions => array( $this->name . .published => 1 ), fields => $fields ); return $this->find(all, $params); } }

We now want to set up a test that will use this model denition, but through xtures, to test some functionality in the model. CakePHP test suite loads a very minimum set of les (to keep tests isolated), so we have 612 Chapter 10. Development

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to start by loading our model - in this case the Article model which we already dened. Lets now create a le named ArticleTest.php in your app/Test/Case/Model directory, with the following contents:
App::uses(Article, Model); class ArticleTest extends CakeTestCase { public $fixtures = array(app.article); }

In our test cases variable $fixtures we dene the set of xtures that well use. You should remember to include all the xtures that will have queries run against them. Note: You can override the test model database by specifying the $useDbConfig property. Ensure that the relevant xture uses the same value so that the table is created in the correct database.

Creating a test method Lets now add a method to test the function published() in the Article model. app/Test/Case/Model/ArticleTest.php so it now looks like this:
App::uses(Article, Model); class ArticleTest extends CakeTestCase { public $fixtures = array(app.article); public function setUp() { parent::setUp(); $this->Article = ClassRegistry::init(Article); } public function testPublished() { $result = $this->Article->published(array(id, $expected = array( array(Article => array(id => 1, title array(Article => array(id => 2, title array(Article => array(id => 3, title ); $this->assertEquals($expected, $result); } }

Edit the le

title)); => First Article)), => Second Article)), => Third Article))

You can see we have added a method called testPublished(). We start by creating an instance of our Article model, and then run our published() method. In $expected we set what we expect should be the proper result (that we know since we have dened which records are initially populated to the article table.) We test that the result equals our expectation by using the assertEquals method. See the Running Tests section for more information on how to run your test case.

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Note: When setting up your Model for testing be sure to use ClassRegistry::init(YourModelName); as it knows to use your test database connection.

Mocking model methods There will be times youll want to mock methods on models when testing them. You should use getMockForModel to create testing mocks of models. It avoids issues with reected properties that normal mocks have:
public function testSendingEmails() { $model = $this->getMockForModel(EmailVerification, array(send)); $model->expects($this->once()) ->method(send) ->will($this->returnValue(true)); $model->verifyEmail([email protected]); }

New in version 2.3: CakeTestCase::getMockForModel() was added in 2.3.

Testing Controllers
While you can test controller classes in a similar fashion to Helpers, Models, and Components, CakePHP offers a specialized ControllerTestCase class. Using this class as the base class for your controller test cases allows you to use testAction() for simpler test cases. ControllerTestCase allows you to easily mock out components and models, as well as potentially difcult to test methods like redirect(). Say you have a typical Articles controller, and its corresponding model. The controller code looks like:
class ArticlesController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Form, Html); public function index($short = null) { if (!empty($this->request->data)) { $this->Article->save($this->request->data); } if (!empty($short)) { $result = $this->Article->findAll(null, array(id, title)); } else { $result = $this->Article->findAll(); } if (isset($this->params[requested])) { return $result; } $this->set(title, Articles); $this->set(articles, $result);

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} }

Create a le named ArticlesControllerTest.php in your app/Test/Case/Controller directory and put the following inside:
class ArticlesControllerTest extends ControllerTestCase { public $fixtures = array(app.article); public function testIndex() { $result = $this->testAction(/articles/index); debug($result); } public function testIndexShort() { $result = $this->testAction(/articles/index/short); debug($result); } public function testIndexShortGetRenderedHtml() { $result = $this->testAction( /articles/index/short, array(return => contents) ); debug($result); } public function testIndexShortGetViewVars() { $result = $this->testAction( /articles/index/short, array(return => vars) ); debug($result); } public function testIndexPostData() { $data = array( Article => array( user_id => 1, published => 1, slug => new-article, title => New Article, body => New Body ) ); $result = $this->testAction( /articles/index, array(data => $data, method => post) ); debug($result); } }

This example shows a few of the ways you can use testAction to test your controllers. The rst parameter Testing 615

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of testAction should always be the URL you want to test. CakePHP will create a request and dispatch the controller and action. When testing actions that contain redirect() and other code following the redirect it is generally a good idea to return when redirecting. The reason for this, is that redirect() is mocked in testing, and does not exit like normal. And instead of your code exiting, it will continue to run code following the redirect. For example:
class ArticlesController extends AppController { public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { if ($this->Article->save($this->request->data)) { $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } } // more code } }

When testing the above code, you will still run // more code even when the redirect is reached. Instead, you should write the code like:
class ArticlesController extends AppController { public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { if ($this->Article->save($this->request->data)) { return $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } } // more code } }

In this case // more code will not be executed as the method will return once the redirect is reached. Simulating GET requests As seen in the testIndexPostData() example above, you can use testAction() to test POST actions as well as GET actions. By supplying the data key, the request made to the controller will be POST. By default all requests will be POST requests. You can simulate a GET request by setting the method key:
public function testAdding() { $data = array( Post => array( title => New post, body => Secret sauce ) ); $this->testAction(/posts/add, array(data => $data, method => get)); // some assertions. }

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The data key will be used as query string parameters when simulating a GET request. Choosing the return type You can choose from a number of ways to inspect the success of your controller action. Each offers a different way to ensure your code is doing what you expect: vars Get the set view variables. view Get the rendered view, without a layout. contents Get the rendered view including the layout. result Get the return value of the controller action. Useful for testing requestAction methods. The default value is result. As long as your return type is not result you can also access the various other return types as properties in the test case:
public function testIndex() { $this->testAction(/posts/index); $this->assertInternalType(array, $this->vars[posts]); }

Using mocks with testAction There will be times when you want to replace components or models with either partially mocked objects or completely mocked objects. You can do this by using ControllerTestCase::generate(). generate() takes the hard work out of generating mocks on your controller. If you decide to generate a controller to be used in testing, you can generate mocked versions of its models and components along with it:
$Posts = $this->generate(Posts, array( methods => array( isAuthorized ), models => array( Post => array(save) ), components => array( RequestHandler => array(isPut), Email => array(send), Session ) ));

The above would create a mocked PostsController, stubbing out the isAuthorized method. The attached Post model will have save() stubbed, and the attached components would have their respective methods stubbed. You can choose to stub an entire class by not passing methods to it, like Session in the example above.

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Generated controllers are automatically used as the testing controller to test. To enable automatic generation, set the autoMock variable on the test case to true. If autoMock is false, your original controller will be used in the test. The response object in the generated controller is always replaced with a mock that does not send headers. After using generate() or testAction() you can access the controller object at $this->controller. A more complex example In its simplest form, testAction() will run PostsController::index() on your testing controller (or an automatically generated one), including all of the mocked models and components. The results of the test are stored in the vars, contents, view, and return properties. Also available is a headers property which gives you access to the headers that would have been sent, allowing you to check for redirects:
public function testAdd() { $Posts = $this->generate(Posts, array( components => array( Session, Email => array(send) ) )); $Posts->Session ->expects($this->once()) ->method(setFlash); $Posts->Email ->expects($this->once()) ->method(send) ->will($this->returnValue(true)); $this->testAction(/posts/add, array( data => array( Post => array(name => New Post) ) )); $this->assertContains(/posts/index, $this->headers[Location]); $this->assertEquals(New Post, $this->vars[post][Post][name]); $this->assertRegExp(/<html/, $this->contents); $this->assertRegExp(/<form/, $this->view); }

This example shows a slightly more complex use of the testAction() and generate() methods. First, we generate a testing controller and mock the SessionComponent. Now that the SessionComponent is mocked, we have the ability to run testing methods on it. Assuming PostsController::add() redirects us to index, sends an email and sets a ash message, the test will pass. For the sake of example, we also check to see if the layout was loaded by checking the entire rendered contents, and checks the view for a form tag. As you can see, your freedom to test controllers and easily mock its classes is greatly expanded with these changes. When doing controller tests using mocks that use static methods youll have to use a different method to 618 Chapter 10. Development

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register your mock expectations. For example if you wanted to mock out AuthComponent::user() youd have to do the following:
public function testAdd() { $Posts = $this->generate(Posts, array( components => array( Session, Auth => array(user) ) )); $Posts->Auth->staticExpects($this->any()) ->method(user) ->with(id) ->will($this->returnValue(2)); }

By using staticExpects you will be able to mock and manipulate static methods on components and models. Testing a JSON Responding Controller JSON is a very friendly and common format to use when building a web service. Testing the endpoints of your web service is very simple with CakePHP. Let us begin with a simple example controller that responds in JSON:
class MarkersController extends AppController { public $autoRender = false; public function index() { $data = $this->Marker->find(first); $this->response->body(json_encode($data)); } }

Now we create the le app/Test/Case/Controller/MarkersControllerTest.php and make sure our web service is returning the proper response:
class MarkersControllerTest extends ControllerTestCase { public function testIndex() { $result = $this->testAction(/markers/index.json); $result = json_decode($result, true); $expected = array( Marker => array(id => 1, lng => 66, lat => 45), ); $this->assertEquals($expected, $result); } }

Testing Views
Generally most applications will not directly test their HTML code. Doing so is often results in fragile, difcult to maintain test suites that are prone to breaking. When writing functional tests using Testing 619

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ControllerTestCase you can inspect the rendered view content by setting the return option to view. While it is possible to test view content using ControllerTestCase, a more robust and maintable integration/view testing can be accomplished using tools like Selenium webdriver (http://seleniumhq.org).

Testing Components
Lets pretend we have a component called PagematronComponent in our application. This component helps us set the pagination limit value across all the controllers that use it. Here is our example component located in app/Controller/Component/PagematronComponent.php:
class PagematronComponent extends Component { public $Controller = null; public function startup(Controller $controller) { parent::startup($controller); $this->Controller = $controller; // Make sure the controller is using pagination if (!isset($this->Controller->paginate)) { $this->Controller->paginate = array(); } } public function adjust($length = short) { switch ($length) { case long: $this->Controller->paginate[limit] = 100; break; case medium: $this->Controller->paginate[limit] = 50; break; default: $this->Controller->paginate[limit] = 20; break; } } }

Now we can write tests to ensure our paginate limit parameter is being set correctly by the adjust method in our component. We create the le app/Test/Case/Controller/Component/PagematronComponentTest.php:
App::uses(Controller, Controller); App::uses(CakeRequest, Network); App::uses(CakeResponse, Network); App::uses(ComponentCollection, Controller); App::uses(PagematronComponent, Controller/Component); // A fake controller to test against class TestPagematronController extends Controller { public $paginate = null; }

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class PagematronComponentTest extends CakeTestCase { public $PagematronComponent = null; public $Controller = null; public function setUp() { parent::setUp(); // Setup our component and fake test controller $Collection = new ComponentCollection(); $this->PagematronComponent = new PagematronComponent($Collection); $CakeRequest = new CakeRequest(); $CakeResponse = new CakeResponse(); $this->Controller = new TestPagematronController($CakeRequest, $CakeResponse); $this->PagematronComponent->startup($this->Controller); } public function testAdjust() { // Test our adjust method with different parameter settings $this->PagematronComponent->adjust(); $this->assertEquals(20, $this->Controller->paginate[limit]); $this->PagematronComponent->adjust(medium); $this->assertEquals(50, $this->Controller->paginate[limit]); $this->PagematronComponent->adjust(long); $this->assertEquals(100, $this->Controller->paginate[limit]); } public function tearDown() { parent::tearDown(); // Clean up after were done unset($this->PagematronComponent); unset($this->Controller); } }

Testing Helpers
Since a decent amount of logic resides in Helper classes, its important to make sure those classes are covered by test cases. First we create an example helper to test. The CurrencyRendererHelper will help us display currencies in our views and for simplicity only has one method usd().
// app/View/Helper/CurrencyRendererHelper.php class CurrencyRendererHelper extends AppHelper { public function usd($amount) { return USD . number_format($amount, 2, ., ,); } }

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Now we create our tests:

// app/Test/Case/View/Helper/CurrencyRendererHelperTest.php App::uses(Controller, Controller); App::uses(View, View); App::uses(CurrencyRendererHelper, View/Helper); class CurrencyRendererHelperTest extends CakeTestCase { public $CurrencyRenderer = null; // Here we instantiate our helper public function setUp() { parent::setUp(); $Controller = new Controller(); $View = new View($Controller); $this->CurrencyRenderer = new CurrencyRendererHelper($View); } // Testing the usd() function public function testUsd() { $this->assertEquals(USD 5.30, $this->CurrencyRenderer->usd(5.30)); // We should always have 2 decimal digits $this->assertEquals(USD 1.00, $this->CurrencyRenderer->usd(1)); $this->assertEquals(USD 2.05, $this->CurrencyRenderer->usd(2.05)); // Testing the thousands separator $this->assertEquals(USD 12,000.70, $this->CurrencyRenderer->usd(12000.70)); } }

Here, we call usd() with different parameters and tell the test suite to check if the returned values are equal to what is expected. Save this in and execute the test. You should see a green bar and messaging indicating 1 pass and 4 assertions.

Creating Test Suites

If you want several of your tests to run at the same time, you can creating a test suite. A testsuite is composed of several test cases. CakeTestSuite offers a few methods for easily creating test suites based on the le system. If we wanted to create a test suite for all our model tests we could would create app/Test/Case/AllModelTest.php. Put the following in it:
class AllModelTest extends CakeTestSuite { public static function suite() { $suite = new CakeTestSuite(All model tests); $suite->addTestDirectory(TESTS . Case . DS . Model); return $suite; } }

The code above will group all test cases found in the /app/Test/Case/Model/ folder. To add an 622 Chapter 10. Development

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individual le, use $suite->addTestFile($filename);. You can recursively add a directory for all tests using:
$suite->addTestDirectoryRecursive(TESTS . Case);

Would recursively add all test cases in the app/Test/Case/ directory.

Creating Tests for Plugins

Tests for plugins are created in their own directory inside the plugins folder.:
/app /Plugin /Blog /Test /Case /Fixture

They work just like normal tests but you have to remember to use the naming conventions for plugins when importing classes. This is an example of a testcase for the BlogPost model from the plugins chapter of this manual. A difference from other tests is in the rst line where Blog.BlogPost is imported. You also need to prex your plugin xtures with plugin.blog.blog_post:
App::uses(BlogPost, Blog.Model); class BlogPostTest extends CakeTestCase { // Plugin fixtures located in /app/Plugin/Blog/Test/Fixture/ public $fixtures = array(plugin.blog.blog_post); public $BlogPost; public function testSomething() { // ClassRegistry makes the model use the test database connection $this->BlogPost = ClassRegistry::init(Blog.BlogPost); // do some useful test here $this->assertTrue(is_object($this->BlogPost)); } }

If you want to use plugin xtures in the app tests you can plugin.pluginName.fixtureName syntax in the $fixtures array.

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using

Integration with Jenkins

Jenkins (http://jenkins-ci.org) is a continuous integration server, that can help you automate the running of your test cases. This helps ensure that all your tests stay passing and your application is always ready. Integrating a CakePHP application with Jenkins is fairly straightforward. The following assumes youve already installed Jenkins on *nix system, and are able to administer it. You also know how to create jobs, and run builds. If you are unsure of any of these, refer to the Jenkins documentation (http://jenkins-ci.org/) . Testing 623

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Create a job Start off by creating a job for your application, and connect your repository so that jenkins can access your code. Add test database cong Using a separate database just for Jenkins is generally a good idea, as it stops bleed through and avoids a number of basic problems. Once youve created a new database in a database server that jenkins can access (usually localhost). Add a shell script step to the build that contains the following:
cat > app/Config/database.php <<DATABASE_PHP class DATABASE_CONFIG { public $test = array( datasource => Database/Mysql, host => localhost, database => jenkins_test, login => jenkins, password => cakephp_jenkins, encoding => utf8 ); } DATABASE_PHP

This ensures that youll always have the correct database conguration that Jenkins requires. Do the same for any other conguration les you need to. Its often a good idea to drop and re-create the database before each build as well. This insulates you from chained failures, where one broken build causes others to fail. Add another shell script step to the build that contains the following:

mysql -u jenkins -pcakephp_jenkins -e DROP DATABASE IF EXISTS jenkins_test; CREATE DATABAS

Add your tests Add another shell script step to your build. In this step run the tests for your application. Creating a junit log le, or clover coverage is often a nice bonus, as it gives you a nice graphical view of your testing results:
app/Console/cake test app AllTests \ --stderr \ --log-junit junit.xml \ --coverage-clover clover.xml

If you use clover coverage, or the junit results, make sure to congure those in Jenkins as well. Failing to congure those steps will mean you wont see the results. Run a build You should be able to run a build now. Check the console output and make any necessary changes to get a passing build.

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REST
Many newer application programmers are realizing the need to open their core functionality to a greater audience. Providing easy, unfettered access to your core API can help get your platform accepted, and allows for mashups and easy integration with other systems. While other solutions exist, REST is a great way to provide easy access to the logic youve created in your application. Its simple, usually XML-based (were talking simple XML, nothing like a SOAP envelope), and depends on HTTP headers for direction. Exposing an API via REST in CakePHP is simple.

The Simple Setup

The fastest way to get up and running with REST is to add a few lines to your routes.php le, found in app/Cong. The Router object features a method called mapResources(), that is used to set up a number of default routes for REST access to your controllers. Make sure mapResources() comes before require CAKE . Config . DS . routes.php; and other routes which would override the routes. If we wanted to allow REST access to a recipe database, wed do something like this:
//In app/Config/routes.php... Router::mapResources(recipes); Router::parseExtensions();

The rst line sets up a number of default routes for easy REST access where method species the desired result format (e.g. xml, json, rss). These routes are HTTP Request Method sensitive. HTTP format GET GET POST PUT DELETE POST URL.format /recipes.format /recipes/123.format /recipes.format /recipes/123.format /recipes/123.format /recipes/123.format Controller action invoked RecipesController::index() RecipesController::view(123) RecipesController::add() RecipesController::edit(123) RecipesController::delete(123) RecipesController::edit(123)

CakePHPs Router class uses a number of different indicators to detect the HTTP method being used. Here they are in order of preference: 1. The _method POST variable 2. The X_HTTP_METHOD_OVERRIDE 3. The REQUEST_METHOD header The _method POST variable is helpful in using a browser as a REST client (or anything else that can do POST easily). Just set the value of _method to the name of the HTTP request method you wish to emulate. Once the router has been set up to map REST requests to certain controller actions, we can move on to creating the logic in our controller actions. A basic controller might look something like this:
// Controller/RecipesController.php class RecipesController extends AppController {

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public $components = array(RequestHandler); public function index() { $recipes = $this->Recipe->find(all); $this->set(array( recipes => $recipes, _serialize => array(recipes) )); } public function view($id) { $recipe = $this->Recipe->findById($id); $this->set(array( recipe => $recipe, _serialize => array(recipe) )); } public function edit($id) { $this->Recipe->id = $id; if ($this->Recipe->save($this->request->data)) { $message = Saved; } else { $message = Error; } $this->set(array( message => $message, _serialize => array(message) )); } public function delete($id) { if ($this->Recipe->delete($id)) { $message = Deleted; } else { $message = Error; } $this->set(array( message => $message, _serialize => array(message) )); } }

Since weve added a call to Router::parseExtensions(), the CakePHP router is already primed to serve up different views based on different kinds of requests. Since were dealing with REST requests, well be making XML views. You can also easily make JSON views using CakePHPs built in JSON and XML views. By using the built in XmlView we can dene a _serialize view variable. This special view variable is used to dene which view variables XmlView should serialize into XML. If we wanted to modify the data before it is converted into XML we should not dene the _serialize view variable, and instead use view les. We place the REST views for our RecipesController inside app/View/recipes/xml. We can also use the Xml for quick-and-easy XML output in those views. 626 Chapter 10. Development

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Heres what our index view might look like:

// app/View/Recipes/xml/index.ctp // Do some formatting and manipulation on // the $recipes array. $xml = Xml::fromArray(array(response => $recipes)); echo $xml->asXML();

When serving up a specic content type using parseExtensions(), CakePHP automatically looks for a view helper that matches the type. Since were using XML as the content type, there is no built-in helper, however if you were to create one it would automatically be loaded for our use in those views. The rendered XML will end up looking something like this:
<recipes> <recipe id="234" created="2008-06-13" modified="2008-06-14"> <author id="23423" first_name="Billy" last_name="Bob"></author> <comment id="245" body="Yummy yummmy"></comment> </recipe> <recipe id="3247" created="2008-06-15" modified="2008-06-15"> <author id="625" first_name="Nate" last_name="Johnson"></author> <comment id="654" body="This is a comment for this tasty dish."></comment> </recipe> </recipes>

Creating the logic for the edit action is a bit trickier, but not by much. Since youre providing an API that outputs XML, its a natural choice to receive XML as input. Not to worry, the RequestHandler and Router classes make things much easier. If a POST or PUT request has an XML content-type, then the input is run through Cakes Xml class, and the array representation of the data is assigned to $this->request>data. Because of this feature, handling XML and POST data in parallel is seamless: no changes are required to the controller or model code. Everything you need should end up in $this->request->data.

Accepting input in other formats

Typically REST applications not only output content in alternate data formats they also accept data in different formats. In CakePHP, the RequestHandlerComponent helps facilitate this. By default it will decode any incoming JSON/XML input data for POST/PUT requests and supply the array version of that data in $this->request->data. You can also wire in additional deserializers for alternate formats if you need them, using RequestHandler::addInputType()

Modifying the default REST routes

New in version 2.1. If the default REST routes dont work for your application, you can modify them using Router::resourceMap(). This method allows you to set the default routes that get set with Router::mapResources(). When using this method you need to set all the defaults you want to use:
Router::resourceMap(array( array(action => index, method => GET, id => false), array(action => view, method => GET, id => true), array(action => add, method => POST, id => false),

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array(action => edit, method => PUT, id => true), array(action => delete, method => DELETE, id => true), array(action => update, method => POST, id => true) ));

By overwriting the default resource map, future calls to mapResources() will use the new values.

Custom REST Routing

If the default routes created by Router::mapResources() dont work for you, use the Router::connect() method to dene a custom set of REST routes. The connect() method allows you to dene a number of different options for a given URL. See the section on Using additional conditions when matching routes for more information.

Dispatcher Filters
New in version 2.2. There are several reasons to want a piece of code to be run before any controller code is executed or right before the response is sent to the client, such as response caching, header tuning, special authentication or just to provide access to a mission-critical API response in lesser time than a complete request dispatching cycle would take. CakePHP provides for such cases a clean and extensible interface for attaching lters to this dispatching cycle, similar to a middleware layer thought to provide stackable services or routines for every request. We call them Dispatcher Filters

Conguring Filters
Filters are usually congured in the bootstrap.php le, but you could easily load them from any other conguration le before the request is dispatched. Adding and removing lters is done through the Congure class, using the special key Dispatcher.filters. By default CakePHP comes with a couple lter classes already enabled for all requests, lets take a look at how they are added:
Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( AssetDispatcher, CacheDispatcher ));

Each of those array values are class names that will be instantiated and added as listeners for the events generated at dispatcher level. The rst one, AssetDispatcher is meant to check whether the request is referring to a theme or plugin asset le, such as a css, javascript or image stored on either a plugins webroot folder or the corresponding one for a Theme. It will serve the le accordingly if found, stopping the rest of the dispatching cycle. The CacheDispatcher lter, when Cache.check cong variable is enabled, will check if the response was already cached in the le system for a similar request and serve the cached code immediately. As you can see, both provided lters have the responsibility of stopping any further code and send the response right away to the client. But lters are not limited to this role, as we will show shortly in this

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section. You can add your own class names to the list of lters, and they will get executed in the order they were dened. There is also an alternative way for attaching lters that do not involve the special DispatcherFilter classes:

Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( my-filter => array(callable => array($classInstance, methodName), on => after ));

As shown above, you can pass any valid PHP callback (http://php.net/callback) type, as you may remember, a callback is anything that PHP can execute with call_user_func. We do make a little exception, if a string is provided it will be treated as a class name, not as a possible function name. This of course gives the ability to PHP 5.3 users to attach anonymous functions as lters:
Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( my-filter => array(callable => function($event) {...}, on => before), //more filters here ));

The on key only takes before and after as valid values, and evidently means whether the lter should run before or after any controller code is executed. Additionally to dening lters with the callable key, you also get the chance to dene a priority for your lters, if none is specied then a default of 10 is selected for you As all lters will have default priority 10, should you want to run a lter before any other in the list, select lower priority numbers as needed:
Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( my-filter => array( callable => function($event) {...}, on => before, priority => 5 ), other-filter => array( callable => array($class, method), on => after, priority => 1 ), //more filters here ));

Obviously, when dening priorities the order in which lters are declared does not matter but for those having the same. When dening lters as class names there is no option to dene priority in-line, we will get into that soon. Finally, CakePHPs plugin notation can be used to dene lters located in plugins:
Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( MyPlugin.MyFilter, ));

Feel free to remove the default attached lters if you choose to use a more advanced/faster way of serving theme and plugin assets or if you do not wish to use built-in full page caching, or just implement your own.

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Filter Classes
Dispatcher lters, when dened as class names in conguration, should extend the class DispatcherFilter provided in the Routing CakePHPs directory. Lets create a simple lter to respond to a specic url with a Hello World text:
App::uses(DispatcherFilter, Routing); class HelloWorldFilter extends DispatcherFilter { public $priority = 9; public function beforeDispatch(CakeEvent $event) { $request = $event->data[request]; $response = $event->data[response]; if ($request->url === hello-world) { $response->body(Hello World); $event->stopPropagation(); return $response; } } }

This class should be saved in a le in app/Routing/Filter/HelloWorldFilter.php and congured in the bootstrap le according to how it was explained in the previous section. There is plenty to explain here, lets begin with the $priority value. As mentioned before, when using lter classes you can only dene the order in which they are run using the $priority property in the class, default value is 10 if the property is declared, this means that it will get executed _after_ the Router class has parsed the request. We do not want this to happen in our previous example, because most probably you do not have any controller set up for answering to that url, hence we chose 9 as our priority. DispatcherFilter exposes two methods that can be overridden in subclasses, they are beforeDispatch and afterDispatch, and are executed before or after any controller is executed respectively. Both methods receive a CakeEvent object containing the request and response objects (CakeRequest and CakeResponse instances) along with an additionalParams array inside the data property. The latter contains information used for internal dispatching when calling requestAction. In our example we conditionally returned the $response object as a result, this will tell the Dispatcher to not instantiate any controller and return such object as response immediately to the client. We also added $event->stopPropagation() to prevent other lters from being executed after this one. Lets now create another lter for altering response headers in any public page, in our case it would be anything served from the PagesController:
App::uses(DispatcherFilter, Routing); class HttpCacheFilter extends DispatcherFilter { public function afterDispatch(CakeEvent $event) { $request = $event->data[request]; $response = $event->data[response];

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if ($request->params[controller] !== pages) { return; } if ($response->statusCode() === 200) { $response->sharable(true); $response->expires(strtotime(+1 day)); } } }

This lter will send a expiration header to 1 day in the future for all responses produced by the pages controller. You could of course do the same in the controller, this is just an example of what could be done with lters. For instance, instead of altering the response you could cache it using the Cache class and serve the response from the beforeDispatch callback.

Inline Filters
Our last example will use an anonymous function (only available on PHP 5.3+) to serve a list of posts in json format, we encourage you to do so using controllers and the JsonView class, but lets imagine you need to save a few milliseconds for this mission-critical API endpoint:
$postsList = function($event) { if ($event->data[request]->url !== posts/recent.json) { return; } App::uses(ClassRegistry, Utility); $postModel = ClassRegistry::init(Post); $event->data[response]->body(json_encode($postModel->find(recent))); $event->stopPropagation(); return $event->data[response]; }; Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( AssetDispatcher, CacheDispatcher, recent-posts => array( callable => $postsList, priority => 9, on=> before ) ));

In previous example we have selected a priority of 9 for our lter, so to skip any other logic either placed in custom or core lters such as CakePHP internal routing system. Although it is not required, it shows how to make your important code run rst in case you need to trim as much fat as possible from some requests. For obvious reasons this has the potential of making your app very difcult to maintain. Filters are an extremely powerful tool when used wisely, adding response handlers for each url in your app is not a good use for it. But if you got a valid reason to do so, then you have a clean solution at hand. Keep in mind that not everything needs to be a lter, Controllers and Components are usually a more accurate choice for adding any request handling code to your app. Dispatcher Filters 631

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Vendor packages
Vendor le information goes here.

Vendor assets
Support for vendor assets have been removed for 1.3. It is recommended that you take any vendor assets you have and repackage them into plugins. See Plugin assets for more information.

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CHAPTER 11

Deployment

Once your application is complete, or even before that youll want to deploy it. There are a few things you should do when deploying a CakePHP application.

Check your security

If youre throwing your application out into the wild, its a good idea to make sure it doesnt have any leaks. Check the Security to guard against CSRF attacks, form eld tampering, and others. Doing Data Validation, and/or Data Sanitization is also a great idea, for protecting your database and also against XSS attacks. Check that only your webroot directory is publicly visible, and that your secrets (such as your app salt, and any security keys) are private and unique as well!

Set document root

Setting the document root correctly on your application is an important step to keeping your code secure and your application safer. CakePHP applications should have the document root set to the applications app/webroot. This makes the application and conguration les inaccessible through a URL. Setting the document root is different for different webservers. See the URL Rewriting documentation for webserver specic information. In all cases you will want to set the virtual host/domains document to be app/webroot/. This removes the possibility of les outside of the webroot directory being executed.

Update core.php
Updating core.php, specically the value of debug is extremely important. Turning debug = 0 disables a number of development features that should never be exposed to the Internet at large. Disabling debug changes the following types of things: Debug messages, created with pr() and debug() are disabled. 633

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Core CakePHP caches are by default ushed every 999 days, instead of every 10 seconds as in development. Error views are less informative, and give generic error messages instead. Errors are not displayed. Exception stack traces are disabled. In addition to the above, many plugins and application extensions use debug to modify their behavior.

Improve your applications performance

Since handling static assets, such as images, JavaScript and CSS les of plugins, through the Dispatcher is incredibly inefcient, it is strongly recommended to symlink them for production. For example like this:
ln -s app/Plugin/YourPlugin/webroot/css/yourplugin.css app/webroot/css/yourplugin.css

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CHAPTER 12

Tutorials & Examples

In this section, you can walk through typical CakePHP applications to see how all of the pieces come together. Alternatively, you can refer to the non-ofcial CakePHP plugin repository CakePackages (http://plugins.cakephp.org/) and the Bakery (http://bakery.cakephp.org/) for existing applications and components.

Blog Tutorial
Welcome to CakePHP. Youre probably checking out this tutorial because you want to learn more about how CakePHP works. Its our aim to increase productivity and make coding more enjoyable: we hope youll see this as you dive into the code. This tutorial will walk you through the creation of a simple blog application. Well be getting and installing Cake, creating and conguring a database, and creating enough application logic to list, add, edit, and delete blog posts. Heres what youll need: 1. A running web server. Were going to assume youre using Apache, though the instructions for using other servers should be very similar. We might have to play a little with the server conguration, but most folks can get Cake up and running without any conguration at all. Make sure you have PHP 5.2.8 or greater. 2. A database server. Were going to be using MySQL server in this tutorial. Youll need to know enough about SQL in order to create a database: Cake will be taking the reins from there. Since were using MySQL, also make sure that you have pdo_mysql enabled in PHP. 3. Basic PHP knowledge. The more object-oriented programming youve done, the better: but fear not if youre a procedural fan. 4. Finally, youll need a basic knowledge of the MVC programming pattern. A quick overview can be found in Understanding Model-View-Controller. Dont worry, its only a half a page or so.

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Lets get started!

Getting Cake
First, lets get a copy of fresh Cake code. To get a fresh download, visit the CakePHP project on GitHub: https://github.com/cakephp/cakephp/tags and download the latest release of 2.0 You can also clone the repository using git://github.com/cakephp/cakephp.git git (http://git-scm.com/). git clone

Regardless of how you downloaded it, place the code inside of your DocumentRoot. Once nished, your directory setup should look something like the following:
/path_to_document_root /app /lib /plugins /vendors .htaccess index.php README

Now might be a good time to learn a bit about how Cakes directory structure works: check out CakePHP Folder Structure section.

Creating the Blog Database

Next, lets set up the underlying database for our blog. If you havent already done so, create an empty database for use in this tutorial, with a name of your choice. Right now, well just create a single table to store our posts. Well also throw in a few posts right now to use for testing purposes. Execute the following SQL statements into your database:
/* First, create our posts table: */ CREATE TABLE posts ( id INT UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, title VARCHAR(50), body TEXT, created DATETIME DEFAULT NULL, modified DATETIME DEFAULT NULL ); /* Then insert some posts for testing: */ INSERT INTO posts (title,body,created) VALUES (The title, This is the post body., NOW()); INSERT INTO posts (title,body,created) VALUES (A title once again, And the post body follows., NOW()); INSERT INTO posts (title,body,created) VALUES (Title strikes back, This is really exciting! Not., NOW());

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The choices on table and column names are not arbitrary. If you follow Cakes database naming conventions, and Cakes class naming conventions (both outlined in CakePHP Conventions), youll be able to take advantage of a lot of free functionality and avoid conguration. Cake is exible enough to accommodate even the worst legacy database schema, but adhering to convention will save you time. Check out CakePHP Conventions for more information, but sufce it to say that naming our table posts automatically hooks it to our Post model, and having elds called modied and created will be automagically managed by Cake.

Cake Database Conguration

Onward and upward: lets tell Cake where our database is and how to connect to it. For many, this is the rst and last time you congure anything. A copy of CakePHPs database conguration le is found in /app/Config/database.php.default. Make a copy of this le in the same directory, but name it database.php. The cong le should be pretty straightforward: just replace the values in the $default array with those that apply to your setup. A sample completed conguration array might look something like the following:
public $default = array( datasource => Database/Mysql, persistent => false, host => localhost, port => , login => cakeBlog, password => c4k3-rUl3Z, database => cake_blog_tutorial, schema => , prefix => , encoding => );

Once youve saved your new database.php le, you should be able to open your browser and see the Cake welcome page. It should also tell you that your database connection le was found, and that Cake can successfully connect to the database. Note: Remember that youll need to have PDO, and pdo_mysql enabled in your php.ini.

Optional Conguration
There are three other items that can be congured. Most developers complete these laundry-list items, but theyre not required for this tutorial. One is dening a custom string (or salt) for use in security hashes. The second is dening a custom number (or seed) for use in encryption. The third item is allowing CakePHP write access to its tmp folder. The security salt is used for generating hashes. Change the default salt value by editing /app/Config/core.php line 187. It doesnt much matter what the new value is, as long as its not Blog Tutorial 637

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easily guessed:
/** * A random string used in security hashing methods. */ Configure::write(Security.salt, pl345e-P45s_7h3*S@l7!);

The cipher seed is used for encrypt/decrypt strings. Change the default seed value by editing /app/Config/core.php line 192. It doesnt much matter what the new value is, as long as its not easily guessed:
/** * A random numeric string (digits only) used to encrypt/decrypt strings. */ Configure::write(Security.cipherSeed, 7485712659625147843639846751);

The nal task is to make the app/tmp directory web-writable. The best way to do this is to nd out what user your webserver runs as (<?php echo whoami; ?>) and change the ownership of the app/tmp directory to that user. The nal command you run (in *nix) might look something like this:
$ chown -R www-data app/tmp

If for some reason CakePHP cant write to that directory, youll be informed by a warning while not in production mode.

A Note on mod_rewrite
Occasionally a new user will run into mod_rewrite issues. For example if the CakePHP welcome page looks a little funny (no images or css styles), it probably means mod_rewrite isnt functioning on your system. Please refer to one of the sections below about url rewriting for your webserver to get you up and running: URL Rewriting
Apache and mod_rewrite (and .htaccess)

While CakePHP is built to work with mod_rewrite out of the boxand usually doesweve noticed that a few users struggle with getting everything to play nicely on their systems. Here are a few things you might try to get it running correctly. First look at your httpd.conf (Make sure you are editing the system httpd.conf rather than a user- or site-specic httpd.conf). 1. Make sure that an .htaccess override is allowed and that AllowOverride is set to All for the correct DocumentRoot. You should see something similar to:
# # # # # # Each directory to which Apache has access can be configured with respect to which services and features are allowed and/or disabled in that directory (and its subdirectories). First, we configure the "default" to be a very restrictive set of features.

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# <Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride All # Order deny,allow # Deny from all </Directory>

2. Make sure you are loading up mod_rewrite correctly. You should see something like:
LoadModule rewrite_module libexec/apache2/mod_rewrite.so

In many systems these will be commented out (by being prepended with a #) by default, so you may just need to remove those leading # symbols. After you make changes, restart Apache to make sure the settings are active. Verify that you your .htaccess les are actually in the right directories. This can happen during copying because some operating systems treat les that start with . as hidden and therefore wont see them to copy. 3. Make sure your copy of CakePHP is from the downloads section of the site or our GIT repository, and has been unpacked correctly by checking for .htaccess les. Cake root directory (needs to be copied to your document, this redirects everything to your Cake app):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^ $ app/webroot/ RewriteRule </IfModule>

[L]

(.*) app/webroot/ $ 1 [L]

Cake app directory (will be copied to the top directory of your application by bake):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine on webroot/ RewriteRule ^$ RewriteRule </IfModule> (.*) webroot/ $ 1

[L] [L]

Cake webroot directory (will be copied to your applications web root by bake):
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

If your CakePHP site still has problems with mod_rewrite you might want to try and modify settings for virtualhosts. If on ubuntu, edit the le /etc/apache2/sites-available/default (location is distribution dependent). In this le, ensure that AllowOverride None is changed to AllowOverride All, so you have:

Blog Tutorial

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<Directory /> Options FollowSymLinks AllowOverride All </Directory> <Directory /var/www> Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews AllowOverride All Order Allow,Deny Allow from all </Directory>

If on Mac OSX, another solution is to use the tool virtualhostx to make a virtual host to point to your folder. For many hosting services (GoDaddy, 1and1), your web server is actually being served from a user directory that already uses mod_rewrite. If you are installing CakePHP into a user directory (http://example.com/~username/cakephp/), or any other URL structure that already utilizes mod_rewrite, youll need to add RewriteBase statements to the .htaccess les CakePHP uses (/.htaccess, /app/.htaccess, /app/webroot/.htaccess). This can be added to the same section with the RewriteEngine directive, so for example your webroot .htaccess le would look like:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase /path/to/cake/app RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

The details of those changes will depend on your setup, and can include additional things that are not Cake related. Please refer to Apaches online documentation for more information. 4. (Optional) To improve production setup, you should prevent invalid assets from being parsed by CakePHP. Modify your webroot .htaccess to something like:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase /path/to/cake/app RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/(app/webroot/)?(img|css|js)/(.*) $ RewriteRule ^(.*) $ index.php [QSA,L] </IfModule>

The above will simply prevent incorrect assets from being sent to index.php and instead display your webservers 404 page. Additionally you can create a matching HTML 404 page, or use the default built-in CakePHP 404 by adding an ErrorDocument directive:

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ErrorDocument 404 /404-not-found

Pretty URLs on nginx

nginx is a popular server that uses less system resources than Apache. Its drawback is that it does not make use of .htaccess les like Apache, so it is necessary to create those rewritten URLs in the site-available conguration. Depending upon your setup, you will have to modify this, but at the very least, you will need PHP running as a FastCGI instance.
server { listen 80; server_name www.example.com; rewrite ^(.*) http://example.com $ 1 permanent; } server { listen 80; server_name example.com; # root directive should be global root /var/www/example.com/public/app/webroot/; index index.php; access_log /var/www/example.com/log/access.log; error_log /var/www/example.com/log/error.log; location / { try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$uri&$args; } location ~ \.php $ { try_files $uri =404; include /etc/nginx/fastcgi_params; fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000; fastcgi_index index.php; fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name; } }

URL Rewrites on IIS7 (Windows hosts)

IIS7 does not natively support .htaccess les. While there are add-ons that can add this support, you can also import htaccess rules into IIS to use CakePHPs native rewrites. To do this, follow these steps: 1. Use Microsofts Web Platform Installer (http://www.microsoft.com/web/downloads/platform.aspx) to install the URL Rewrite Module 2.0 (http://www.iis.net/downloads/microsoft/url-rewrite) or download it directly (32-bit (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5747) / 64-bit (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=7435)). 2. Create a new le in your CakePHP root folder, called web.cong. Blog Tutorial 641

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3. Using Notepad or any XML-safe editor and copy the following code into your new web.cong le...

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <configuration> <system.webServer> <rewrite> <rules> <rule name="Rewrite requests to test.php" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^test.php(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="app/webroot/test.php{R:1}" /> </rule> <rule name="Exclude direct access to app/webroot/*" stopProcessing="true"> <match url="^app/webroot/(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="None" /> </rule> <rule name="Rewrite routed access to assets (img, css, files, js, favicon)" <match url="^(img|css|files|js|favicon.ico)(.*)$" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="app/webroot/{R:1}{R:2}" appendQueryString=" </rule> <rule name="Rewrite requested file/folder to index.php" stopProcessing="tru <match url="^(.*)$" ignoreCase="false" /> <action type="Rewrite" url="index.php" appendQueryString="true" /> </rule> </rules> </rewrite> </system.webServer> </configuration>

Once the web.cong le is created with the correct IIS-friendly rewrite rules, CakePHPs links, css, js, and rerouting should work correctly.
I dont / cant use URL rewriting

If you dont want to or cant use URL rewriting on your webserver, refer to the core conguration. Now continue to Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer to start building your rst CakePHP application.

Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer

Create a Post Model
The Model class is the bread and butter of CakePHP applications. By creating a CakePHP model that will interact with our database, well have the foundation in place needed to do our view, add, edit, and delete operations later. CakePHPs model class les go in /app/Model, and the le well be creating will be saved to /app/Model/Post.php. The completed le should look like this:
class Post extends AppModel { }

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Naming convention is very important in CakePHP. By naming our model Post, CakePHP can automatically infer that this model will be used in the PostsController, and will be tied to a database table called posts. Note: CakePHP will dynamically create a model object for you if it cannot nd a corresponding le in /app/Model. This also means that if you accidentally name your le wrong (i.e. post.php or posts.php), CakePHP will not recognize any of your settings and will use the defaults instead. For more on models, such as table prexes, callbacks, and validation, check out the Models chapter of the Manual.

Create a Posts Controller

Next, well create a controller for our posts. The controller is where all the business logic for post interaction will happen. In a nutshell, its the place where you play with the models and get post-related work done. Well place this new controller in a le called PostsController.php inside the /app/Controller directory. Heres what the basic controller should look like:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form); }

Now, lets add an action to our controller. Actions often represent a single function or interface in an application. For example, when users request www.example.com/posts/index (which is also the same as www.example.com/posts/), they might expect to see a listing of posts. The code for that action would look something like this:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form); public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->Post->find(all)); } }

Let me explain the action a bit. By dening function index() in our PostsController, users can now access the logic there by requesting www.example.com/posts/index. Similarly, if we were to dene a function called foobar(), users would be able to access that at www.example.com/posts/foobar. Warning: You may be tempted to name your controllers and actions a certain way to obtain a certain URL. Resist that temptation. Follow CakePHP conventions (plural controller names, etc.) and create readable, understandable action names. You can map URLs to your code using routes covered later on. The single instruction in the action uses set() to pass data from the controller to the view (which well create next). The line sets the view variable called posts equal to the return value of the find(all) method of the Post model. Our Post model is automatically available at $this->Post because weve followed Cakes naming conventions. To learn more about Cakes controllers, check out the Controllers chapter.

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Creating Post Views

Now that we have our data owing to our model, and our application logic and ow dened by our controller, lets create a view for the index action we created above. Cake views are just presentation-avored fragments that t inside an applications layout. For most applications theyre HTML mixed with PHP, but they may end up as XML, CSV, or even binary data. Layouts are presentation code that is wrapped around a view, and can be dened and switched between, but for now, lets just use the default. Remember in the last section how we assigned the posts variable to the view using the set() method? That would hand down data to the view that would look something like this:
// print_r($posts) output: Array ( [0] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 1 [title] => The title [body] => This is the post body. [created] => 2008-02-13 18:34:55 [modified] => ) ) [1] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 2 [title] => A title once again [body] => And the post body follows. [created] => 2008-02-13 18:34:56 [modified] => ) ) [2] => Array ( [Post] => Array ( [id] => 3 [title] => Title strikes back [body] => This is really exciting! Not. [created] => 2008-02-13 18:34:57 [modified] => ) ) )

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(well have to create a folder named Posts in this case). To format this post data in a nice table, our view code might look something like this
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/index.ctp --> <h1>Blog posts</h1> <table> <tr> <th>Id</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Created</th> </tr> <!-- Here is where we loop through our $posts array, printing out post info --> <?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $post[Post][id]; ?></td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link($post[Post][title], array(controller => posts, action => view, $post[Post][id])); ?> </td> <td><?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?></td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> <?php unset($post); ?> </table>

Hopefully this should look somewhat simple. You might have noticed the use of an object called $this->Html. This is an instance of the CakePHP HtmlHelper class. CakePHP comes with a set of view helpers that make things like linking, form output, JavaScript and Ajax a snap. You can learn more about how to use them in Helpers, but whats important to note here is that the link() method will generate an HTML link with the given title (the rst parameter) and URL (the second parameter). When specifying URLs in Cake, it is recommended that you use the array format. This is explained in more detail in the section on Routes. Using the array format for URLs allows you to take advantage of CakePHPs reverse routing capabilities. You can also specify URLs relative to the base of the application in the form of /controller/action/param1/param2. At this point, you should be able to point your browser to http://www.example.com/posts/index. You should see your view, correctly formatted with the title and table listing of the posts. If you happened to have clicked on one of the links we created in this view (that link a posts title to a URL /posts/view/some_id), you were probably informed by CakePHP that the action hasnt yet been dened. If you were not so informed, either something has gone wrong, or you actually did dene it already, in which case you are very sneaky. Otherwise, well create it in the PostsController now:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form); public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->Post->find(all));

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} public function view($id = null) { if (!$id) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $this->set(post, $post); } }

The set() call should look familiar. Notice were using findById() rather than find(all) because we only really want a single posts information. Notice that our view action takes a parameter: the ID of the post wed like to see. This parameter is handed to the action through the requested URL. If a user requests /posts/view/3, then the value 3 is passed as $id. We also do a bit of error checking to ensure a user is actually accessing a record. If a user requests /posts/view, we will throw a NotFoundException and let the CakePHP ErrorHandler take over. We also perform a similar check to make sure the user has accessed a record that exists. Now lets create the view for our new view action and place it in /app/View/Posts/view.ctp
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/view.ctp --> <h1><?php echo h($post[Post][title]); ?></h1> <p><small>Created: <?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?></small></p> <p><?php echo h($post[Post][body]); ?></p>

Verify that this is working by trying the links at /posts/index or manually requesting a post by accessing /posts/view/1.

Adding Posts
Reading from the database and showing us the posts is a great start, but lets allow for the adding of new posts. First, start by creating an add() action in the PostsController:
class PostsController extends AppController { public $helpers = array(Html, Form, Session); public $components = array(Session); public function index() { $this->set(posts, $this->Post->find(all)); }

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public function view($id) { if (!$id) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $this->set(post, $post); } public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { $this->Post->create(); if ($this->Post->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Your post has been saved.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Unable to add your post.); } } } }

Note: You need to include the SessionComponent - and SessionHelper - in any controller where you will use it. If necessary, include it in your AppController. Heres what the add() action does: if the HTTP method of the request was POST, try to save the data using the Post model. If for some reason it doesnt save, just render the view. This gives us a chance to show the user validation errors or other warnings. Every CakePHP request includes a CakeRequest object which is accessible using $this->request. The request object contains useful information regarding the request that was just received, and can be used to control the ow of your application. In this case, we use the CakeRequest::is() method to check that the request is a HTTP POST request. When a user uses a form to POST data to your application, that information is available in $this->request->data. You can use the pr() or debug() functions to print it out if you want to see what it looks like. We use the SessionComponents SessionComponent::setFlash() method to set a message to a session variable to be displayed on the page after redirection. In the layout we have SessionHelper::flash which displays the message and clears the corresponding session variable. The controllers Controller::redirect function redirects to another URL. The param array(action => index) translates to URL /posts i.e the index action of posts controller. You can refer to Router::url() function on the API (http://api20.cakephp.org) to see the formats in which you can specify a URL for various Cake functions. Calling the save() method will check for validation errors and abort the save if any occur. Well discuss how those errors are handled in the following sections. Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer 647

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Data Validation
Cake goes a long way in taking the monotony out of form input validation. Everyone hates coding up endless forms and their validation routines. CakePHP makes it easier and faster. To take advantage of the validation features, youll need to use Cakes FormHelper in your views. The FormHelper is available by default to all views at $this->Form. Heres our add view:
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/add.ctp --> <h1>Add Post</h1> <?php echo $this->Form->create(Post); echo $this->Form->input(title); echo $this->Form->input(body, array(rows => 3)); echo $this->Form->end(Save Post); ?>

Here, we use the FormHelper to generate the opening tag for an HTML form. Heres the HTML that $this->Form->create() generates:
<form id="PostAddForm" method="post" action="/posts/add">

If create() is called with no parameters supplied, it assumes you are building a form that submits to the current controllers add() action (or edit() action when id is included in the form data), via POST. The $this->Form->input() method is used to create form elements of the same name. The rst parameter tells CakePHP which eld they correspond to, and the second parameter allows you to specify a wide array of options - in this case, the number of rows for the textarea. Theres a bit of introspection and automagic here: input() will output different form elements based on the model eld specied. The $this->Form->end() call generates a submit button and ends the form. If a string is supplied as the rst parameter to end(), the FormHelper outputs a submit button named accordingly along with the closing form tag. Again, refer to Helpers for more on helpers. Now lets go back and update our /app/View/Posts/index.ctp view to include a new Add Post link. Before the <table>, add the following line:
<?php echo $this->Html->link( Add Post, array(controller => posts, action => add) ); ?>

You may be wondering: how do I tell CakePHP about my validation requirements? Validation rules are dened in the model. Lets look back at our Post model and make a few adjustments:
class Post extends AppModel { public $validate = array( title => array( rule => notEmpty ), body => array(

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rule => notEmpty ) ); }

The $validate array tells CakePHP how to validate your data when the save() method is called. Here, Ive specied that both the body and title elds must not be empty. CakePHPs validation engine is strong, with a number of pre-built rules (credit card numbers, email addresses, etc.) and exibility for adding your own validation rules. For more information on that setup, check the Data Validation. Now that you have your validation rules in place, use the app to try to add a post with an empty title or body to see how it works. Since weve used the FormHelper::input() method of the FormHelper to create our form elements, our validation error messages will be shown automatically.

Editing Posts
Post editing: here we go. Youre a CakePHP pro by now, so you should have picked up a pattern. Make the action, then the view. Heres what the edit() action of the PostsController would look like:
public function edit($id = null) { if (!$id) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } $post = $this->Post->findById($id); if (!$post) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid post)); } if ($this->request->is(post) || $this->request->is(put)) { $this->Post->id = $id; if ($this->Post->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Your post has been updated.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Unable to update your post.); } } if (!$this->request->data) { $this->request->data = $post; } }

This action rst ensures that the user has tried to access an existing record. If they havent passed in a passed in an $id parameter, or the post does not exist, we throw a NotFoundException for the CakePHP ErrorHandler to take care of. Next the action checks that the request is a POST request. If it is, then we use the POST data to update our Post record, or kick back and show the user validation errors. If there is no data set to $this->request->data, we simply set it to the previously retrieved post. Blog Tutorial - Adding a layer 649

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The edit view might look something like this:

<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/edit.ctp --> <h1>Edit <?php echo echo echo echo echo Post</h1> $this->Form->create(Post); $this->Form->input(title); $this->Form->input(body, array(rows => 3)); $this->Form->input(id, array(type => hidden)); $this->Form->end(Save Post);

This view outputs the edit form (with the values populated), along with any necessary validation error messages. One thing to note here: CakePHP will assume that you are editing a model if the id eld is present in the data array. If no id is present (look back at our add view), Cake will assume that you are inserting a new model when save() is called. You can now update your index view with links to edit specic posts:
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/index.ctp (edit links added) -->

<h1>Blog posts</h1> <p><?php echo $this->Html->link("Add Post", array(action => add)); ?></p> <table> <tr> <th>Id</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Action</th> <th>Created</th> </tr> <!-- Heres where we loop through our $posts array, printing out post info -->

<?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $post[Post][id]; ?></td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link($post[Post][title], array(action => view, </td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link(Edit, array(action => edit, $post[Post][i </td> <td> <?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?> </td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> </table>

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Deleting Posts
Next, lets make a way for users to delete posts. Start with a delete() action in the PostsController:
public function delete($id) { if ($this->request->is(get)) { throw new MethodNotAllowedException(); } if ($this->Post->delete($id)) { $this->Session->setFlash(The post with id: . $id . has been deleted.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } }

This logic deletes the post specied by $id, and uses $this->Session->setFlash() to show the user a conrmation message after redirecting them on to /posts. If the user attempts to do a delete using a GET request, we throw an Exception. Uncaught exceptions are captured by CakePHPs exception handler, and a nice error page is displayed. There are many built-in Exceptions that can be used to indicate the various HTTP errors your application might need to generate. Because were just executing some logic and redirecting, this action has no view. You might want to update your index view with links that allow users to delete posts, however:
<!-- File: /app/View/Posts/index.ctp --> <h1>Blog posts</h1> <p><?php echo $this->Html->link(Add Post, array(action => add)); ?></p> <table> <tr> <th>Id</th> <th>Title</th> <th>Actions</th> <th>Created</th> </tr> <!-- Heres where we loop through our $posts array, printing out post info -->

<?php foreach ($posts as $post): ?> <tr> <td><?php echo $post[Post][id]; ?></td> <td> <?php echo $this->Html->link($post[Post][title], array(action => view, </td> <td> <?php echo $this->Form->postLink( Delete, array(action => delete, $post[Post][id]), array(confirm => Are you sure?)); ?> <?php echo $this->Html->link(Edit, array(action => edit, $post[Post][i </td> <td>

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<?php echo $post[Post][created]; ?> </td> </tr> <?php endforeach; ?> </table>

Using postLink() will create a link that uses Javascript to do a POST request deleting our post. Allowing content to be deleted using GET requests is dangerous, as web crawlers could accidentally delete all your content. Note: This view code also uses the FormHelper to prompt the user with a JavaScript conrmation dialog before they attempt to delete a post.

Routes
For some, CakePHPs default routing works well enough. Developers who are sensitive to user-friendliness and general search engine compatibility will appreciate the way that CakePHPs URLs map to specic actions. So well just make a quick change to routes in this tutorial. For more information on advanced routing techniques, see Routes Conguration. By default, CakePHP responds to a request for the root of your site (i.e. http://www.example.com) using its PagesController, rendering a view called home. Instead, well replace this with our PostsController by creating a routing rule. Cakes routing is found in /app/Config/routes.php. Youll want to comment out or remove the line that denes the default root route. It looks like this:
Router::connect(/, array(controller => pages, action => display, home));

This line connects the URL / with the default CakePHP home page. We want it to connect with our own controller, so replace that line with this one:
Router::connect(/, array(controller => posts, action => index));

This should connect users requesting / to the index() action of our PostsController. Note: CakePHP also makes use of reverse routing - if with the above route dened you pass array(controller => posts, action => index) to a function expecting an array, the resultant URL used will be /. Its therefore a good idea to always use arrays for URLs as this means your routes dene where a URL goes, and also ensures that links point to the same place too.

Conclusion
Creating applications this way will win you peace, honor, love, and money beyond even your wildest fantasies. Simple, isnt it? Keep in mind that this tutorial was very basic. CakePHP has many more features to

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offer, and is exible in ways we didnt wish to cover here for simplicitys sake. Use the rest of this manual as a guide for building more feature-rich applications. Now that youve created a basic Cake application youre ready for the real thing. Start your own project, read the rest of the Cookbook and API (http://api20.cakephp.org). If you need help, come see us in #cakephp. Welcome to CakePHP! Suggested Follow-up Reading These are common tasks people learning CakePHP usually want to study next: 1. Layouts: Customizing your website layout 2. Elements Including and reusing view snippets 3. Scaffolding: Prototyping before creating code 4. Code Generation with Bake Generating basic CRUD code 5. Simple Authentication and Authorization Application: User authentication and authorization tutorial

Simple Authentication and Authorization Application

Following our Blog Tutorial example, imagine we wanted to secure the access to certain urls, based on the logged in user. We also have another requirement, to allow our blog to have multiple authors so each one of them can create their own posts, edit and delete them at will disallowing other authors to make any changes on ones posts.

Creating all users related code

First, lets create a new table in our blog database to hold our users data:
CREATE TABLE users ( id INT UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, username VARCHAR(50), password VARCHAR(50), role VARCHAR(20), created DATETIME DEFAULT NULL, modified DATETIME DEFAULT NULL );

We have adhered to the CakePHP conventions in naming tables, but were also taking advantage of another convention: by using the username and password columns in a users table, CakePHP will be able to auto congure most things for us when implementing the user login. Next step is to create our User model, responsible for nding, saving and validating any user data:
// app/Model/User.php class User extends AppModel { public $validate = array(

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username => array( required => array( rule => array(notEmpty), message => A username is required ) ), password => array( required => array( rule => array(notEmpty), message => A password is required ) ), role => array( valid => array( rule => array(inList, array(admin, author)), message => Please enter a valid role, allowEmpty => false ) ) ); }

Lets also create our UsersController, the following contents correspond to a basic baked UsersController class using the code generation utilities bundled with CakePHP:
// app/Controller/UsersController.php class UsersController extends AppController { public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); $this->Auth->allow(add); } public function index() { $this->User->recursive = 0; $this->set(users, $this->paginate()); } public function view($id = null) { $this->User->id = $id; if (!$this->User->exists()) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid user)); } $this->set(user, $this->User->read(null, $id)); } public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { $this->User->create(); if ($this->User->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(__(The user has been saved)); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } else {

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$this->Session->setFlash(__(The user could not be saved. Please, try again } } }

public function edit($id = null) { $this->User->id = $id; if (!$this->User->exists()) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid user)); } if ($this->request->is(post) || $this->request->is(put)) { if ($this->User->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(__(The user has been saved)); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(__(The user could not be saved. Please, try again } } else { $this->request->data = $this->User->read(null, $id); unset($this->request->data[User][password]); } } public function delete($id = null) { if (!$this->request->is(post)) { throw new MethodNotAllowedException(); } $this->User->id = $id; if (!$this->User->exists()) { throw new NotFoundException(__(Invalid user)); } if ($this->User->delete()) { $this->Session->setFlash(__(User deleted)); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } $this->Session->setFlash(__(User was not deleted)); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } }

In the same way we created the views for our blog posts or by using the code generation tool, we implement the views. For the purpose of this tutorial, we will show just the add.ctp:
<!-- app/View/Users/add.ctp --> <div class="users form"> <?php echo $this->Form->create(User); ?> <fieldset> <legend><?php echo __(Add User); ?></legend> <?php echo $this->Form->input(username); echo $this->Form->input(password); echo $this->Form->input(role, array( options => array(admin => Admin, author => Author) ));

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?> </fieldset> <?php echo $this->Form->end(__(Submit)); ?> </div>

Authentication (login and logout)

Were now ready to add our authentication layer. In CakePHP this is handled by the AuthComponent, a class responsible for requiring login for certain actions, handling user sign-in and sign-out, and also authorizing logged in users to the actions they are allowed to reach. To add this component to your application open your app/Controller/AppController.php le and add the following lines:
// app/Controller/AppController.php class AppController extends Controller { //...

public $components = array( Session, Auth => array( loginRedirect => array(controller => posts, action => index), logoutRedirect => array(controller => pages, action => display, home ) ); public function beforeFilter() { $this->Auth->allow(index, view); } //... }

There is not much to congure, as we used the conventions for the users table. We just set up the urls that will be loaded after the login and logout actions is performed, in our case to /posts/ and / respectively. What we did in the beforeFilter function was to tell the AuthComponent to not require a login for all index and view actions, in every controller. We want our visitors to be able to read and list the entries without registering in the site. Now, we need to be able to register new users, save their username and password, and, more importantly, hash their password so it is not stored as plain text in our database. Lets tell the AuthComponent to let un-authenticated users access the users add function and implement the login and logout action:
// app/Controller/UsersController.php public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); $this->Auth->allow(add); // Letting users register themselves } public function login() { if ($this->request->is(post)) {

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if ($this->Auth->login()) { $this->redirect($this->Auth->redirect()); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(__(Invalid username or password, try again)); } } } public function logout() { $this->redirect($this->Auth->logout()); }

Password hashing is not done yet, open your app/Model/User.php model le and add the following:
// app/Model/User.php App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component); class User extends AppModel { // ...

public function beforeSave($options = array()) { if (isset($this->data[$this->alias][password])) { $this->data[$this->alias][password] = AuthComponent::password($this->data[$this-> } return true; } // ...

So, now every time a user is saved, the password is hashed using the default hashing provided by the AuthComponent class. Were just missing a template view le for the login function, here it is:
<div class="users form"> <?php echo $this->Session->flash(auth); ?> <?php echo $this->Form->create(User); ?> <fieldset> <legend><?php echo __(Please enter your username and password); ?></legend> <?php echo $this->Form->input(username); echo $this->Form->input(password); ?> </fieldset> <?php echo $this->Form->end(__(Login)); ?> </div>

You can now register a new user by accessing the /users/add url and log-in with the newly created credentials by going to /users/login url. Also try to access any other url that was not explicitly allowed such as /posts/add, you will see that the application automatically redirects you to the login page. And thats it! It looks too simple to be truth. Lets go back a bit to explain what happened. The beforeFilter function is telling the AuthComponent to not require a login for the add action in addition to the index and view actions that were already allowed in the AppControllers beforeFilter function. The login action calls the $this->Auth->login() function in the AuthComponent, and it works Simple Authentication and Authorization Application 657

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without any further cong because we are following conventions as mentioned earlier. That is, having a User model with a username and a password column, and use a form posted to a controller with the user data. This function returns whether the login was successful or not, and in the case it succeeds, then we redirect the user to the congured redirection url that we used when adding the AuthComponent to our application. The logout works by just accessing the /users/logout url and will redirect the user to the congured logoutUrl formerly described. This url is the result of the AuthComponent::logout() function on success.

Authorization (whos allowed to access what)

As stated before, we are converting this blog into a multi-user authoring tool, and in order to do this, we need to modify the posts table a bit to add the reference to the User model:
ALTER TABLE posts ADD COLUMN user_id INT(11);

Also, a small change in the PostsController is required to store the currently logged in user as a reference for the created post:

// app/Controller/PostsController.php public function add() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { $this->request->data[Post][user_id] = $this->Auth->user(id); //Added this lin if ($this->Post->save($this->request->data)) { $this->Session->setFlash(Your post has been saved.); $this->redirect(array(action => index)); } } }

The user() function provided by the component returns any column from the currently logged in user. We used this method to add the data into the request info that is saved. Lets secure our app to prevent some authors from editing or deleting the others posts. Basic rules for our app are that admin users can access every url, while normal users (the author role) can only access the permitted actions. Open again the AppController class and add a few more options to the Auth cong:
// app/Controller/AppController.php public $components = array( Session, Auth => array( loginRedirect => array(controller => posts, action => index), logoutRedirect => array(controller => pages, action => display, home), authorize => array(Controller) // Added this line ) ); public function isAuthorized($user) { // Admin can access every action if (isset($user[role]) && $user[role] === admin) {

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return true; } // Default deny return false; }

We just created a very simple authorization mechanism. In this case the users with role admin will be able to access any url in the site when logged in, but the rest of them (i.e the role author) cant do anything different from not logged in users. This is not exactly what we wanted, so we need to supply more rules to our isAuthorized() method. But instead of doing it in AppController, lets delegate each controller to supply those extra rules. The rules were going to add to PostsController should allow authors to create posts but prevent the edition of posts if the author does not match. Open the le PostsController.php and add the following content:
// app/Controller/PostsController.php public function isAuthorized($user) { // All registered users can add posts if ($this->action === add) { return true; } // The owner of a post can edit and delete it if (in_array($this->action, array(edit, delete))) { $postId = $this->request->params[pass][0]; if ($this->Post->isOwnedBy($postId, $user[id])) { return true; } } return parent::isAuthorized($user); }

Were now overriding the AppControllers isAuthorized() call and internally checking if the parent class is already authorizing the user. If he isnt, then just allow him to access the add action, and conditionally access edit and delete. A nal thing is left to be implemented, to tell whether the user is authorized to edit the post or not, were calling a isOwnedBy() function in the Post model. It is in general a good practice to move as much logic as possible into models. Lets then implement the function:
// app/Model/Post.php public function isOwnedBy($post, $user) { return $this->field(id, array(id => $post, user_id => $user)) === $post; }

This concludes our simple authentication and authorization tutorial. For securing the UsersController you can follow the same technique we did for PostsController. You could also be more creative and code something more general in AppController based on your own rules. Should you need more control, we suggest you read the complete Auth guide in the Authentication section where you will nd more about conguring the component, creating custom Authorization classes, and Simple Authentication and Authorization Application 659

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much more. Suggested Follow-up Reading 1. Code Generation with Bake Generating basic CRUD code 2. Authentication: User registration and login

Simple Acl controlled Application

Note: This isnt a beginner level tutorial. If you are just starting out with CakePHP we would advice you to get a better overall experience of the frameworks features before trying out this tutorial. In this tutorial you will create a simple application with Authentication and Access Control Lists. This tutorial assumes you have read the Blog Tutorial tutorial, and you are familiar with Code Generation with Bake. You should have some experience with CakePHP, and be familiar with MVC concepts. This tutorial is a brief introduction to the AuthComponent and AclComponent. What you will need 1. A running web server. Were going to assume youre using Apache, though the instructions for using other servers should be very similar. We might have to play a little with the server conguration, but most folks can get Cake up and running without any conguration at all. 2. A database server. Were going to be using MySQL in this tutorial. Youll need to know enough about SQL in order to create a database: Cake will be taking the reins from there. 3. Basic PHP knowledge. The more object-oriented programming youve done, the better: but fear not if youre a procedural fan.

Preparing our Application

First, lets get a copy of fresh Cake code. To get a fresh download, visit the CakePHP project at GitHub: https://github.com/cakephp/cakephp/tags and download the stable release. For this tutorial you need the latest 2.0 release. You can also clone the repository using git://github.com/cakephp/cakephp.git git (http://git-scm.com/). git clone

Once youve got a fresh copy of cake setup your database.php cong le, and change the value of Security.salt in your app/Cong/core.php. From there we will build a simple database schema to build our application on. Execute the following SQL statements into your database:
CREATE TABLE users ( id INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, username VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL UNIQUE, password CHAR(40) NOT NULL, group_id INT(11) NOT NULL,

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created DATETIME, modified DATETIME );

CREATE TABLE groups ( id INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, name VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL, created DATETIME, modified DATETIME );

CREATE TABLE posts ( id INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, user_id INT(11) NOT NULL, title VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL, body TEXT, created DATETIME, modified DATETIME ); CREATE TABLE widgets ( id INT(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, name VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL, part_no VARCHAR(12), quantity INT(11) );

These are the tables we will be using to build the rest of our application. Once we have the table structure in the database we can start cooking. Use Code Generation with Bake to quickly create your models, controllers, and views. To use cake bake, call cake bake all and this will list the 4 tables you inserted into mySQL. Select 1. Group, and follow the prompts. Repeat for the other 3 tables, and this will have generated the 4 controllers, models and your views for you. Avoid using Scaffold here. The generation of the ACOs will be seriously affected if you bake the controllers with the Scaffold feature. While baking the Models cake will automagically detect the associations between your Models (or relations between your tables). Let cake supply the correct hasMany and belongsTo associations. If you are prompted to pick hasOne or hasMany, generally speaking youll need a hasMany (only) relationships for this tutorial. Leave out admin routing for now, this is a complicated enough subject without them. Also be sure not to add either the Acl or Auth Components to any of your controllers as you are baking them. Well be doing that soon enough. You should now have models, controllers, and baked views for your users, groups, posts and widgets.

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Preparing to Add Auth

We now have a functioning CRUD application. Bake should have setup all the relations we need, if not add them in now. There are a few other pieces that need to be added before we can add the Auth and Acl components. First add a login and logout action to your UsersController:
public function login() { if ($this->request->is(post)) { if ($this->Auth->login()) { $this->redirect($this->Auth->redirect()); } else { $this->Session->setFlash(Your username or password was incorrect.); } } } public function logout() { //Leave empty for now. }

Then create the following view le for login at app/View/Users/login.ctp:

echo $this->Form->create(User, array(action => login)); echo $this->Form->inputs(array( legend => __(Login), username, password )); echo $this->Form->end(Login);

Next well have to update our User model to hash passwords before they go into the database. Storing plaintext passwords is extremely insecure and AuthComponent will expect that your passwords are hashed. In app/Model/User.php add the following:
App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component); class User extends AppModel { // other code.

public function beforeSave($options = array()) { $this->data[User][password] = AuthComponent::password($this->data[User][pass return true; } }

Next we need to make some modications to AppController. If you dont have /app/Controller/AppController.php, create it. Note that this goes in /app/Controller/, not /app/app_controllers.php. Since we want our entire site controlled with Auth and Acl, we will set them up in AppController:
class AppController extends Controller { public $components = array( Acl, Auth => array(

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authorize => array( Actions => array(actionPath => controllers) ) ), Session ); public $helpers = array(Html, Form, Session); public function beforeFilter() { //Configure AuthComponent $this->Auth->loginAction = array(controller => users, action => login); $this->Auth->logoutRedirect = array(controller => users, action => login); $this->Auth->loginRedirect = array(controller => posts, action => add); } }

Before we set up the ACL at all we will need to add some users and groups. With AuthComponent in use we will not be able to access any of our actions, as we are not logged in. We will now add some exceptions so AuthComponent will allow us to create some groups and users. In both your GroupsController and your UsersController Add the following:
public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); // For CakePHP 2.0 $this->Auth->allow(*); // For CakePHP 2.1 and up $this->Auth->allow(); }

These statements tell AuthComponent to allow public access to all actions. This is only temporary and will be removed once we get a few users and groups into our database. Dont add any users or groups just yet though.

Initialize the Db Acl tables

Before we create any users or groups we will want to connect them to the Acl. However, we do not at this time have any Acl tables and if you try to view any pages right now, you will get a missing table error (Error: Database table acos for model Aco was not found.). To remove these errors we need to run a schema le. In a shell run the following:
./Console/cake schema create DbAcl

This schema will prompt you to drop and create the tables. Say yes to dropping and creating the tables. If you dont have shell access, or are having trouble using the console, you can run the sql le found in /path/to/app/Cong/Schema/db_acl.sql. With the controllers setup for data entry, and the Acl tables initialized we are ready to go right? Not entirely, we still have a bit of work to do in the user and group models. Namely, making them auto-magically attach to the Acl. Simple Acl controlled Application 663

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Acts As a Requester
For Auth and Acl to work properly we need to associate our users and groups to rows in the Acl tables. In order to do this we will use the AclBehavior. The AclBehavior allows for the automagic connection of models with the Acl tables. Its use requires an implementation of parentNode() on your model. In our User model we will add the following:
class User extends AppModel { public $belongsTo = array(Group); public $actsAs = array(Acl => array(type => requester)); public function parentNode() { if (!$this->id && empty($this->data)) { return null; } if (isset($this->data[User][group_id])) { $groupId = $this->data[User][group_id]; } else { $groupId = $this->field(group_id); } if (!$groupId) { return null; } else { return array(Group => array(id => $groupId)); } } }

Then in our Group Model Add the following:

class Group extends AppModel { public $actsAs = array(Acl => array(type => requester)); public function parentNode() { return null; } }

What this does, is tie the Group and User models to the Acl, and tell CakePHP that every-time you make a User or Group you want an entry on the aros table as well. This makes Acl management a piece of cake as your AROs become transparently tied to your users and groups tables. So anytime you create or delete a user/group the Aro table is updated. Our controllers and models are now prepped for adding some initial data, and our Group and User models are bound to the Acl table. So add some groups and users using the baked forms by browsing to http://example.com/groups/add and http://example.com/users/add. I made the following groups: administrators managers users I also created a user in each group so I had a user of each different access group to test with later. Write

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everything down or use easy passwords so you dont forget. If you do a SELECT * FROM aros; from a mysql prompt you should get something like the following:
+----+-----------+-------+-------------+-------+------+------+ | id | parent_id | model | foreign_key | alias | lft | rght | +----+-----------+-------+-------------+-------+------+------+ | 1 | NULL | Group | 1 | NULL | 1 | 4 | | 2 | NULL | Group | 2 | NULL | 5 | 8 | | 3 | NULL | Group | 3 | NULL | 9 | 12 | | 4 | 1 | User | 1 | NULL | 2 | 3 | | 5 | 2 | User | 2 | NULL | 6 | 7 | | 6 | 3 | User | 3 | NULL | 10 | 11 | +----+-----------+-------+-------------+-------+------+------+ 6 rows in set (0.00 sec)

This shows us that we have 3 groups and 3 users. The users are nested inside the groups, which means we can set permissions on a per-group or per-user basis. Group-only ACL In case we want simplied per-group only permissions, we need to implement bindNode() in User model:
public function bindNode($user) { return array(model => Group, foreign_key => $user[User][group_id]); }

This method will tell ACL to skip checking User Aros and to check only Group Aros. Every user has to have assigned group_id for this to work. In this case our aros table will look like this:
+----+-----------+-------+-------------+-------+------+------+ | id | parent_id | model | foreign_key | alias | lft | rght | +----+-----------+-------+-------------+-------+------+------+ | 1 | NULL | Group | 1 | NULL | 1 | 2 | | 2 | NULL | Group | 2 | NULL | 3 | 4 | | 3 | NULL | Group | 3 | NULL | 5 | 6 | +----+-----------+-------+-------------+-------+------+------+ 3 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Creating ACOs (Access Control Objects)

Now that we have our users and groups (aros), we can begin inputting our existing controllers into the Acl and setting permissions for our groups and users, as well as enabling login / logout. Our ARO are automatically creating themselves when new users and groups are created. What about a way to auto-generate ACOs from our controllers and their actions? Well unfortunately there is no magic way in CakePHPs core to accomplish this. The core classes offer a few ways to manually create ACOs though. You can create ACO objects from the Acl shell or You can use the AclComponent. Creating Acos from the shell looks like: Simple Acl controlled Application 665

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./Console/cake acl create aco root controllers

While using the AclComponent would look like:

$this->Acl->Aco->create(array(parent_id => null, alias => controllers)); $this->Acl->Aco->save();

Both of these examples would create our root or top level ACO which is going to be called controllers. The purpose of this root node is to make it easy to allow/deny access on a global application scope, and allow the use of the Acl for purposes not related to controllers/actions such as checking model record permissions. As we will be using a global root ACO we need to make a small modication to our AuthComponent conguration. AuthComponent needs to know about the existence of this root node, so that when making ACL checks it can use the correct node path when looking up controllers/actions. In AppController ensure that your $components array contains the actionPath dened earlier:
class AppController extends Controller { public $components = array( Acl, Auth => array( authorize => array( Actions => array(actionPath => controllers) ) ), Session );

Continue to Simple Acl controlled Application - part 2 to continue the tutorial.

Simple Acl controlled Application - part 2

An Automated tool for creating ACOs
As mentioned before, there is no pre-built way to input all of our controllers and actions into the Acl. However, we all hate doing repetitive things like typing in what could be hundreds of actions in a large application. For this purpose exists a very handy plugin available at github, called AclExtras (https://github.com/markstory/acl_extras/) which can be downloaded in The Github Downloads page (https://github.com/markstory/acl_extras/zipball/master). Were going to briey describe how to use it to generate all our ACOs First grab a copy of the plugin and unzipped or clone it using git into app/Plugin/AclExtras. Then activate the plugin in your app/Cong/boostrap.php le as shown below:
//app/Config/boostrap.php // ... CakePlugin::load(AclExtras);

Finally execute the following command in the CakePHP console:

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./Console/cake AclExtras.AclExtras aco_sync

You can get a complete guide for all available commands like this:
./Console/cake AclExtras.AclExtras -h ./Console/cake AclExtras.AclExtras aco_sync -h

Once populated your acos table proceed to create your application permissions.

Setting up permissions
Creating permissions much like creating ACOs has no magic solution, nor will I be providing one. To allow AROs access to ACOs from the shell interface use the AclShell. For more information on how to use it consult the AclShell help which can be accessed by running:
./Console/cake acl --help

Note: * needs to be quoted (*) In order to allow with the AclComponent we would use the following code syntax in a custom method:
$this->Acl->allow($aroAlias, $acoAlias);

We are going to add in a few allow/deny statements now. Add the following to a temporary function in your UsersController and visit the address in your browser to run them (e.g. http://localhost/cake/app/users/initdb). If you do a SELECT * FROM aros_acos you should see a whole pile of 1s and -1s. Once youve conrmed your permissions are set, remove the function:
public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); $this->Auth->allow(initDB); // We can remove this line after were finished } public function initDB() { $group = $this->User->Group; //Allow admins to everything $group->id = 1; $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers); //allow managers to posts and widgets $group->id = 2; $this->Acl->deny($group, controllers); $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers/Posts); $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers/Widgets); //allow users to only add and edit on posts and widgets $group->id = 3; $this->Acl->deny($group, controllers); $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers/Posts/add); $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers/Posts/edit); $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers/Widgets/add); $this->Acl->allow($group, controllers/Widgets/edit);

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//we add an exit to avoid an ugly "missing views" error message echo "all done"; exit; }

We now have set up some basic access rules. Weve allowed administrators to everything. Managers can access everything in posts and widgets. While users can only access add and edit in posts & widgets. We had to get a reference of a Group model and modify its id to be able to specify the ARO we wanted, this is due to how AclBehavior works. AclBehavior does not set the alias eld in the aros table so we must use an object reference or an array to reference the ARO we want. You may have noticed that I deliberately left out index and view from my Acl permissions. We are going to make view and index public actions in PostsController and WidgetsController. This allows non-authorized users to view these pages, making them public pages. However, at any time you can remove these actions from AuthComponent::allowedActions and the permissions for view and edit will revert to those in the Acl. Now we want to take out the references to Auth->allowedActions in your users and groups controllers. Then add the following to your posts and widgets controllers:
public function beforeFilter() { parent::beforeFilter(); $this->Auth->allow(index, view); }

This removes the off switches we put in earlier on the users and groups controllers, and gives public access on the index and view actions in posts and widgets controllers. In AppController::beforeFilter() add the following:
$this->Auth->allow(display);

This makes the display action public. This will keep our PagesController::display() public. This is important as often the default routing has this action as the home page for your application.

Logging in
Our application is now under access control, and any attempt to view non-public pages will redirect you to the login page. However, we will need to create a login view before anyone can login. Add the following to app/View/Users/login.ctp if you havent done so already:
<h2>Login</h2> <?php echo $this->Form->create(User, array(url => array(controller => users, action => echo $this->Form->input(User.username); echo $this->Form->input(User.password); echo $this->Form->end(Login); ?>

If a user is already logged in, redirect him by adding this to your UsersController:

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public function login() { if ($this->Session->read(Auth.User)) { $this->Session->setFlash(You are logged in!); $this->redirect(/, null, false); } }

You should now be able to login and everything should work auto-magically. When access is denied Auth messages will be displayed if you added the echo $this->Session->flash(auth)

Logout
Now onto the logout. Earlier we left this function blank, now is the time to ll it. UsersController::logout() add the following:
$this->Session->setFlash(Good-Bye); $this->redirect($this->Auth->logout());

In

This sets a Session ash message and logs out the User using Auths logout method. Auths logout method basically deletes the Auth Session Key and returns a url that can be used in a redirect. If there is other session data that needs to be deleted as well add that code here.

All done
You should now have an application controlled by Auth and Acl. Users permissions are set at the group level, but you can set them by user at the same time. You can also set permissions on a global and percontroller and per-action basis. Furthermore, you have a reusable block of code to easily expand your ACO table as your app grows.

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CHAPTER 13

Appendices

Appendices contain information regarding the new features introduced in 2.0, and the migration path from 1.3 to 2.0.

2.4 Migration Guide

2.4 Migration Guide
CakePHP 2.4 is a fully API compatible upgrade from 2.3. This page outlines the changes and improvements made in 2.4. Console Logged notice messages will now be colourized in terminals that support colours.
SchemaShell

cake schema generate now supports the --exclude parameter.

BakeShell

cake bake model now supports baking $behaviors. Finding lft, rght and parent_id elds in your table it will add the Tree behavior, for example. You can also extend the ModelTask to support your own behaviors to be recognized.

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FixtureTask

cake bake fixture now supports a --schema parameter to allow baking all xtures with noninteractive all while using schema import. Core
Object

Object::log() had the $scope parameter added. Components

AuthComponent

AuthComponent now supports proper stateless mode when using Basic or Digest authenticators. Starting of session can be prevented by setting AuthComponent::$sessionKey to false. Also now when using only Basic or Digest you are no longer redirected to login page. For more info check the AuthComponent page. Property AuthComponent::$authError can be set to boolean false to suppress ash message from being displayed.
PasswordHasher

Authenticating objects now use new password hasher objects for password hash generation and checking. See Hashing passwords for more info. Model
Models

Model::save(), Model::saveField(), Model::saveAll(), Model::saveAssociated(), Model::saveMany() now take a new counterCache option. You can set it to false to avoid updating counter cache values for the particular save operation. Model::clear() was added.
Datasource

Mysql, Postgres, and SQLserver now support a settings array in the connection denition. This key => value pair will be issued as SET commands when the connection is created.

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View
JsonView

JSONP support has been added to JsonView.

HtmlHelper

The API for HtmlHelper::css() has been been simplied. You can now provide an array of options as the second argument. When you do, the rel attribute defaults to stylesheet. New option escapeTitle added to HtmlHelper::link() to control escaping of only link title and not attributes.
TextHelper

TextHelper::autoParagraph() has been added. It allows to automatically convert text into HTML paragraphs.
PaginatorHelper

PaginatorHelper::param() has been added. Network

CakeRequest

CakeRequest::param() has been added. CakeRequest::is() has been modied to support an array of types and will return true if the request matches any type. CakeRequest::isAll() has been added to check that a request matches all the given types.
CakeEmail

Logged email messages now have the scope of email by default. If you are not seeing email contents in your logs, be sure to add the email scope to your logging conguration. CakeEmail::emailPattern() was added. This method can be used to relax email validation rules. This is useful when dealing with certain Japanese hosts that allow non-compliant addresses to be used.

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HttpSocket

HttpSocket::patch() has been added. I18n

L10n

ell is now the default locale for Greek as specied by ISO 639-3 and gre its alias. The locale folders have to be adjusted accordingly (from /Locale/gre/ to /Locale/ell/ ). fas is now the default locale for Farsi as specied by ISO 639-3 and per its alias. The locale folders have to be adjusted accordingly (from /Locale/per/ to /Locale/fas/ ). sme is now the default locale for Sami as specied by ISO 639-3 and smi its alias. The locale folders have to be adjusted accordingly (from /Locale/smi/ to /Locale/sme/ ). mkd replaces mk as default locale for Macedonian as specied by ISO 639-3. The corresponding locale folders have to be adjusted, as well. Catalog code in has been dropped in favor of id (Indonesian), e has been dropped in favor of el (Greek), n has been dropped in favor of nl (Dutch), p has been dropped in favor of pl (Polish), sz has been dropped in favor of se (Sami). Kazakh has been added with kaz as locale and kk as catalog code. Kalaallisut has been added with kal as locale and kl as catalog code. Logging Log engines do not need the sufx Log anymore in their setup conguration. So for the FileLog engine it sufces to dene engine => File now. This unies the way engines are named in conguration (see Cache engines for example). Note: If you have a Log engine like DatabaseLogger that does not follow the convention to use a sufx Log for your class name you have to adjust your class name to DatabaseLog. You should also avoid class names like SomeLogLog which include the sufx twice at the end.
FileLog

Two new cong options size and rotate have been added for FileLog engine.
SyslogLog

The new logging engine SyslogLog was added to stream messages to syslog.

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Utility
General

pr no longer outputs HTML when running in cli mode.

Validation

Validation::date() now supports the y and ym formats. The country code of Validation::phone() for Canada has been changed from can to ca to unify the country codes for validation methods according to ISO 3166 (two letter codes).
CakeNumber

The currencies AUD, CAD and JPY have been added. The symbols for GBP and EUR are now UTF-8. If you upgrade a non-UTF-8 application, make sure that you update the static $_currencies attribute with the appropriate HTML entity symbols (&#163; and &#8364;) before you use those currencies.
CakeTime

CakeTime::isPast() and CakeTime::isFuture() were added.

Xml

New option pretty has been added to Xml::fromArray() to return nicely formatted Xml Error
ErrorHandler

New conguration option skipLog has been added, to allow skipping certain Exception types to be logged. Configure::write(Exception.skipLog, array(NotFoundException, ForbiddenException)); will avoid these exceptions and the ones extending them to be be logged when Exception.log cong is true

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Routing
Router

Router::baseUrl() was added. This method replaces FULL_BASE_URL. Which is now deprecated.

2.3 Migration Guide

2.3 Migration Guide
CakePHP 2.3 is a fully API compatible upgrade from 2.2. This page outlines the changes and improvements made in 2.3. Constants An application can now easily dene CACHE and LOGS, as they are conditionally dened by CakePHP now. Caching FileEngine is always the default cache engine. In the past a number of people had difculty setting up and deploying APC correctly both in cli + web. Using les should make setting up CakePHP simpler for new developers. Congure::write(Cache.viewPrex, YOURPREFIX); has been added to core.php to allow multiple domains/languages per setup. Component
AuthComponent

A new property AuthComponent::$unauthorizedRedirect has been added. For default true value user is redirected to referrer url upon authorization failure. If set to a string or array user is redirected to that url. If set to false a ForbiddenException exception is thrown instead of redirecting. A new authenticate adapter has been added to support blowsh/bcrypt hashed passwords. You can now use Blowfish in your $authenticate array to allow bcrypt passwords to be used. AuthComponent::redirect() has AuthComponent::redirectUrl() instead. been deprecated. Use

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PaginatorComponent

PaginatorComponent now supports the findType option. This can be used to specify what nd method you want used for pagination. This is a bit easier to manage and set than the 0th index. PaginatorComponent now throws a NotFoundException when trying to access a page which is out of range (i.e. requested page is greater than total page count).
SecurityComponent

SecurityComponent now supports the unlockedActions option. This can be used to disable all security checks for any actions listed in this option.
RequestHandlerComponent

RequestHandlerComponent::viewClassMap() has been added, which is used to map a type to view classname. You can add $settings[viewClassMap] for automatically setting the correct viewClass based on extension/content type.
CookieComponent

CookieComponent::check() CakeSession::check() does. Console

was

added.

This

method

works

the

same

as

The server shell was added. You can use this to start the PHP5.4 webserver for your CakePHP application. Baking a new project now sets the applications cache prex to the name of the application. I18n
L10n

nld is now the default locale for Dutch as specied by ISO 639-3 and dut its alias. The locale folders have to be adjusted accordingly (from /Locale/dut/ to /Locale/nld/ ). Albanian is now sqi, Basque is now eus, Chinese is now zho, Tibetan is now bod, Czech is now ces, Farsi is now fas, French is now fra, Icelandic is now isl, Macedonian is now mkd, Malaysian is now msa, Romanian is now ron, Serbian is now srp and Slovak is now slk. The corresponding locale folders have to be adjusted, as well.

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Core
CakePlugin

CakePlugin::load() can now take a new ignoreMissing option. Setting it to true will prevent le include errors when you try to load routes or bootstrap but they dont exist for a plugin. So essentially you can now use the following statement which will load all plugins and their routes and bootstrap for whatever plugin it can nd:: CakePlugin::loadAll(array(routes => true, bootstrap => true, ignoreMissing => true))
Congure

Configure::check() was added. This method works the same as CakeSession::check() does. ConfigReaderInterface::dump() was added. Please ensure any custom readers you have now implement a dump() method. The $key parameter of IniReader::dump() now supports keys like PluginName.keyname similar to PhpReader::dump(). Error
Exceptions

CakeBaseException was added, which all core Exceptions now extend. The base exception class also introduces the responseHeader() method which can be called on created Exception instances to add headers for the response, as Exceptions dont reuse any response instance. Model Support for the biginteger type was added to all core datasources, and xtures. Support for FULLTEXT indexes was added for the MySQL driver.
Models

Model::find(list) now sets the recursive based on the max containment depth or recursive value. When list is used with ContainableBehavior. Model::find(first) will now return an empty array when no records are found.
Validation

Missing validation methods will always trigger errors now instead of only in development mode.

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Network
SmtpTransport

TLS/SSL support was added for SMTP connections.

CakeRequest

CakeRequest::onlyAllow() was added. CakeRequest::query() was added.

CakeResponse

CakeResponse::file() was added. The content types application/javascript, application/xml, application/rss+xml now also send the application charset.
CakeEmail

The contentDisposition option was added to CakeEmail::attachments(). This allows you to disable the Content-Disposition header added to attached les.
HttpSocket

HttpSocket now veries SSL certicates by default. If you are using self-signed certicates or connecting through proxies you may need to use some of the new options to augment this behavior. See Handling SSL certicates for more information. HttpResponse was renamed to HttpSocketResponse. This avoids a common issue with the http pecl extension. There is an HttpResponse class provided as well for compatibility reasons. Routing
Router

Support for tel:, sms: were added to Router::url(). View MediaView is deprecated, and you can use new features in CakeResponse to achieve the same results. Serialization in Json and Xml views has been moved to _serialize() 2.3 Migration Guide 679

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beforeRender and afterRender callbacks are now being called in Json and Xml views when using view templates. View::fetch() now has a $default argument. This argument can be used to provide a default value should a block be empty. View::prepend() has been added to allow prepending content to existing block. XmlView now uses the _rootNode view variable to customize the top level XML node. View::elementExists() was added. You can use this method to check if elements exist before using them. View::element() had the ignoreMissing option added. You can use this to suppress the errors triggered by missing view elements. View::startIfEmpty() was added.
Layout

The doctype for layout les in the app folder and the bake templates in the cake package has been changed from XHTML to HTML5. Helpers New property Helper::$settings has been added for your helper setting. The $settings parameter of Helper::__construct() is merged with Helper::$settings.
FormHelper

FormHelper::select() now accepts a list of values in the disabled attribute. Combined with multiple => checkbox, this allows you to provide a list of values you want disabled. FormHelper::postLink() now accepts a method key. This allows you to create link forms using HTTP methods other than POST. When creating inputs with FormHelper::input() you can now set the errorMessage option to false. This will disable the error message display, but leave the error classnames intact. The FormHelper now also adds the HTML5 required attribute to your input elements based on validation rules for a eld. If you have a Cancel button in your form which submits the form then you should add formnovalidate => true to your button options to prevent the triggering of validation in html. You can also prevent the validation triggering for the whole form by adding novalidate => true in your FormHelper::create() options. FormHelper::input() now generates input elements of type tel and email based on eld names if type option is not specied.

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HtmlHelper

HtmlHelper::getCrumbList() now has the separator, firstClass and lastClass options. These allow you to better control the HTML this method generates.
TextHelper

TextHelper::tail() was added to truncate text starting from the end. ending in TextHelper::truncate() is deprecated in favor of ellipsis
PaginatorHelper

PaginatorHelper::numbers() now has a new option currentTag to allow specifying extra tag for wrapping current page number. For methods: PaginatorHelper::prev() and PaginatorHelper::next() it is now possible to set the tag option to false to disable the wrapper. Also a new option disabledTag has been added for these two methods. Testing A core xture for the default cake_sessions table was added. You can use it by adding core.cake_sessions to your xture list. CakeTestCase::getMockForModel() was added. This simplies getting mock objects for models. Utility
CakeNumber

CakeNumber::fromReadableSize() was added. CakeNumber::formatDelta() was added. CakeNumber::defaultCurrency() was added.

Folder

Folder::copy() and Folder::move() now support the ability to merge the target and source directories in addition to skip/overwrite.

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String

String::tail() was added to truncate text starting from the end. ending in String::truncate() is deprecated in favor of ellipsis
Debugger

Debugger::exportVar() now outputs private and protected properties in PHP >= 5.3.0.
Security

Support for bcrypt (http://codahale.com/how-to-safely-store-a-password/) was added. Security::hash() documentation for more information on how to use bcrypt.
Validation

See the

Validation::fileSize() was added.

ObjectCollection

ObjectCollection::attached() was deprecated in favor of the new method ObjectCollection::loaded(). This unies the access to the ObjectCollection as load()/unload() already replaced attach()/detach().

2.2 Migration Guide

2.2 Migration Guide
CakePHP 2.2 is a fully API compatible upgrade from 2.0/2.1. This page outlines the changes and improvements made for 2.2. Required steps to upgrade When upgrading to CakePHP 2.2 its important to add a few new conguration values to app/Config/bootstrap.php. Adding these will ensure consistent behavior with 2.1.x:
// Enable the Dispatcher filters for plugin assets, and // CacheHelper. Configure::write(Dispatcher.filters, array( AssetDispatcher, CacheDispatcher ));

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// Add logging configuration. CakeLog::config(debug, array( engine => FileLog, types => array(notice, info, debug), file => debug, )); CakeLog::config(error, array( engine => FileLog, types => array(warning, error, critical, alert, emergency), file => error, ));

You will also need to modify app/Config/core.php. Change the value of LOG_ERROR to LOG_ERR:
define(LOG_ERROR, LOG_ERR);

When using Model::validateAssociated() or Model::saveAssociated() and primary model validation fails, the validation errors of associated models are no longer wiped out. Model::$validationErrors will now always show all the errors. You might need to update your test cases to reect this change. Console
I18N extract shell

An option was added to overwrite existing POT les by default:

./Console/cake i18n extract --overwrite

Models Model::find(count) will now call the custom nd methods with $state = before and $queryData[operation] = count. In many cases custom nds already return correct counts for pagination, but operation key allows more exibility to build other queries, or drop joins which are required for the custom nder itself. As the pagination of custom nd methods never worked quite well it required workarounds for this in the model level, which are now no longer needed. Model::find(first) will now return an empty array when no records are found. Datasources Dbo datasources now supports real nested transactions. If you need to use this feature in your application, enable it using ConnectionManager::getDataSource(default)->useNestedTransactions = true;

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Testing The webrunner now includes links to re-run a test with debug output. Generated test cases for Controller now subclass ControllerTestCase. Error Handling When repeat exceptions, or exception are raised when rendering error pages, the new error layout will be used. Its recommended to not use additional helpers in this layout as its intended for development level errors only. This xes issues with fatal errors in rendering error pages due to helper usage in the default layout. It is important to copy the app/View/Layouts/error.ctp into your app directory. Failing to do so will make error page rendering fail. You can now congure application specic console error handling. By setting Error.consoleHandler, and Exception.consoleHandler you can dene the callback that will handle errors/exceptions raised in console applications. The handler congured in Error.handler and Error.consoleHandler will receive fatal error codes (ie. E_ERROR, E_PARSE, E_USER_ERROR).
Exceptions

The NotImplementedException was added. Core

Congure

Configure::dump() was added. It is used to persist conguration data in durable storage like les. Both PhpReader and IniReader work with it. A new cong parameter Cong.timezone is available which you can set to users timezone string. eg. You can do Configure::write(Config.timezone, Europe/Paris). If a method of CakeTime class is called with $timezone parameter as null and Cong.timezone is set, then the value of Cong.timezone will be used. This feature allows you to set users timezone just once instead of passing it each time in function calls. Controller
AuthComponent

The options for adapters dened in AuthComponent::$authenticate now accepts a contain option. This is used to set containable options for when user records are loaded.

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CookieComponent

You can now encrypt cookie values with the rijndael cipher. This requires the mcrypt (http://php.net/mcrypt) extension to be installed. Using rijndael gives cookie values actual encryption, and is recommended in place of the XOR cipher available in previous releases. The XOR cipher is still the default cipher scheme to maintain compatibility with previous releases. You can read more in the Security::rijndael() documentation. Pagination Paginating custom nders will now return correct counts, see Model changes for more info. Network
CakeEmail

CakeEmail::charset() and CakeEmail::headerCharset() were added. Legacy Japanese encodings are now handled correctly. ISO-2202-JP is used when the encoding is ISO-2202-JP-MS which works around a number of issues in mail clients when dealing with the CP932 and Shift_JIS encodings. CakeEmail::theme() was added. CakeEmail::domain() was added. You can use this method to set the domain name used when sending email from a CLI script or if you want to control the hostname used to send email. You can now dene theme and helpers in your EmailCong class.
CakeRequest

CakeRequest will now automatically decode application/x-www-form-urlencoded request bodies on PUT and DELETE requests. This data will be available as $this->data just like POST data is. Utility
Set

The Set class is now deprecated, and replaced by the Hash class. Set will not be removed until 3.0. Set::expand() was added.

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Hash

The Hash class was added in 2.2. It replaced Set providing a more consistent, reliable and performant API to doing many of the same tasks Set does. See the Hash page for more detail.
CakeTime

The $userOffset parameter has been replaced with $timezone parameter in all relevant functions. So instead of numeric offset you can now pass in a timezone string or DateTimeZone object. Passing numeric offsets for $timezone parameter is still possible for backwards compatibility. CakeTime::timeAgoInWords() had the accuracy option added. This option allows you to specify how accurate formatted times should be. New methods added: CakeTime::toServer() CakeTime::timezone() CakeTime::listTimezones() The $dateString parameter in all methods now accepts a DateTime object. Helpers
FormHelper

FormHelper now better handles adding required classes to inputs. It now honors the on key. FormHelper::radio() now supports an empty which works similar to the empty option on select(). Added FormHelper::inputDefaults() to set common properties for each of the inputs generated by the helper
TimeHelper

Since 2.1, TimeHelper uses the CakeTime class for all its relevant methods. The $userOffset parameter has been replaced with $timezone parameter. TimeHelper::timeAgoInWords() has the element option added. This allows you to specify an HTML element to wrap the formatted time.
HtmlHelper

HtmlHelper::tableHeaders() now supports setting attributes per table cell.

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Routing
Dispatcher

Event listeners can now be attached to the dispatcher calls, those will have the ability to change the request information or the response before it is sent to the client. Check the full documentation for this new features in Dispatcher Filters With the addition of Dispatcher Filters youll need to update app/Config/bootstrap.php. See Required steps to upgrade.
Router

Router::setExtensions() has been added. With the new method you can now add more extensions to be parsed, for example within a plugin routes le. Cache
Redis Engine

A new caching engine was added using the phpredis extension (https://github.com/nicolasff/phpredis) it is congured similarly to the Memcache engine.
Cache groups

It is now possible to tag or label cache keys under groups. This makes it simpler to mass-delete cache entries associated to the same label. Groups are declared at conguration time when creating the cache engine:
Cache::config(array( engine => Redis, ... groups => array(post, comment, user) ));

You can have as many groups as you like, but keep in mind they cannot be dynamically modied. The Cache::clearGroup() class method was added. It takes the group name and deletes all entries labeled with the same string. Log Changes in CakeLog now require, some additional conguration app/Config/bootstrap.php. See Required steps to upgrade, and Logging. in your

The CakeLog class now accepts the same log levels as dened in RFC 5424 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5424). Several convenience methods have also been added:

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CakeLog::emergency($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::alert($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::critical($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::error($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::warning($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::notice($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::info($message, $scope = array()) CakeLog::debug($message, $scope = array()) A third argument $scope has been added to CakeLog::write. See Logging Scopes. A new log engine: ConsoleLog has been added. Model Validation A new object ModelValidator was added to delegate the work of validating model data, it should be transparent to the application and fully backwards compatible. It also exposes a rich API to add, modify and remove validation rules. Check docs for this object in Data Validation. Custom validation functions in your models need to have public visibility so that they are accessible by ModelValidator. New validation rules added: Validation::naturalNumber() Validation::mimeType() Validation::uploadError()

2.1 Migration Guide

2.1 Migration Guide
CakePHP 2.1 is a fully API compatible upgrade from 2.0. This page outlines the changes and improvements made for 2.1. AppController, AppHelper, AppModel and AppShell These classes are now required to be part of the app directory, as they were removed from the CakePHP core. If you do not already have these classes, you can use the following while upgrading:

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// app/View/Helper/AppHelper.php App::uses(Helper, View); class AppHelper extends Helper { } // app/Model/AppModel.php App::uses(Model, Model); class AppModel extends Model { } // app/Controller/AppController.php App::uses(Controller, Controller); class AppController extends Controller { } // app/Console/Command/AppShell.php App::uses(Shell, Console); class AppShell extends Shell { }

If your application already has these les/classes you dont need to do anything. Additionally if you were using the core PagesController, you would need to copy this to your app/Controller directory as well. .htaccess les The default .htaccess les have changed, you should remember to update them or update your webservers URL re-writing scheme to match the changes done in .htaccess Models The beforeDelete callback will be red before behaviors beforeDelete callbacks. This makes it consistent with the rest of the events triggered in the model layer. Model::find(threaded) now accepts $options[parent] if using other eld then parent_id. Also if the model has TreeBehavior attached and set up with other parent eld, the threaded nd will by default use that. Parameters for queries using prepared statements will now be part of the SQL dump. Validation arrays can now be more specic with when a eld is required. The required key now accepts create and update. These values will make a eld required when creating or updating. Model now has a schemaName property. If your application switches datasources by modifying Model::$useDbConfig you should also modify schemaName or use Model::setDataSource() method which handles this for you.
CakeSession

Changed in version 2.1.1: CakeSession no longer sets the P3P header, as this is the responsibility of your application. More info see ticket #2515 (http://cakephp.lighthouseapp.com/projects/42648/tickets/25152.1 Migration Guide 689

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cakephp-20-session-p3p-header-doesnt-work-in-an-iframe) in lighthouse Behaviors

TranslateBehavior

I18nModel has been moved into a separate le. Exceptions The default exception rendering now includes more detailed stack traces including le excerpts and argument dumps for all functions in the stack. Utility
Debugger

Debugger::getType() has been added. It can be used to get the type of variables. Debugger::exportVar() has been modied to create more readable and useful output.
debug()

debug() now uses Debugger internally. This makes it consistent with Debugger, and takes advantage of improvements made there.
Set

Set::nest() has been added. It takes in a at array and returns a nested array
File

File::info() includes lesize & mimetype information. File::mime() was added.

Cache

CacheEngine has been moved into a separate le.

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Congure

ConfigReaderInterface has been moved into a separate le.

App

App::build() now has the ability to register new packages using App::REGISTER. See Add new packages to an application for more information. Classes that could not be found on congured paths will be searched inside APP as a fallback path. This makes autoloading nested directories in app/Vendor easier. Console
Test Shell

A new TestShell has been added. It reduces the typing required to run unit tests, and offers a le path based UI:
./Console/cake test app Model/Post ./Console/cake test app Controller/PostsController ./Console/cake test Plugin View/Helper/MyHelper

The old testsuite shell and its syntax are still available.
General

Generated les no longer contain timestamps with the generation datetime. Routing
Router

Routes can now use a special /** syntax to include all trailing arguments as a single passed argument. See the section on Connecting Routes for more information. Router::resourceMap() was added. Router::defaultRouteClass() was added. This method allows you to set the default route class used for all future routes that are connected. Network
CakeRequest

Added is(requested) and isRequested() for detecting requestAction. 2.1 Migration Guide 691

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CakeResponse

Added CakeResponse::cookie() for setting cookies. Added a number of methods for Fine tuning HTTP cache Controller
Controller

Controller::$uses was modied the default value is now true instead of false. Additionally different values are handled slightly differently, but will behave the same in most cases. true Will load the default model and merge with AppController. An array will load those models and merge with AppController. An empty array will not load any models other than those declared in the base class. false will not load any models, and will not merge with the base class either. Components
AuthComponent

AuthComponent::allow() no longer accepts allow(*) as a wildcard for all actions. Just use allow(). This unies the API between allow() and deny(). recursive option was added to all authentication adapters. Allows you to more easily control the associations stored in the session.
AclComponent

AclComponent no longer lowercases and inects the classname used for Acl.classname. Instead it uses the provided value as is. Acl backend implementations should now be put in Controller/Component/Acl. Acl implementations should be moved into the Component/Acl directory from Component. For example if your Acl class was called CustomAclComponent, and was in Controller/Component/CustomAclComponent.php. It should be moved into Controller/Component/Acl/CustomAcl.php, and be named CustomAcl. DbAcl has been moved into a separate le. IniAcl has been moved into a separate le. AclInterface has been moved into a separate le.

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Helpers
TextHelper

TextHelper::autoLink(), TextHelper::autoLinkUrls(), TextHelper::autoLinkEmails() now HTML escape their input by default. You can control this with the escape option.
HtmlHelper

HtmlHelper::script() had a block option added. HtmlHelper::scriptBlock() had a block option added. HtmlHelper::css() had a block option added. HtmlHelper::meta() had a block option added. The $startText parameter of HtmlHelper::getCrumbs() can now be an array. This gives more control and exibility over the rst crumb link. HtmlHelper::docType() now defaults to html5. HtmlHelper::image() now has a fullBase option. HtmlHelper::media() has been added. You can use this method to create HTML5 audio/video elements. plugin syntax support has been added for HtmlHelper::script(), HtmlHelper::css(), HtmlHelper::image(). You can now easily link to plugin assets using Plugin.asset. HtmlHelper::getCrumbList() had the $startText parameter added. View View::$output is deprecated. $content_for_layout is deprecated. Use $this->fetch(content); instead. $scripts_for_layout is deprecated. Use the following instead:
echo $this->fetch(meta); echo $this->fetch(css); echo $this->fetch(script);

$scripts_for_layout is still available, but the view blocks API gives a more extensible & exible replacement. The Plugin.view syntax is now available everywhere. You can use this syntax anywhere you reference the name of a view, layout or element. The $options[plugin] option for element() is deprecated. Plugin.element_name instead. You should use

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Content type views

Two new view classes have been added to CakePHP. A new JsonView and XmlView allow you to easily generate XML and JSON views. You can learn more about these classes in the section on JSON and XML views
Extending views

View has a new method allowing you to wrap or extend a view/element/layout with another le. See the section on Extending Views for more information on this feature.
Themes

The ThemeView class is deprecated in favor of the View class. Simply setting $this->theme = MyTheme will enable theme support, and all custom View classes which extend from ThemeView should extend View.
View blocks

View blocks are a exible way to create slots or blocks in your views. Blocks replace $scripts_for_layout with a more robust and exible API. See the section on Using view blocks for more information. Helpers
New callbacks

Two new callbacks have been added to Helpers. Helper::beforeRenderFile() and Helper::afterRenderFile() these new callbacks are red before/after every view fragment is rendered. This includes elements, layouts and views.
CacheHelper

<!--nocache--> tags now work inside elements correctly.

FormHelper

FormHelper now omits disabled elds from the secured elds hash. This makes working with SecurityComponent and disabled inputs easier. The between option when used in conjunction with radio inputs, now behaves differently. The between value is now placed between the legend and rst input elements.

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The hiddenField option with checkbox inputs can now be set to a specic value such as N rather than just 0. The for attribute for date + time inputs now reects the rst generated input. This may result in the for attribute changing for generated datetime inputs. The type attribute for FormHelper::button() can be removed now. It still defaults to submit. FormHelper::radio() now allows you to disable all options. You can do this by setting either disabled => true or disabled => disabled in the $attributes array.
PaginatorHelper

PaginatorHelper::numbers() now has a currentClass option. Testing Web test runner now displays the PHPUnit version number. Web test runner now defaults to displaying app tests. Fixtures can be created in different datasources other than $test. Models loaded using the ClassRegistry and using another datasource will get their datasource name prepended with test_ (e.g datasource master will try to use test_master in the testsuite) Test cases are generated with class specic setup methods. Events A new generic events system has been built and it replaced the way callbacks were dispatched. This should not represent any change to your code. You can dispatch your own events and attach callbacks to them at will, useful for inter-plugin communication and easier decoupling of your classes.

New Features in CakePHP 2.1

Models
Model::saveAll(), Model::saveAssociated(), Model::validateAssociated()

Model::saveAll() and friends now support passing the eldList for multiple models. Example:
$this->SomeModel->saveAll($data, array( fieldList => array( SomeModel => array(field_1), AssociatedModel => array(field_2, field_3)

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) ));

Model::saveAll() and friends now can save unlimited levels deep. Example:

$data = array( Article => array(title => My first article), Comment => array( array(body => Comment 1, user_id => 1), array(body => Save a new user as well, User => array(first => mad, last ), ); $this->SomeModel->saveAll($data, array(deep => true));

View
View Blocks

View Blocks are a mechanism to allow the inclusion of slots of content, whilst allowing child view classes or elements to provide custom content for that block. Blocks are output by calling the fetch method on the View. For example, the following can be placed in your View/Layouts/default.ctp le:
<?php echo $this->fetch(my_block); ?>

This will echo the content of the block if available, or an empty string if it is undened. Setting the content of a block can be done in a number of ways. A simple assignment of data can be done using assign:
<?php $this->assign(my_block, Hello Block); ?>

Or you can use it to capture a section of more complex content:

<?php $this->start(my_block); ?> <h1>Hello Block!</h1> <p>This is a block of content</p> <p>Page title: <?php echo $title_for_layout; ?></p> <?php $this->end(); ?>

Block capturing also supports nesting:

<?php $this->start(my_block); ?> <h1>Hello Block!</h1> <p>This is a block of content</p> <?php $this->start(second_block); ?> <p>Page title: <?php echo $title_for_layout; ?></p> <?php $this->end(); ?> <?php $this->end(); ?>

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ThemeView

In 2.1, the use of ThemeView is deprecated in favor of using the View class itself. ThemeView is now a stub class. All custom pathing code has been moved into the View class, meaning that it is now possible for classes extending the View class to automatically support themes. Whereas before we might set the $viewClass Controller property to Theme, it is now possible to enable themes by simply setting the $theme property. Example:
App::uses(Controller, Controller); class AppController extends Controller { public $theme = Example; }

All View classes which extended ThemeView in 2.0 should now simply extend View.
JsonView

A new view class that eases the output of JSON content. Previously, it was necessary to create a JSON layout (APP/View/Layouts/json/default.ctp) and a corresponding view for each action that would output JSON. This is no longer required with JsonView. The JsonView is used like any other view class, by dening it on the controller. Example:
App::uses(Controller, Controller); class AppController extends Controller { public $viewClass = Json; }

Once you have setup the controller, you need to identify what content should be serialized as JSON, by setting the view variable _serialize. Example:
$this->set(compact(users, posts, tags)); $this->set(_serialize, array(users, posts));

The above example would result in only the users and posts variables being serialized for the JSON output, like so:
{"users": [...], "posts": [...]}

There is no longer any need to create view ctp les in order to display Json content. Further customization of the output can be achieved by extending the JsonView class with your own custom view class if required. The following example wraps the result with {results:
App::uses(JsonView, View); class ResultsJsonView extends JsonView {

...

}:

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public function render($view = null, $layout = null) { $result = parent::render($view, $layout); if (isset($this->viewVars[_serialize])) { return json_encode(array(results => json_decode($result))); } return $result; } }

XmlView

Much like the JsonView, the XmlView requires you to set the _serialize view variable in order to indicate what information should be serialized into XML for output:
$this->set(compact(users, posts, tags)); $this->set(_serialize, array(users, posts));

The above example would result in only the users and posts variables being serialized for the XML output, like so:
<response><users>...</users><posts>...</posts></response>

Note that the XmlView adds a response node to wrap all serialized content.
Conditional View Rendering

Several new methods were added to CakeRequest to ease the task of setting correct HTTP headers to foster HTTP caching. You can now dene our caching strategy using the expiration or validation HTTP cache model, or combine both. Now there are specic methods in CakeRequest to ne-tune CacheControl directives, set the entity tag (Etag), set the Last-Modied time and much more. When those methods are combined with having the RequestHandlerComponent enabled in your controller, the component will automatically decide if the response is already cached in the client and will send a 304 Not Modied status code before rendering the view. Skipping the view rendering process saves CPU cycles and memory.:
class ArticlesController extends AppController { public $components = array(RequestHandler); public function view($id) { $article = $this->Article->read(null, $id); $this->response->modified($article[Article][modified]); $this->set(compact(article)); } }

In the above example the view will not be rendered if the client sent the header If-Modied-Since, and the response will have a 304 status.

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Helpers To allow easier use outside of the View layer, methods from TimeHelper, TextHelper, and NumberHelper helpers have been extracted to CakeTime, String, and CakeNumber classes respectively. To use the new utility classes:
class AppController extends Controller { public function log($msg) { $msg .= String::truncate($msg, 100); parent::log($msg); } }

You can override the default class to use by creating a new class in your APP/Utility folder, e.g.: Utility/MyAwesomeStringClass.php, and specify it in engine key:
// Utility/MyAwesomeStringClass.php class MyAwesomeStringClass extends String { // my truncate is better than yours public function static truncate($text, $length = 100, $options = array()) { return null; } } // Controller/AppController.php class AppController extends Controller { public $helpers = array( Text => array( engine => MyAwesomeStringClass, ), ); }

HtmlHelper

A new function HtmlHelper::media() has been added for HTML5s audio/video element generation.

2.0 Migration Guide

2.0 Migration Guide
This page summarizes the changes from CakePHP 1.3 that will assist in a project migration to 2.0, as well as for a developer reference to get up to date with the changes made to the core since the CakePHP 1.3 branch. Be sure to read the other pages in this guide for all the new features and API changes.

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Tip: Be sure to checkout the Upgrade shell included in the 2.0 core to help you migrate your 1.3 code to 2.0.

PHP Version Support CakePHP 2.x supports PHP Version 5.2.8 and above. PHP4 support has been dropped. For developers that are still working with production PHP4 environments, the CakePHP 1.x versions continue to support PHP4 for the lifetime of their development and support lifetime. The move to PHP 5 means all methods and properties have been updated with visibility keywords. If your code is attempting access to private or protected methods from a public scope, you will encounter errors. While this does not really constitute a large framework change, it means that access to tighter visibility methods and variables is now not possible. File and Folder naming In CakePHP 2.0 we rethought the way we are structuring our les and folders. Given that PHP 5.3 is supporting namespaces we decided to prepare our code base for adopting in a near future this PHP version, so we adopted the https://github.com/php-g/g-standards/blob/master/accepted/PSR-0.md. At rst we glanced at the internal structure of CakePHP 1.3 and realized that after all these years there was no clear organization in the les, nor did the directory structure really hint where each le should be located. With this change we would be allowed to experiment a little with (almost) automatic class loading for increasing the overall framework performance. Biggest roadblock for achieving this was maintaining some sort of backwards compatibility in the way the classes are loaded right now, and we denitely did not want to become a framework of huge class prexes, having classnames like My_Huge_Class_Name_In_Package. We decided adopting a strategy of keeping simple class names while offering a very intuitive way of declaring class locations and clear migration path for future PHP 5.3 version of CakePHP. First lets highlight the main changes in le naming standard we adopted:
File names

All les containing classes should be named after the class it contains. No le should contain more than one class. So, no more lowercasing and underscoring your le names. Here are some examples: my_things_controller.php becomes MyThingsController.php form.php (a Helper) becomes FormHelper.php session.php (a Component) becomes SessionComponent.php This makes le naming a lot more clear and consistent across applications, and also avoids a few edge cases where the le loader would get confused in the past and load les it should not.

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Folder Names

Most folders should be also CamelCased, especially when containing classes. Think of namespaces, each folder represents a level in the namespacing hierarchy, folders that do not contain classes, or do not constitute a namespace on themselves, should be lowercased. CamelCased Folders: Cong Console Controller Controller/Component Lib Locale Model Model/Behavior Plugin Test Vendor View View/Helper lowercased Folders: tmp webroot htaccess (URL Rewriting) In your app/webroot/.htaccess replace line RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php?url=$1 [QSA,L] with RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [QSA,L] AppController / AppModel / AppHelper / AppShell The app/app_controller.php, app/app_model.php, app/app_helper.php are now located and named as app/Controller/AppController.php, app/Model/AppModel.php and app/View/Helper/AppHelper.php respectively. Also all shell/task now extend AppShell. app/Console/Command/AppShell.php You can have your custom AppShell.php at

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Internationalization / Localization __() (Double underscore shortcut function) always returns the translation (not echo anymore). If you want to echo the result of the translation, use:
echo __(My Message);

This change includes all shortcut translation methods:

__() __n() __d() __dn() __dc() __dcn() __c()

Alongside this, if you pass additional parameters, the translation will call sprintf (http://php.net/manual/en/function.sprintf.php) with these parameters before returning. For example:
// Will return something like "Called: MyClass:myMethod" echo __(Called: %s:%s, $className, $methodName);

It is valid for all shortcut translation methods. More information about the speciers, you can see in sprintf (http://php.net/manual/en/function.sprintf.php) function. Class location and constants changed The constants APP and CORE_PATH have consistent values between the web and console environments. In previous versions of CakePHP these values changed depending on your environment. Basics.php getMicrotime() has been removed. Use the native microtime(true) instead. e() was removed. Use echo. r() was removed. Use str_replace. a() was removed. Use array() aa() was removed. Use array() up() was removed. Use strtoupper() low() was removed. Use strtolower() params() was removed. It was not used anywhere in CakePHP. ife() was removed. Use a ternary operator. uses() was removed. Use App::import() instead. 702 Chapter 13. Appendices

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Compatibility functions for PHP4 have been removed. PHP5 constant has been removed. Global var called $TIME_START was removed use the constant TIME_START or $_SERVER[REQUEST_TIME] instead.
Removed Constants

A number of constants were removed, as they were no longer accurate, or duplicated. APP_PATH BEHAVIORS COMPONENTS CONFIGS CONSOLE_LIBS CONTROLLERS CONTROLLER_TESTS ELEMENTS HELPERS HELPER_TESTS LAYOUTS LIB_TESTS LIBS MODELS MODEL_TESTS SCRIPTS VIEWS CakeRequest This new class encapsulates the parameters and functions related to an incoming request. It replaces many features inside Dispatcher, RequestHandlerComponent and Controller. It also replaces $this->params array in all places. CakeRequest implements ArrayAccess so many interactions with the old params array do not need to change. See the CakeRequest new features for more information.

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Request handling, $_GET[url] and .htaccess les CakePHP no longer uses $_GET[url] for handling application request paths. Instead it uses $_SERVER[PATH_INFO]. This provides a more uniform way of handling requests between servers with URL rewriting and those without. Because of these changes, youll need to update your .htaccess les and app/webroot/index.php, as these les were changed to accommodate the changes. Additionally $this->params[url][url] no longer exists. Instead you should be using $this->request->url to access the same value. This attribute now contains the url without the leading slash / prepended. Note: For the homepage itself (http://domain/) $this->request->url now returns boolean false instead of /. Make sure you check on that accordingly:
if (!$this->request->url) {} // instead of $this->request->url === /

Components Component is now the required base class for all components. You should update your components and their constructors, as both have changed:
class PrgComponent extends Component { public function __construct(ComponentCollection $collection, $settings = array()) { parent::__construct($collection, $settings); } }

As with helpers it is important to call parent::__construct() in components with overridden constructors. Settings for a component are also passed into the constructor now, and not the initialize() callback. This makes getting well constructed objects easier, and allows the base class to handle setting the properties up. Since settings have been moved to the component constructor, the initialize() callback no longer receives $settings as its 2nd parameter. You should update your components to use the following method signature:
public function initialize(Controller $controller) { }

Additionally, the initialize() method is only called on components that are enabled. This usually means components that are directly attached to the controller object.
Deprecated callbacks removed

All the deprecated callbacks in Component have not been transferred to ComponentCollection. Instead you should use the trigger() method to interact with callbacks. If you need to trigger a callback you could do so by calling:
$this->Components->trigger(someCallback, array(&$this));

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Changes in disabling components

In the past you were able to disable components via $this->Auth->enabled = false; for example. In CakePHP 2.0 you should use the ComponentCollections disable method, $this->Components>disable(Auth);. Using the enabled property will not work.
AclComponent

AclComponent implementations are now required to implement AclInterface. AclComponent::adapter() has been added to allow runtime modication of the ACL implementation the component uses. AclComponent::grant() has been deprecated, it will be removed in a future version. Use AclComponent::allow() instead. AclComponent::revoke() has been deprecated, it will be removed in a future version. Use AclComponent::deny() instead.
RequestHandlerComponent

Many of RequestHandlerComponents methods are just proxies for CakeRequest methods. The following methods have been deprecated and will be removed in future versions: isSsl() isAjax() isPost() isPut() isFlash() isDelete() getReferer() getClientIp() accepts(), prefers(), requestedWith() All deal in mapped content types now. They no longer work with mime-types. You can use RequestHandler::setContent() to create new content types. RequestHandler::setContent() no longer accepts an array as a single argument, you must supply both arguments.
SecurityComponent

SecurityComponent no longer handles Basic and Digest Authentication. These are both handled by the new AuthComponent. The following methods have been removed from SecurityComponent:

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requireLogin() generateDigestResponseHash() loginCredentials() loginRequest() parseDigestAuthData() In addition the following properties were removed: $loginUsers $requireLogin Moving these features to AuthComponent was done to provide a single place for all types of authentication and to streamline the roles of each component.
AuthComponent

The AuthComponent was entirely re-factored for 2.0, this was done to help reduce developer confusion and frustration. In addition, AuthComponent was made more exible and extensible. You can nd out more in the Authentication guide.
EmailComponent

The EmailComponent has been deprecated and has created a new library class to send e-mails. See CakeEmail Email changes for more details.
SessionComponent

Session component has lost the following methods. activate() active() __start() cakeError removed The cakeError() method has been removed. Its recommended that you switch all uses of cakeError to use exceptions. cakeError was removed because it was simulating exceptions. Instead of simulation, real exceptions are used in CakePHP 2.0.

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Error handling The error handling implementation has dramatically changed in 2.0. Exceptions have been introduced throughout the framework, and error handling has been updated to offer more control and exibility. You can read more in the Exceptions and Error Handling section. Lib classes
App

The API for App::build() has changed to App::build($paths, $mode). It now allows you to either append, prepend or reset/replace existing paths. The $mode param can take any of the following 3 values: App::APPEND, App::PREPEND, App::RESET. The default behavior of the function remains the same (ie. Prepending new paths to existing list). App::path() Now supports plugins, App::path(Controller, Users) will return the folder location of the controllers in the Users plugin. Wont merge core paths anymore, it will only return paths dened in App::build() or default ones in app (or corresponding plugin). App::build() Will not merge app path with core paths anymore. App::objects() Now supports plugins, App::objects(Users.Model) will return the models in plugin Users. Returns array() instead of false for empty results or invalid types. Does not return core objects anymore, App::objects(core) will return array(). Returns the complete class name. App class lost the following properties, use method App::path() to access their value App::$models App::$behaviors App::$controllers App::$components App::$datasources App::$libs App::$views

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App::$helpers App::$plugins App::$vendors App::$locales App::$shells App::import() No longer looks for classes recursively, it strictly uses the values for the paths dened in App::build(). Will not be able to load App::import(Component, Component) use App::uses(Component, Controller); Using App::import(Lib, CoreClass) to load core classes is no longer possible. Importing a non-existent le, supplying a wrong type or package name, or null values for $name and $le parameters will result in a false return value. App::import(Core, CoreClass) is no longer supported, use App::uses() instead and let the class autoloading do the rest. Loading Vendor les does not look recursively in the vendors folder, it will also no longer convert the le to underscored as it did in the past. App::core() First parameter is no longer optional, it will always return one path It cant be used anymore to get the vendors paths It will only accept new style package names Class loading with App::uses() Although there has been a huge refactoring in how the classes are loaded, in very few occasions you will need to change your application code to respect the way you were used to doing it. The biggest change is the introduction of a new method:
App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component);

We decided the function name should emulate PHP 5.3s use keyword, just as a way of declaring where a classname should be located. The rst parameter of App::uses() is the complete name of the class you intend to load, and the second one, the package name (or namespace) where it belongs to. The main difference with CakePHP 1.3s App::import() is that the former wont actually import the class, it will just setup the system so when the class is used for the rst time it will be located. Some examples on using App::uses() when migrating from App::import():
App::import(Controller, Pages); // becomes App::uses(PagesController, Controller);

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App::import(Component, Auth); // becomes App::uses(AuthComponent, Controller/Component); App::import(View, Media); // becomes App::uses(MediaView, View); App::import(Core, Xml); // becomes App::uses(Xml, Utility); App::import(Datasource, MongoDb.MongoDbSource); // becomes App::uses(MongoDbSource, MongoDb.Model/Datasource);

All classes that were loaded in the past using App::import(Core, $class); will need to be loaded using App::uses() referring to the correct package. See the api to locate the classes in their new folders. Some examples:
App::import(Core, CakeRoute); // becomes App::uses(CakeRoute, Routing/Route); App::import(Core, Sanitize); // becomes App::uses(Sanitize, Utility); App::import(Core, HttpSocket); // becomes App::uses(HttpSocket, Network/Http);

In contrast to how App::import() worked in the past, the new class loader will not locate classes recursively. This led to an impressive performance gain even on develop mode, at the cost of some seldom used features that always caused side effects. To be clear again, the class loader will only fetch the class in the exact package in which you told it to nd it. App::build() and core paths App::build() will not merge app paths with core paths anymore. Examples:
App::build(array(controllers => array(/full/path/to/controllers))); //becomes App::build(array(Controller => array(/full/path/to/Controller))); App::build(array(helpers => array(/full/path/to/controllers))); //becomes App::build(array(View/Helper => array(/full/path/to/View/Helper)));

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CakeLog

Log streams now need to implement CakeLogInterface. Exceptions will be raised if a congured logger does not.
Cache

Cache is now a static class, it no longer has a getInstance() method. CacheEngine is now an abstract class. You cannot directly create instances of it anymore. CacheEngine implementations must extend CacheEngine, exceptions will be raised if a congured class does not. FileCache now requires trailing slashes to be added to the path setting when you are modifying a cache conguration. Cache no longer retains the name of the last congured cache engine. This means that operations you want to occur on a specic engine need to have the $cong parameter equal to the cong name you want the operation to occur on.
Cache::config(something); Cache::write(key, $value); // would become Cache::write(key, $value, something);

Router

You can no longer modify named parameter settings with Router::setRequestInfo(). You should use Router::connectNamed() to congure how named parameters are handled. Router no longer has a getInstance() method. It is a static class, call its methods and properties statically. Router::getNamedExpressions() is deprecated. Use the new router constants. Router::ACTION, Router::YEAR, Router::MONTH, Router::DAY, Router::ID, and Router::UUID instead. Router::defaults() has been removed. Delete the core routes le inclusion from your applications routes.php le to disable default routing. Conversely if you want default routing, you will have to add an include to Cake/Config/routes.php in your routes le. When using Router::parseExtensions() the under $this->params[url][ext]. $this->request->params[ext]. extension parameter is no longer Instead it is available at

Default plugin routes have changed. Plugin short routes are no longer built in for any actions other than index. Previously /users and /users/add would map to the UsersController in the Users plugin. In 2.0, only the index action is given a short route. If you wish to continue using short routes, you can add a route like: 710 Chapter 13. Appendices

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Router::connect(/users/:action, array(controller => users, plugin => users))

To your routes le for each plugin you need short routes on. Your app/Cong/routes.php le needs to be updated adding this line at the bottom of the le:
require CAKE . Config . DS . routes.php;

This is needed in order to generate the default routes for your application. If you do not wish to have such routes, or want to implement your own standard you can include your own le with custom router rules.
Dispatcher

Dispatcher has been moved inside app/webroot/index.php le.

of

cake/libs,

you

will

have

to

update

your

Dispatcher::dispatch() now takes two parameters. The request and response objects. These should be instances of CakeRequest & CakeResponse or a subclass thereof. Dispatcher::parseParams() now only accepts a CakeRequest object. Dispatcher::baseUrl() has been removed. Dispatcher::getUrl() has been removed. Dispatcher::uri() has been removed. Dispatcher::$here has been removed.
Congure

Configure::read() with no parameter no longer returns the value of debug instead it returns all values in Congure. Use Configure::read(debug); if you want the value of debug. Configure::load() now requires a CongReader to be setup. Read Loading conguration les for more information. Configure::store() now writes values to a given Cache conguration. Read Loading conguration les for more information.
Scaffold

Scaffold edit views should be renamed to form. This was done to make scaffold and bake templates consistent. views/scaffolds/edit.ctp -> View/Scaffolds/form.ctp views/posts/scaffold.edit.ctp -> View/Posts/scaffold.form.ctp

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Xml

The class Xml was completely re-factored. Now this class does not manipulate data anymore, and it is a wrapper to SimpleXMLElement. You can use the following methods: Xml::build(): static method that you can pass an xml string, array, path to le or url. The result will be a SimpleXMLElement instance or an exception will be thrown in case of error. Xml::fromArray(): static method that returns a SimpleXMLElement from an array. Xml::toArray(): static method that returns an array from SimpleXMLElement. You should see the Xml documentation for more information on the changes made to the Xml class.
Inector

Inector no longer has a getInstance() method. Inflector::slug() no longer supports the $map argument. Use Inflector::rules() to dene transliteration rules.
CakeSession

CakeSession is now a fully static class, both SessionHelper and SessionComponent are wrappers and sugar for it. It can now easily be used in models or other contexts. All of its methods are called statically. Session conguration has also changed see the session section for more information
HttpSocket

HttpSocket doesnt change the header keys. Following other places in core, the HttpSocket does not change the headers. RFC 2616 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2616.html) says that headers are case insensitive, and HttpSocket preserves the values the remote host sends. HttpSocket returns responses as objects now. Instead of arrays, HttpSocket returns instances of HttpResponse. See the HttpSocket documentation for more information. Cookies are stored internally by host, not per instance. This means that, if you make two requests to different servers, cookies from domain1 wont be sent to domain2. This was done to avoid possible security problems. Helpers
Constructor changed

In order to accommodate View being removed from the ClassRegistry, the signature of Helper::__construct() was changed. You should update any subclasses to use the following:

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public function __construct(View $View, $settings = array())

When overriding the constructor you should always call parent::__construct as well. Helper::__construct stores the view instance at $this->_View for later reference. The settings are not handled by the parent constructor.
HelperCollection added

After examining the responsibilities of each class involved in the View layer, it became clear that View was handling much more than a single task. The responsibility of creating helpers is not central to what View does, and was moved into HelperCollection. HelperCollection is responsible for loading and constructing helpers, as well as triggering callbacks on helpers. By default, View creates a HelperCollection in its constructor, and uses it for subsequent operations. The HelperCollection for a view can be found at $this->Helpers The motivations for refactoring this functionality came from a few issues. View being registered in ClassRegistry could cause registry poisoning issues when requestAction or the EmailComponent were used. View being accessible as a global symbol invited abuse. Helpers were not self contained. After constructing a helper, you had to manually construct several other objects in order to get a functioning object. You can read more about HelperCollection in the Collections documentation.
Deprecated properties

The following properties on helpers are deprecated, you should use the request object properties or Helper methods instead of directly accessing these properties as they will be removed in a future release. Helper::$webroot is deprecated, use the request objects webroot property. Helper::$base is deprecated, use the request objects base property. Helper::$here is deprecated, use the request objects here property. Helper::$data is deprecated, use the request objects data property. Helper::$params is deprecated, use the $this->request instead.
XmlHelper, AjaxHelper and JavascriptHelper removed

The AjaxHelper and JavascriptHelper have been removed as they were deprecated in version 1.3. The XmlHelper was removed, as it was made obsolete and redundant with the improvements to Xml. The Xml class should be used to replace previous usage of XmlHelper. The AjaxHelper, and JavascriptHelper are replaced with the JsHelper and HtmlHelper.

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JsHelper

JsBaseEngineHelper is now abstract, you will need to implement all the methods that previously generated errors.
PaginatorHelper

PaginatorHelper::sort() now takes the title and key arguments in the reverse order. $key will always be rst now. This was done to prevent needing to swap arguments when adding a second one. PaginatorHelper had a number of changes to the paging params used internally. The default key has been removed. PaginatorHelper now supports generating links with paging parameters in the querystring. There have been a few improvements to pagination in general. For more information on that you should read the new pagination features page.
FormHelper

$selected parameter removed The $selected parameter was removed from several methods in FormHelper. All methods now support a $attributes[value] key now which should be used in place of $selected. This change simplies the FormHelper methods, reducing the number of arguments, and reduces the duplication that $selected created. The effected methods are: FormHelper::select() FormHelper::dateTime() FormHelper::year() FormHelper::month() FormHelper::day() FormHelper::hour() FormHelper::minute() FormHelper::meridian() Default urls on forms is the current action The default url for all forms, is now the current url including passed, named, and querystring parameters. You can override this default by supplying $options[url] in the second parameter of $this->Form->create(). FormHelper::hidden() Hidden elds no longer remove the class attribute. This means that if there are validation errors on hidden elds, the error-field classname will be applied.

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CacheHelper

CacheHelper has been fully decoupled from View, and uses helper callbacks to generate caches. You should remember to place CacheHelper after other helpers that modify content in their afterRender and afterLayout callbacks. If you dont some changes will not be part of the cached content. CacheHelper also no longer uses <cake:nocache> to indicate un-cached regions. Instead it uses special HTML/XML comments. <!--nocache--> and <!--/nocache-->. This helps CacheHelper generate valid markup and still perform the same functions as before. You can read more CacheHelper and View changes.
Helper Attribute format more exible

The Helper class has more 3 protected attributes: Helper::_minimizedAttributes: array array(checked, selected, ...)); with minimized attributes (ie:

Helper::_attributeFormat: how attributes will be generated (ie: %s="%s"); Helper::_minimizedAttributeFormat: how minimized attributes will be generated: (ie %s="%s") By default the values used in CakePHP 1.3 were not changed. But now you can use boolean attributes from HTML, like <input type="checkbox" checked />. To this, just change $_minimizedAttributeFormat in your AppHelper to %s. To use with Html/Form helpers and others, you can write:
$this->Form->checkbox(field, array(checked => true, value => some_value));

Other facility is that minimized attributes can be passed as item and not as key. For example:
$this->Form->checkbox(field, array(checked, value => some_value));

Note that checked have a numeric key. Controller Controllers constructor now takes two parameters. A CakeRequest, and CakeResponse objects. These objects are used to populate several deprecated properties and will be set to $request and $response inside the controller. Controller::$webroot is deprecated, use the request objects webroot property. Controller::$base is deprecated, use the request objects base property. Controller::$here is deprecated, use the request objects here property. Controller::$data is deprecated, use the request objects data property. Controller::$params is deprecated, use the $this->request instead.

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Controller::$Component has been moved to Controller::$Components. See the Collections documentation for more information. Controller::$view has been renamed to Controller::$viewClass. Controller::$view is now used to change which view le is rendered. Controller::render() now returns a CakeResponse object. The deprecated properties on Controller will be accessible through a __get() method. This method will be removed in future versions, so its recommended that you update your application. Controller now denes a maxLimit for pagination. This maximum limit is set to 100, but can be overridden in the $paginate options.
Pagination

Pagination has traditionally been a single method in Controller, this created a number of problems though. Pagination was hard to extend, replace, or modify. For 2.0 pagination has been extracted into a component. Controller::paginate() still exists, and serves as a convenience method for loading and using the PaginatorComponent. For more information on the new features offered by pagination in 2.0, see the Pagination documentation. View
View no longer registered in ClassRegistry

The view being registered ClassRegistry invited abuse and affectively created a global symbol. In 2.0 each Helper receives the current View instance in its constructor. This allows helpers access to the view in a similar fashion as in the past, without creating global symbols. You can access the view instance at $this->_View in any helper.
Deprecated properties

View::$webroot is deprecated, use the request objects webroot property. View::$base is deprecated, use the request objects base property. View::$here is deprecated, use the request objects here property. View::$data is deprecated, use the request objects data property. View::$params is deprecated, use the $this->request instead. View::$loaded has been removed. Use the HelperCollection to access loaded helpers. View::$model has been removed. This behavior is now on Helper View::$modelId has been removed. This behavior is now on Helper View::$association has been removed. This behavior is now on Helper

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View::$fieldSuffix has been removed. This behavior is now on Helper View::entity() has been removed. This behavior is now on Helper View::_loadHelpers() has been removed, used View::loadHelpers() instead. How View::element() uses caching has changed, see below for more information. View callbacks have been shifted around, see below for more information API for View::element() has changed. Read here for more info. The deprecated properties on View will be accessible through a __get() method. This method will be removed in future versions, so its recommended that you update your application.
Removed methods

View::_triggerHelpers() Use $this->Helpers->trigger() instead. View::_loadHelpers() Use $this->loadHelpers() instead. Helpers now lazy load their own helpers.
Added methods

View::loadHelper($name, $settings = array()); Load a single helper. View::loadHelpers() Loads all the helpers indicated in View::$helpers.
View->Helpers

By default View objects contain a HelperCollection at $this->Helpers.

Themes

To use themes in your Controller you no longer set public $view = Theme;. Use public $viewClass = Theme; instead.
Callback positioning changes

beforeLayout used to re after scripts_for_layout and content_for_layout were prepared. In 2.0, beforeLayout is red before any of the special variables are prepared, allowing you to manipulate them before they are passed to the layout. The same was done for beforeRender. It is now red well before any view variables are manipulated. In addition to these changes, helper callbacks always receive the name of the le about to be rendered. This combined with helpers being able to access the view through $this->_View and the current view content through $this->_View->output gives you more power than ever before.

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Helper callback signature changes

Helper callbacks now always get one argument passed in. For beforeRender and afterRender it is the view le being rendered. For beforeLayout and afterLayout it is the layout le being rendered. Your helpers function signatures should look like:
public function beforeRender($viewFile) { } public function afterRender($viewFile) { } public function beforeLayout($layoutFile) { } public function afterLayout($layoutFile) { }

Element caching, and view callbacks have been changed in 2.0 to help provide you with more exibility and consistency. Read more about those changes.
CacheHelper decoupled

In previous versions there was a tight coupling between CacheHelper and View. For 2.0 this coupling has been removed and CacheHelper just uses callbacks like other helpers to generate full page caches.
CacheHelper <cake:nocache> tags changed

In previous versions, CacheHelper used a special <cake:nocache> tag as markers for output that should not be part of the full page cache. These tags were not part of any XML schema, and were not possible to validate in HTML or XML documents. For 2.0, these tags have been replaced with HTML/XML comments:
<cake:nocache> becomes <!--nocache--> </cake:nocache> becomes <!--/nocache-->

The internal code for full page view caches has also changed, so be sure to clear out view cache les when updating.
MediaView changes

MediaView::render() now forces download of unknown le types instead of just returning false. If you want you provide an alternate download lename you now specify the full name including extension using key name in the array parameter passed to the function.

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PHPUnit instead of SimpleTest All of the core test cases and supporting infrastructure have been ported to use PHPUnit 3.5. Of course you can continue to use SimpleTest in your application by replacing the related les. No further support will be given for SimpleTest and it is recommended that you migrate to PHPUnit as well. For some additional information on how to migrate your tests see PHPUnit migration hints.
No more group tests

PHPUnit does not differentiate between group tests and single test cases in the runner. Because of this, the group test options, and support for old style group tests has been removed. It is recommended that GroupTests be ported to PHPUnit_Framework_Testsuite subclasses. You can nd several examples of this in CakePHPs test suite. Group test related methods on TestManager have also been removed.
Testsuite shell

The testsuite shell has had its invocation simplied and expanded. You no longer need to differentiate between case and group. It is assumed that all tests are cases. In the past you would have done cake testsuite app case models/post you can now do cake testsuite app Model/Post. The testsuite shell has been refactored to use the PHPUnit cli tool. It now supports all the command line options supported by PHPUnit. cake testsuite help will show you a list of all possible modiers. Models Model relationships are now lazy loaded. You can run into a situation where assigning a value to a nonexistent model property will throw errors:
$Post->inexistentProperty[] = value;

will throw the error Notice: Indirect modication of overloaded property $inexistentProperty has no effect. Assigning an initial value to the property solves the issue:
$Post->nonexistentProperty = array(); $Post->nonexistentProperty[] = value;

Or just declare the property in the model class:

class Post { public $nonexistentProperty = array(); }

Either of these approaches will solve the notice errors. The notation of find() in Cake 1.2 is no longer supported. $model->find(type, array(PARAMS)) as in Cake 1.3. Finds should use notation

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Database objects

Cake 2.0 introduces some changes to Database objects that should not greatly affect backwards compatibility. The biggest one is the adoption of PDO for handling database connections. If you are using a vanilla installation of PHP 5 you will already have installed the needed extensions, but you may need to activate individual extensions for each driver you wish to use. Using PDO across all DBOs let us homogenize the code for each one and provide more reliable and predictable behavior for all drivers. It also allowed us to write more portable and accurate tests for database related code. The rst thing users will probably miss is the affected rows and total rows statistics, as they are not reported due to the more performant and lazy design of PDO, there are ways to overcome this issue but very specic to each database. Those statistics are not gone, though, but could be missing or even inaccurate for some drivers. A nice feature added after the PDO adoption is the ability to use prepared statements with query placeholders using the native driver if available. List of Changes DboMysqli was removed, we will support DboMysql only. API for DboSource::execute has changed, it will now take an array of query values as second parameter:
public function execute($sql, $params = array(), $options = array())

became:
public function execute($sql, $options = array(), $params = array())

third parameter is meant to receive options for logging, currently it only understands the log option. DboSource::value() looses its third parameter, it was not used anyways DboSource::fetchAll() now accepts an array as second parameter, to pass values to be bound to the query, third parameter was dropped. Example:

$db->fetchAll(SELECT * from users where username = ? AND password = ?, array(jhon, $db->fetchAll(SELECT * from users where username = :username AND password = :password

The PDO driver will automatically escape those values for you. Database statistics are collected only if the fullDebug property of the corresponding DBO is set to true. New method DboSource::getConnection() will return the PDO object in case you need to talk to the driver directly. Treatment of boolean values changed a bit to make it more cross-database friendly, you may need to change your test cases.

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Postgresql support was immensely improved, it now correctly creates schemas, truncate tables, and is easier to write tests using it. DboSource::insertMulti() will no longer accept sql string, just pass an array of elds and a nested array of values to insert them all at once TranslateBehavior was refactored to use model virtualFields, this makes the implementation more portable. All tests cases with Mysql related stuff were moved to the corresponding driver test case. This left the DboSourceTest le a bit skinny. Transaction nesting support. Now it is possible to start a transaction several times. It will only be committed if the commit method is called the same amount of times. Sqlite support was greatly improved. The major difference with cake 1.3 is that it will only support Sqlite 3.x . It is a great alternative for development apps, and quick at running test cases. Boolean column values will be casted to php native boolean type automatically, so make sure you update your test cases and code if you were expecting the returned value to be a string or an integer: If you had a published column in the past using mysql all values returned from a nd would be numeric in the past, now they are strict boolean values. Behaviors
BehaviorCollection

BehaviorCollection no longer strtolower()s mappedMethods. Behavior mappedMethods are now case sensitive.
AclBehavior and TreeBehavior

No longer supports strings as conguration. Example:

public $actsAs = array( Acl => Controlled, Tree => nested );

became:
public $actsAs = array( Acl => array(type => Controlled), Tree => array(type => nested) );

Plugins Plugins no longer magically append their plugin prex to components, helpers and models used within them. You must be explicit with the components, models, and helpers you wish to use. In the past: 2.0 Migration Guide 721

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public $components = array(Session, Comments);

Would look in the controllers plugin before checking app/core components. It will now only look in the app/core components. If you wish to use objects from a plugin you must put the plugin name:
public $components = array(Session, Comment.Comments);

This was done to reduce hard to debug issues caused by magic misring. It also improves consistency in an application, as objects have one authoritative way to reference them.
Plugin App Controller and Plugin App Model

The plugin AppController and AppModel are no longer located directly in the plugin folder. They are now placed into the plugins Controller and Model folders as such:
/app /Plugin /Comment /Controller CommentAppController.php /Model CommentAppModel.php

Console Much of the console framework was rebuilt for 2.0 to address many of the following issues: Tightly coupled. It was difcult to make help text for shells. Parameters for shells were tedious to validate. Plugin tasks were not reachable. Objects with too many responsibilities.
Backwards incompatible Shell API changes

Shell no longer has an AppModel instance. This AppModel instance was not correctly built and was problematic. Shell::_loadDbConfig() has been removed. It was not generic enough to stay in Shell. You can use the DbConfigTask if you need to ask the user to create a db cong. Shells no longer use $this->Dispatcher to access stdin, stdout, and stderr. ConsoleOutput and ConsoleInput objects to handle that now. They have

Shells lazy load tasks, and use TaskCollection to provide an interface similar to that used for Helpers, Components, and Behaviors for on the y loading of tasks.

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Shell::$shell has been removed. Shell::_checkArgs() has been removed. Congure a ConsoleOptionParser Shells no longer have direct access to ShellDispatcher. You should use the ConsoleInput, and ConsoleOutput objects instead. If you need to dispatch other shells, see the section on Invoking other shells from your shell.
Backwards incompatible ShellDispatcher API changes

ShellDispatcher no longer has stdout, stdin, stderr le handles. ShellDispatcher::$shell has been removed. ShellDispatcher::$shellClass has been removed. ShellDispatcher::$shellName has been removed. ShellDispatcher::$shellCommand has been removed. ShellDispatcher::$shellPaths has been removed, use App::path(shells); instead. ShellDispatcher no longer uses help as a magic method that has special status. Instead use the --help/-h options, and an option parser.
Backwards incompatible Shell Changes

Bakes ControllerTask no longer takes public and admin as passed arguments. They are now options, indicated like --admin and --public. Its recommended that you use the help on shells you use to see what if any parameters have changed. Its also recommended that you read the console new features for more information on new APIs that are available. Debugging The debug() function now defaults to outputting html safe strings. This is disabled if being used in the console. The $showHtml option for debug() can be set to false to disable html-safe output from debug. ConnectionManager ConnectionManager::enumConnectionObjects() will now return the current conguration for each connection created, instead of an array with lename, classname and plugin, which wasnt really useful. When dening database connections you will need to make some changes to the way congs were dened in the past. Basically in the database conguration class, the key driver is not accepted anymore, only datasource, in order to make it more consistent. Also, as the datasources have been moved to packages you will need to pass the package they are located in. Example:

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public $default = array( datasource => Database/Mysql, persistent => false, host => localhost, login => root, password => root, database => cake, );

New Features in CakePHP 2.0

Models The model construction process has been made lighter. Model associations are now lazy loaded, applications with lots of models and associations will see great time reductions in the bootstrap process. Now models wont require a database connection in the construction process. The database will be accessed for the rst time only when a nd operation is issued or information for one of the columns is required. View
View::$output

View will now always have the last rendered content (view or layout) accessible through $this->output. In helpers you can use $this->_View->output. Modifying this property will change the content that comes out of the view rendering. Helpers
HtmlHelper

getCrumbList() Creates breadcrumb links wrapped in <li> elements. (http://cakephp.lighthouseapp.com/projects/42648/tickets/856).

See #856

loadConfig() has moved from Helper to HtmlHelper class. This method now uses the new reader classes (see 2.0 Configure) to load your cong le. As an option you can pass the path as second parameter (app/Config is default). To simplify, you can set the conguration le (and the reader) in Controller::$helpers (example below) to load on helper constructor. In conguration le you can set the below keys: tags Should be an array with key value; minimizedAttributes Should be a list; docTypes Should be an array with key value; attributeFormat Should be a string; minimizedAttributeFormat Should be a string. 724 Chapter 13. Appendices

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Example of how to set conguration le on controller:

public $helpers = array( Html => array( configFile => array(config_file, php) // Option one: an array with filename a configFile => config_file // Option two: a string with filename. The PhpReader ) );

FormHelper

FormHelper now supports all HTML5 input types and custom input types. Just use the input type you want as the method on the helper. For example range() would create an input with type = range. postLink() and postButton() Creates link/button to access some page using HTTP method POST. With this, in your controller you can avoid some action, like delete, to be accessed by GET method. select() with multiple = checkbox, now treats the id attribute as a prex for all the generated options. Libs
CakeRequest

CakeRequest is a new class introduced in 2.0. It encapsulates commonly used request introspection methods and replaces the params array with a more useful object. Read more about CakeRequest.
CakeResponse

CakeResponse is a new class introduced in 2.0. It encapsulates commonly used methods and properties in the HTTP response your application generates. It consolidates several features in CakePHP. Read more about CakeResponse.
CakeSession, SessionComponent

CakeSession and the SessionComponent have had a number of changes, see the session section for more information.
Router

Routes can return full urls Route objects can now return full urls, and Router will not further modify them beyond adding the query string and fragment elements. For example this could be used to create routes

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to handle subdomains, or enabling https/http ags. An example of a route class that supports subdomains would be:
class SubdomainRoute extends CakeRoute { public function match($params) { $subdomain = isset($params[subdomain]) ? $params[subdomain] : null; unset($params[subdomain]); $path = parent::match($params); if ($subdomain) { $path = http:// . $subdomain . .localhost . $path; } return $path; } }

When creating links you could do the following to make links pointing at other subdomains.
echo $this->Html->link( Other domain, array(subdomain => test, controller => posts, action => add) );

The above would create a link with http://test.localhost/posts/add as the url.

Xml

Xml has had a number of changes. Read more about Xml class. New Lib features
Congure readers

Configure can now be congured to load conguration les from a variety of sources and formats. The Conguration section contains more information about the changes made to congure. Configure::read() without any arguments allows you to read all values from congure, instead of just the debug value.
Error and exception handling

CakePHP 2.0 has had Exceptions and Error Handling handling rebuilt, to be more exible and give more power to developers.
String::wrap()

String::wrap() was added to help make xed width formatting of text easier. Its used in Shells whenever you use Shell::wrapText(). 726 Chapter 13. Appendices

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debug()

debug() no longer outputs html in the console. Instead it makes output like the following:
########## DEBUG ########## Array ( [0] => test ) ###########################

This should improve readability of debug() on the command line. Components Components received a similar treatment to helpers and behaviors, Component is now the base class for components. Read more about the component changes.
RequestHandler

RequestHandler was heavily refactored due to the introduction of CakeRequest. These changes allowed for some new features to be introduced as well. Automatic parsing of Accept headers If a client sends a single Accept mime type that matches one of the extensions enabled in :php:classRouter, RequestHandler will treat it the same an extension. This expands CakePHPs support for REST style endpoints. To use this feature start off by enabling extensions in app/Config/routes.php:
Router::parseExtensions(json, xml);

Once you have created layouts and views for your extensions, you will be able to visit a url like posts/view/1 and send Accept: application/json in the headers to receive the json version of that url.
CookieComponent

CookieComponent now supports http only cookies. You can enable their use by setting $this->Cookie->httpOnly = true;. Having http only cookies will make them inaccessible from the browser.
Security Component CSRF separation

CakePHP has had CSRF protection since 1.2. For 2.0 the existing CSRF has a new more paranoid mode, and is its own standalone feature. In the past CSRF features were coupled with form tampering safe-guards. Developers often disabled validatePost in order to do dynamic forms, disabling the CSRF protection at the same time. For 2.0 CSRF checking has been separated from form tampering giving you greater control.

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For more information see CSRF protection Controller Controllers now have access to request and response objects. You can read more about these objects on their specic pages. Console The console for CakePHP 2.0 was almost entirely rebuilt. Several new features as well as some backwards incompatible changes were made. Read more about console changes. Pagination Pagination now provides a default maxLimit for pagination at 100. This limit can be overridden with the paginate variable on Controller:
$this->paginate = array(maxLimit => 1000);

This default is provided to prevent user URL manipulation causing excessive strain on the database for subsequent requests, where a user would edit the limit parameter to a very large number. Aliasing You can now alias helpers, components and behaviors to use your class instead of a different one. This means that you can very easily make a MyHtml helper and not need to replace every instance of $this->Html in your views. To do this, pass the className key along with your class, like you would with models:
public $helpers = array( Html => array( className => MyHtml ) );

Similarly, you can alias components for use in your controllers:

public $components = array( Email => array( className => QueueEmailer ) );

Calls to the Email component would call the QueueEmailer component instead. Finally, you can alias behaviors as well:
public $actsAs = array( Containable => array( className => SuperContainable

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) );

Because of the way 2.0 utilizes collections and shares them across the application, any classes you alias will be used throughout your application. Whenever your application tries to access the alias, it will access your class. For instance, when we aliased the Html helper in the example above, any helpers that use the Html helper or elements that load the Html helper, will use MyHtml instead. ConnectionManager A new method ConnectionManager::drop() was added to allow removing connections at runtime.

PHPUnit Migration Hints

Migrating your test cases to PHPUnit 3.5 (http://www.phpunit.de/manual/current/en/) will hopefully be a fairly pain free transition. However, there are a few known differences between test cases under PHPUnit and SimpleTest (http://www.simpletest.org/). Installing PHPUnit
Installing from PEAR (Recommended)

PHPUnit recommends it be installed via the pear installer, to do so run the following commands:
pear channel-discover pear.phpunit.de pear channel-discover components.ez.no pear channel-discover pear.symfony-project.com

This has to be done only once. Now the PEAR Installer (http://pear.php.net/) can be used to install packages from the PHPUnit channel:
pear install phpunit/PHPUnit

Installing manually

In addition to pear, CakePHP also supports placing the PHPUnit directory inside one of your vendors directories along with all its dependencies. Doing so is generally not recommended as PHPUnit is complicated to install as it is composed of many pear packages. Installing with the pear installer is easier and faster. If you do wish to install PHPUnit manually, youll need to place it and all of its dependencies inside your applications Vendor directory. Differences between SimpleTest There are a number of differences between SimpleTest and PHPUnit. The following is an attempt to list the most frequently encountered differences. 2.0 Migration Guide 729

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startCase() and endCase()

These methods are no longer supported. Use the static methods PHPUnit provides: setupBeforeClass and tearDownAfterClass.
start(), end(), before() and after()

These methods were part of SimpleTests test case initialization. start() and end() have no replacements. You can use setUp() and tearDown() to replace before() and after().
setUp() and tearDown()

In the past the methods setUp, tearDown, startTest and endTest where supported, and caused confusion as they looked almost like the same thing but in some cases you should use one or the other. In the new CakePHP test suite, it is recommended to use only setUp and tearDown. The methods startTest and endTest are still supported but are deprecated.
getTests

The method getTests is no longer supported. You can use lters instead. The web test runner now takes an additional query string parameter that allows you to specify a basic regular expression. This regular expression is used to restrict the methods that are run:
e.g. filter=myMethod

Only tests containing the string myMethod will be run on the next refresh. The cake test shell also supports a lter option to lter methods.
Assertion methods

Many of the assertion methods have slightly different names between PHPUnit and SimpleTest. Where possible CakeTestCase provides a wrapper for the SimpleTest method names. These compatibility wrappers will be removed in 2.1.0. The following methods will be affected. assertEqual -> assertEquals assertNotEqual -> assertNotEquals assertPattern -> assertRegExp assertIdentical -> assertSame assertNotIdentical -> assertNotSame assertNoPattern -> assertNotRegExp assertNoErrors -> no replacement

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expectError -> setExpectedException expectException -> setExpectedException assertReference -> assertSame assertIsA -> assertType Some methods take their arguments in different orders, be sure to check the methods you are using when updating them.
Mock expectations

Mock objects are dramatically different between PHPUnit and SimpleTest. There is no compatibility wrapper between them. Updating mock object usage can be a painful process but we hope the following tips help you in your migration. Its highly recommended you familiarize yourself with the PHPUnit Mock object (http://www.phpunit.de/manual/current/en/test-doubles.html#test-doubles.mock-objects) documentation. Replacing method calls The following regular expressions should help update some of your more straightforward mock object expectations. Replace expectOnce() no params
expectOnce\(([^\)]+)\); expects(\$this->once())->method( $ 1);

Replace expectOnce() with params

expectOnce\(([^,]+), array\((.+)\)\); expects(\$this->once())->method( $ 1)->with( $ 2);

Replace expectAt()
expectAt\((\d+), (.+), array\((.+)\)\); expects(\$this->at( $ 1))->method( $ 2)->with( $ 3);

Replace expectNever
expectNever\(([^\)]+)\); expects(\$this->never())->method( $ 1);

Replace setReturnValue
setReturnValue\(([^,]+), (.+)\); expects(\$this->once())->method( $ 1)->will($this->returnValue( $ 2));

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Replace setReturnValueAt
setReturnValueAt((\d+), ([^,]+), (.+)); expects(\$this->at( $ 1))->method( $ 2)->will($this->returnValue( $ 3));

Group tests

Group tests have been removed as PHPUnit treats individual test cases and test suites as composable entities in the runner. You can place group tests inside the cases directory and use PHPUnit_Framework_TestSuite as a base class. An example Testsuite would look like:
class AllJavascriptHelpersTest extends PHPUnit_Framework_TestSuite { /** * Suite define the tests for this suite * * @return void */ public static function suite() { $suite = new PHPUnit_Framework_TestSuite(Js Helper and all Engine Helpers); $helperTestPath = CORE_TEST_CASES . $suite->addTestFile($helperTestPath $suite->addTestFile($helperTestPath $suite->addTestFile($helperTestPath $suite->addTestFile($helperTestPath return $suite; } } DS . View . DS . Helper . DS; . JsHelperTest.php); . JqueryEngineHelperTest.php); . MootoolsEngineHelperTest.php); . PrototypeEngineHelperTest.php);

TestManger no longer has methods to add tests to group tests either. It is recommended that you use the methods PHPUnit offers.

Migration from 1.2 to 1.3

Migrating from CakePHP 1.2 to 1.3
This guide summarizes many of the changes necessary when migrating from a 1.2 to 1.3 Cake core. Each section contains relevant information for the modications made to existing methods as well as any methods that have been removed/renamed. App File Replacements (important) webroot/index.php: Must be replaced due to changes in bootstrapping process. cong/core.php: Additional settings have been put in place which are required for PHP 5.3. webroot/test.php: Replace if you want to run unit tests.

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Removed Constants The following constants have been removed from CakePHP. If your application depends on them you must dene them in app/config/bootstrap.php CIPHER_SEED - It has been replaced with Congure class var Security.cipherSeed which should be changed in app/config/core.php PEAR INFLECTIONS VALID_NOT_EMPTY VALID_EMAIL VALID_NUMBER VALID_YEAR Conguration and application bootstrapping Bootstrapping Additional Paths. In your app/cong/bootstrap.php you may have variables like $pluginPaths or $controllerPaths. There is a new way to add those paths. As of 1.3 RC1 the $pluginPaths variables will no longer work. You must use App::build() to modify paths.

App::build(array( plugins => array(/full/path/to/plugins/, /next/full/path/to/plugins/), models => array(/full/path/to/models/, /next/full/path/to/models/), views => array(/full/path/to/views/, /next/full/path/to/views/), controllers => array(/full/path/to/controllers/, /next/full/path/to/controllers/) datasources => array(/full/path/to/datasources/, /next/full/path/to/datasources/) behaviors => array(/full/path/to/behaviors/, /next/full/path/to/behaviors/), components => array(/full/path/to/components/, /next/full/path/to/components/), helpers => array(/full/path/to/helpers/, /next/full/path/to/helpers/), vendors => array(/full/path/to/vendors/, /next/full/path/to/vendors/), shells => array(/full/path/to/shells/, /next/full/path/to/shells/), locales => array(/full/path/to/locale/, /next/full/path/to/locale/), libs => array(/full/path/to/libs/, /next/full/path/to/libs/) ));

Also changed is the order in which bootstrapping occurs. In the past app/config/core.php was loaded after app/config/bootstrap.php. This caused any App::import() in an application bootstrap to be un-cached and considerably slower than a cached include. In 1.3 core.php is loaded and the core cache congs are created before bootstrap.php is loaded. Loading custom inections inflections.php has been removed, it was an unnecessary le hit, and the related features have been refactored into a method to increase their exibility. You now use Inflector::rules() to load custom inections:

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Inflector::rules(singular, array( rules => array(/^(bil)er$/i => \1, /^(inflec|contribu)tors$/i => \1ta), uninflected => array(singulars), irregular => array(spins => spinor) ));

Will merge the supplied rules into the infection sets, with the added rules taking precedence over the core rules. File renames and internal changes Library Renames Core libraries of libs/session.php, libs/socket.php, libs/model/schema.php and libs/model/behavior.php have been renamed so that there is a better mapping between lenames and main classes contained within (as well as dealing with some name-spacing issues): session.php -> cake_session.php App::import(Core, Session) -> App::import(Core, CakeSession) socket.php -> cake_socket.php App::import(Core, Socket) -> App::import(Core, CakeSocket) schema.php -> cake_schema.php App::import(Model, Schema) -> App::import(Model, CakeSchema) behavior.php -> model_behavior.php App::import(Core, Behavior) -> App::import(Core, ModelBehavior) In most cases, the above renaming will not affect userland code. Inheritance from Object The following classes no longer extend Object: Router Set Inector Cache CacheEngine If you were using Object methods from these classes, you will need to not use those methods. Controller & Components Controller

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Controller::set() no longer changes variables from $var_name to $varName. Variables always appear in the view exactly as you set them. Controller::set(title, $var) no longer sets $title_for_layout when rendering the layout. $title_for_layout is still populated by default. But if you want to customize it, use $this->set(title_for_layout, $var). Controller::$pageTitle has been removed. Use $this->set(title_for_layout, $var); instead. Controller has two new methods startupProcess and shutdownProcess. These methods are responsible for handling the controller startup and shutdown processes. Component Component::triggerCallback has been added. It is a generic hook into the component callback process. It supplants Component::startup(), Component::shutdown() and Component::beforeRender() as the preferred way to trigger callbacks. CookieComponent del is deprecated use delete AclComponent + DbAcl Node reference checks done with paths are now less greedy and will no longer consume intermediary nodes when doing searches. In the past given the structure:
ROOT/ Users/ Users/ edit

The path ROOT/Users would match the last Users node instead of the rst. In 1.3, if you were expecting to get the last node you would need to use the path ROOT/Users/Users RequestHandlerComponent getReferrer is deprecated use getReferer SessionComponent & SessionHelper del is deprecated use delete SessionComponent::setFlash() second param used to be used for setting the layout and accordingly rendered a layout le. This has been modied to use an element. If you specied custom session ash layouts in your applications you will need to make the following changes. 1. Move the required layout les into app/views/elements 2. Rename the $content_for_layout variable to $message 3. Make sure you have echo $session->flash(); in your layout SessionComponent and SessionHelper are not automatically loaded. Both SessionComponent and SessionHelper are no longer automatically included without you asking for them. SessionHelper and SessionComponent now act like every other component and must be declared

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like any other helper/component. You should update AppController::$components and AppController::$helpers to include these classes to retain existing behavior:
var $components = array(Session, Auth, ...); var $helpers = array(Session, Html, Form ...);

These change were done to make CakePHP more explicit and declarative in what classes you the application developer want to use. In the past there was no way to avoid loading the Session classes without modifying core les. Which is something we want you to be able to avoid. In addition Session classes were the only magical component and helper. This change helps unify and normalize behavior amongst all classes. Library Classes CakeSession del is deprecated use delete SessionComponent SessionComponent::setFlash() now uses an element instead of a layout as its second parameter. Be sure to move any ash layouts from app/views/layouts to app/views/elements and change instances of $content_for_layout to $message. Folder mkdir is deprecated use create mv is deprecated use move ls is deprecated use read cp is deprecated use copy rm is deprecated use delete Set isEqual is deprecated. Use == or ===. String getInstance is deprecated, call String methods statically. Router Routing.admin is deprecated. It provided an inconsistent behavior with other prex style routes in that it was treated differently. Instead you should use Routing.prefixes. Prex routes in 1.3 do not require additional routes to be declared manually. All prex routes will be generated automatically. To update simply change your core.php:
//from: Configure::write(Routing.admin, admin); //to: Configure::write(Routing.prefixes, array(admin));

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See the New features guide for more information on using prex routes. A small change has also been done to routing params. Routed params should now only consist of alphanumeric chars, - and _ or /[A-Z0-9-_+]+/:
Router::connect(/:$%@#param/:action/*, array(...)); // BAD Router::connect(/:can/:anybody/:see/:m-3/*, array(...)); //Acceptable

For 1.3 the internals of the Router were heavily refactored to increase performance and reduce code clutter. The side effect of this is two seldom used features were removed, as they were problematic and buggy even with the existing code base. First path segments using full regular expressions was removed. You can no longer create routes like:

Router::connect(/([0-9]+)-p-(.*)/, array(controller => products, action => show))

These routes complicated route compilation and impossible to reverse route. If you need routes like this, it is recommended that you use route parameters with capture patterns. Next mid-route greedy star support has been removed. It was previously possible to use a greedy star in the middle of a route:
Router::connect( /pages/*/:event, array(controller => pages, action => display), array(event => [a-z0-9_-]+) );

This is no longer supported as mid-route greedy stars behaved erratically, and complicated route compiling. Outside of these two edge-case features and the above changes the router behaves exactly as it did in 1.2 Also, people using the id key in array-form URLs will notice that Router::url() now treats this as a named parameter. If you previously used this approach for passing the ID parameter to actions, you will need to rewrite all your $html->link() and $this->redirect() calls to reect this change.
// old format: $url = array(controller => posts, action => view, id => $id); // use cases: Router::url($url); $html->link($url); $this->redirect($url); // 1.2 result: /posts/view/123 // 1.3 result: /posts/view/id:123 // correct format: $url = array(controller => posts, action => view, $id);

Dispatcher Dispatcher is no longer capable of setting a controllers layout/viewPath with request parameters. Control of these properties should be handled by the Controller, not the Dispatcher. This feature was also undocumented, and untested. Debugger Debugger::checkSessionKey() has been renamed to Debugger::checkSecurityKeys()

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Calling Debugger::output("text") Debugger::output("txt"). Object

no

longer

works.

Use

Object::$_log has been removed. CakeLog::write is now called statically. See Logging for more information on changes made to logging. Sanitize Sanitize::html() now actually always returns escaped strings. In the past using the $remove parameter would skip entity encoding, returning possibly dangerous content. Sanitize::clean() now has a remove_html option. This will trigger the strip_tags feature of Sanitize::html(), and must be used in conjunction with the encode parameter. Congure and App Congure::listObjects() replaced by App::objects() Congure::corePaths() replaced by App::core() Congure::buildPaths() replaced by App::build() Congure no longer manages paths. Congure::write(modelPaths, array...) replaced by App::build(array(models => array...)) Congure::read(modelPaths) replaced by App::path(models) There is no longer a debug = 3. The controller dumps generated by this setting often caused memory consumption issues making it an impractical and unusable setting. The $cakeDebug variable has also been removed from View::renderLayout You should remove this variable reference to avoid errors. Configure::load() can now load conguration les from plugins. Configure::load(plugin.file); to load conguration les from plugins. conguration les in your application that use . in the name should be updated to use _ Cache In addition to being able to load CacheEngines from app/libs or plugins, Cache underwent some refactoring for CakePHP1.3. These refactorings focused around reducing the number and frequency of method calls. The end result was a signicant performance improvement with only a few minor API changes which are detailed below. The changes in Cache removed the singletons used for each Engine type, and instead an engine instance is made for each unique key created with Cache::config(). Since engines are not singletons anymore, Cache::engine() was not needed and was removed. In addition Cache::isInitialized() now checks cache conguration names, not cache engine names. You can still use Cache::set() or Cache::engine() to modify cache congurations. Also checkout the New features in CakePHP 1.3 for more information on the additional methods added to Cache. It should be noted that using an app/libs or plugin cache engine for the default cache cong can cause performance issues as the import that loads these classes will always be uncached. It is recommended that you either use one of the core cache engines for your default conguration, or manually include the Use Any

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cache engine class before conguring it. Furthermore any non-core cache engine congurations should be done in app/config/bootstrap.php for the same reasons detailed above. Model Databases and Datasources Model Model::del() and Model::remove() have been removed in favor of Model::delete(), which is now the canonical delete method. Model::findAll, ndCount, ndNeighbours, removed. Dynamic calling of setTablePrex() has been removed. tableprex should be with the $tablePrefix property, and any other custom construction behavior should be done in an overridden Model::__construct(). DboSource::query() now throws warnings for un-handled model methods, instead of trying to run them as queries. This means, people starting transactions improperly via the $this->Model->begin() syntax will need to update their code so that it accesses the models DataSource object directly. Missing validation methods will now trigger errors in development mode. Missing behaviors will now trigger a cakeError. Model::find(first) will no longer use the id property for default conditions if no conditions are supplied and id is not empty. Instead no conditions will be used For Model::saveAll() the default value for option validate is now rst instead of true Datasources DataSource::exists() has been refactored to be more consistent with non-database backed datasources. Previously, if you set var $useTable = false; var $useDbConfig = custom;, it was impossible for Model::exists() to return anything but false. This prevented custom datasources from using create() or update() correctly without some ugly hacks. If you have custom datasources that implement create(), update(), and read() (since Model::exists() will make a call to Model::find(count), which is passed to DataSource::read()), make sure to re-run your unit tests on 1.3. Databases Most database congurations no longer support the connect key (which has been deprecated since pre1.2). Instead, set persistent => true or false to determine whether or not a persistent database connection should be used SQL log dumping A commonly asked question is how can one disable or remove the SQL log dump at the bottom of the page?. In previous versions the HTML SQL log generation was buried inside DboSource. For 1.3 there is a new core element called sql_dump. DboSource no longer automatically outputs SQL logs. If you want to output SQL logs in 1.3, do the following:

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echo $this->element(sql_dump);

You can place this element anywhere in your layout or view. The sql_dump element will only generate output when Configure::read(debug) is equal to 2. You can of course customize or override this element in your app by creating app/views/elements/sql_dump.ctp. View and Helpers View View::renderElement removed. Use View::element() instead. Automagic support for .thtml view le extension has been removed either declare $this->ext = thtml; in your controllers, or rename your views to use .ctp View::set(title, $var) no longer sets $title_for_layout when rendering the layout. $title_for_layout is still populated by default. But if you want to customize it, use $this->set(title_for_layout, $var). View::$pageTitle has been removed. $var); instead. Use $this->set(title_for_layout,

The $cakeDebug layout variable associated with debug = 3 has been removed. Remove it from your layouts as it will cause errors. Also see the notes related to SQL log dumping and Congure for more information. All core helpers no longer use Helper::output(). The method was inconsistently used and caused output issues with many of FormHelpers methods. If you previously overrode AppHelper::output() to force helpers to auto-echo you will need to update your view les to manually echo helper output. TextHelper TextHelper::trim() is deprecated, used truncate() instead. TextHelper::highlight() no longer has: an $highlighter parameter. Use $options[format] instead. an $considerHtmlparameter. Use $options[html] instead.

TextHelper::truncate() no longer has: an $ending parameter. Use $options[ending] instead. an $exact parameter. Use $options[exact] instead. an $considerHtmlparameter. PaginatorHelper PaginatorHelper has had a number of enhancements applied to make styling easier. prev(), next(), first() and last() The disabled state of these methods now defaults to <span> tags instead of <div> tags. passedArgs are now auto merged with url options in paginator. Use $options[html] instead.

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sort(), prev(), next() now add additional class names to the generated html. prev() adds a class of prev. next() adds a class of next. sort() will add the direction currently being sorted, either asc or desc. FormHelper FormHelper::dateTime() no $attributes[empty] instead. longer has has has has has has a a a a has a a a $showEmpty $showEmpty $showEmpty $showEmpty $showEmpty $showEmpty $showEmpty parameter. parameter. parameter. parameter. parameter. parameter. parameter. Use Use Use Use Use Use Use

FormHelper::year() no longer $attributes[empty] instead. FormHelper::month() no longer $attributes[empty] instead. FormHelper::day() no longer $attributes[empty] instead. FormHelper::minute() no longer $attributes[empty] instead. FormHelper::meridian() no $attributes[empty] instead.

longer

FormHelper::select() no longer $attributes[empty] instead.

Default urls generated by form helper no longer contain id parameter. This makes default urls more consistent with documented userland routes. Also enables reverse routing to work in a more intuitive fashion with default FormHelper urls. FormHelper::submit() Can now create other types of inputs other than type=submit. Use the type option to control the type of input generated. FormHelper::button() Now creates <button> elements instead of reset or clear inputs. If you want to generate those types of inputs use FormHelper::submit() with a type => reset option for example. FormHelper::secure() and FormHelper::create() no longer create hidden eldset elements. Instead they create hidden div elements. This improves validation with HTML4. Also be sure to check the 2.0 updates for additional changes and new features in the FormHelper. HtmlHelper HtmlHelper::meta() no longer has an $inline parameter. It has been merged with the $options array. HtmlHelper::link() no longer has an $escapeTitle parameter. Use $options[escape] instead. The escape option now controls the escaping of the title and attributes at the same time. HtmlHelper::para() no longer has an $escape parameter. Use $options[escape] instead. HtmlHelper::div() no longer has an $escape parameter. Use $options[escape] instead. Migration from 1.2 to 1.3 741

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HtmlHelper::tag() no longer has an $escape parameter. Use $options[escape] instead. HtmlHelper::css() no longer has an $inline parameter. Use $options[inline] instead. SessionHelper flash() no longer auto echos. You must add an echo $session->flash(); to your session>ash() calls. flash() was the only helper method that auto outputted, and was changed to create consistency in helper methods. CacheHelper CacheHelpers interactions with Controller::$cacheAction has changed slightly. In the past if you used an array for $cacheAction you were required to use the routed url as the keys, this caused caching to break whenever routes were changed. You also could set different cache durations for different passed argument values, but not different named parameters or query string parameters. Both of these limitations/inconsistencies have been removed. You now use the controllers action names as the keys for $cacheAction. This makes conguring $cacheAction easier as its no longer coupled to the routing, and allows cacheAction to work with all custom routing. If you need to have custom cache durations for specic argument sets you will need to detect and update cacheAction in your controller. TimeHelper TimeHelper has been refactored to make it more i18n friendly. Internally almost all calls to date() have been replaced by strftime(). The new method TimeHelper::i18nFormat() has been added and will take localization data from a LC_TIME locale denition le in app/locale following the POSIX standard. These are the changes made in the TimeHelper API: TimeHelper::format() can now take a time string as rst parameter and a format string as the second one, the format must be using the strftime() style. When called with this parameter order it will try to automatically convert the date format into the preferred one for the current locale. It will also take parameters as in 1.2.x version to be backwards compatible, but in this case format string must be compatible with date(). TimeHelper::i18nFormat() has been added Deprecated Helpers Both the JavascriptHelper and the AjaxHelper are deprecated, and the JsHelper + HtmlHelper should be used in their place. You should replace $javascript->link() with $html->script() $javascript->codeBlock() with $html->scriptBlock() $html->scriptStart() and $html->scriptEnd() depending on your usage. Console and shells Shell or

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Shell::getAdmin() has been moved up to ProjectTask::getAdmin() Schema shell cake schema run create has been renamed to cake schema create cake schema run update has been renamed to cake schema update Console Error Handling The shell dispatcher has been modied to exit with a 1 status code if the method called on the shell explicitly returns false. Returning anything else results in a 0 status code. Before the value returned from the method was used directly as the status code for exiting the shell. Shell methods which are returning 1 to indicate an error should be updated to return false instead. Shell::error() has been modied to exit with status code 1 after printing the error message which now uses a slightly different formatting.
$this->error(Invalid Foo, Please provide bar.); // outputs: Error: Invalid Foo Please provide bar. // exits with status code 1

ShellDispatcher::stderr() has been modied to not prepend Error: to the message anymore. Its signature is now similar to Shell::stdout(). ShellDispatcher::shiftArgs() The method has been modied to return the shifted argument. Before if no arguments were available the method was returning false, it now returns null. Before if arguments were available the method was returning true, it now returns the shifted argument instead. Vendors, Test Suite & schema vendors/css, vendors/js, and vendors/img Support for these three directories, both in app/vendors as well as plugin/vendors has been removed. They have been replaced with plugin and theme webroot directories. Test Suite and Unit Tests Group tests should now extend TestSuite instead of the deprecated GroupTest class. If your Group tests do not run, you will need to update the base class. Vendor, plugin and theme assets Vendor asset serving has been removed in 1.3 in favour of plugin and theme webroot directories. Schema les used with the SchemaShell have been moved to app/config/schema instead of app/config/sql Although config/sql will continue to work in 1.3, it will not in future versions, it is recommend that the new path is used.

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New features in CakePHP 1.3

CakePHP 1.3 introduced a number of new features. This guide attempts to summarize those changes and point to expanded documentation where necessary. Components SecurityComponent The various requireXX methods like requireGet and requirePost now accept a single array as their argument as well as a collection of string names.
$this->Security->requirePost(array(edit, update));

Component settings Component settings for all core components can now be set from the $components array. Much like behaviors, you can declare settings for components when you declare the component.
var $components = array( Cookie => array( name => MyCookie ), Auth => array( userModel => MyUser, loginAction => array(controller => users, action => login) ) );

This should reduce clutter in your Controllers beforeFilter() methods. EmailComponent You can now retrieve the rendered contents of sent Email messages, by reading $this->Email->htmlMessage and $this->Email->textMessage. These properties will contain the rendered email content matching their name. Many of EmailComponents private methods have been made protected for easier extension. EmailComponent::$to can now be an array. Allowing easier setting of multiple recipients, and consistency with other properties. EmailComponent::$messageId has been added, it allows control over the Message-ID header for email messages. View & Helpers Helpers can now be addressed at $this->Helper->func() in addition to $helper->func(). This allows view variables and helpers to share names and not create collisions. New JsHelper and new features in HtmlHelper See JsHelper documentation for more information 744 Chapter 13. Appendices

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Pagination Helper Pagination helper provides additional css classes for styling and you can set the default sort() direction. PaginatorHelper::next() and PaginatorHelper::prev() now generate span tags by default, instead of divs. Helper Helper::assetTimestamp() has been added. It will add timestamps to any asset under WWW_ROOT. It works with Configure::read(Asset.timestamp); just as before, but the functionality used in Html and Javascript helpers has been made available to all helpers. Assuming Asset.timestamp == force
$path = css/cake.generic.css $stamped = $this->Html->assetTimestamp($path); //$stamped contains css/cake.generic.css?5632934892

The appended timestamp contains the last modication time of the le. Since this method is dened in Helper it is available to all subclasses. TextHelper highlight() now accepts an array of words to highlight. NumberHelper A new method addFormat() has been added. This method allows you to set currency parameter sets, so you dont have to retype them:
$this->Number->addFormat(NOK, array(before => Kr. )); $formatted = $this->Number->currency(1000, NOK);

FormHelper The form helper has had a number of improvements and API modications, see Form Helper improvements (http://book.cakephp.org/view/1616/x1-3-improvements) for more information. Logging Logging and CakeLog have been enhanced considerably, both in features and exibility. See New Logging features (http://book.cakephp.org/view/1194/Logging) for more information. Caching Cache engines have been made more exible in 1.3. You can now provide custom Cache adapters in app/libs as well as in plugins using $plugin/libs. App/plugin cache engines can also override the core engines. Cache adapters must be in a cache directory. If you had a cache engine named MyCustomCacheEngine it would be placed in either app/libs/cache/my_custom_cache.php as an app/libs. Or in $plugin/libs/cache/my_custom_cache.php as part of a plugin. Cache congs from plugins need to use the plugin dot syntax:

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Cache::config(custom, array( engine => CachePack.MyCustomCache, ... ));

App and Plugin cache engines should be congured in app/bootstrap.php. If you try to congure them in core.php they will not work correctly. New Cache methods Cache has a few new methods for 1.3 which make introspection and testing teardown easier. Cache::configured() returns an array of congured Cache engine keys. Cache::drop($config) drops a congured Cache engine. Once dropped cache engines are no longer readable or writeable. Cache::increment() Perform an atomic increment on a numeric value. This is not implemented in FileEngine. Cache::decrement() Perform an atomic decrement on a numeric value. This is not implemented in FileEngine. Models, Behaviors and Datasource App::import(), datasources & datasources from plugins Datasources can now be included loaded with App::import() and be included in plugins! To include a datasource in your plugin you put it in my_plugin/models/datasources/your_datasource.php. To import a Datasource from a plugin use App::import(Datasource, MyPlugin.YourDatasource); Using plugin datasources in your database.php You can use plugin datasources by setting the datasource key with the plugin name. For example if you had a WebservicePack plugin with a LastFm datasource (plugin/webservice_pack/models/datasources/last_fm.php), you could do:
var $lastFm = array( datasource => WebservicePack.LastFm ...

Model Missing Validation methods now trigger errors, making debugging why validation isnt working easier. Models now support virtual elds (http://book.cakephp.org/view/1608/Virtual-elds) Behaviors Using behaviors that do not exist, now triggers a cakeError making missing behaviors easier to nd and x. CakeSchema

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CakeSchema can now locate, read and write schema les to plugins. The SchemaShell also exposes this functionality, see below for changes to SchemaShell. CakeSchema also supports tableParameters. Table Parameters are non column specic table information such as collation, charset, comments, and table engine type. Each Dbo implements the tableParameters they support. tableParameters in MySQL MySQL supports the greatest number of tableParameters; You can use tableParameters to set a variety of MySQL specic settings. engine Control the storage engine used for your tables. charset Control the character set used for tables. encoding Control the encoding used for tables. In addition to tableParameters MySQL dbos implement fieldParameters. fieldParameters allow you to control MySQL specic settings per column. charset Set the character set used for a column encoding Set the encoding used for a column See below for examples on how to use table and eld parameters in your schema les. tableParameters in Postgres

tableParameters in SQLite

Using tableParameters in schema les You use tableParameters just as you would any other key in a schema le. Much like indexes:

var $comments => array( id => array(type => integer, null => false, default => 0, key => primary) post_id => array(type => integer, null => false, default => 0), comment => array(type => text), indexes => array( PRIMARY => array(column => id, unique => true), post_id => array(column => post_id), ), tableParameters => array( engine => InnoDB, charset => latin1, collate => latin1_general_ci ) );

is an example of a table using tableParameters to set some database specic settings. If you use a schema le that contains options and features your database does not implement, those options will be ignored. For example if you imported the above schema to a PostgreSQL server, all of the tableParameters would be ignore as PostgreSQL does not support any of the included options.

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Console Bake Bake has had a number of signicant changes made to it. Those changes are detailed in the bake updates section (http://book.cakephp.org/view/1611/Bake-improvements-in-1-3) Subclassing The ShellDispatcher has been modied to not require shells and tasks to have Shell as their immediate parent anymore. Output Shell::nl() has been added. It returns a single or multiple linefeed sequences. Shell::out(), err() and hr() now accept a $newlines parameter which is passed to nl() and allows for controlling how newlines are appended to the output. Shell::out() and Shell::err() have been modied, allowing a parameterless usage. This is especially useful if youre often using $this->out() for outputting just a single newline. Acl Shell All AclShell commands now take node parameters. node parameters can be either an alias path like controllers/Posts/view or Model.foreign_key ie. User.1. You no longer need to know or use the aco/aro id for commands. The Acl shell dataSource switch has been removed. Use the Congure settings instead. SchemaShell The Schema shell can now read and write Schema les and SQL dumps to plugins. It expects and will create schema les in $plugin/config/schema

Router and Dispatcher Router Generating urls with new style prexes works exactly the same as admin routing did in 1.2. They use the same syntax and persist/behave in the same way. Assuming you have Configure::write(Routing.prefixes, array(admin, member)); in your core.php you will be able to do the following from a non-prexed url:

$this->Html->link(Go, array(controller => posts, action => index, member => tru $this->Html->link(Go, array(controller => posts, action => index, admin => true

Likewise, if you are in a prexed url and want to go to a non-prexed url, do the following:

$this->Html->link(Go, array(controller => posts, action => index, member => fal $this->Html->link(Go, array(controller => posts, action => index, admin => fals

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Route classes For 1.3 the router has been internally rebuilt, and a new class CakeRoute has been created. This class handles the parsing and reverse matching of an individual connected route. Also new in 1.3 is the ability to create and use your own Route classes. You can implement any special routing features that may be needed in application routing classes. Developer route classes must extend CakeRoute, if they do not an error will be triggered. Commonly a custom route class will override the parse() and/or match() methods found in CakeRoute to provide custom handling. Dispatcher Accessing ltered asset paths, while having no dened asset lter will create 404 status code responses. Library classes Inector You can now globally customize the default transliteration map used in Inector::slug using Inector::rules. Example Inflector::rules(transliteration, array(// => aa, // => oe)) The Inector now also internally caches all data passed to it for inection (except slug method). Set Set has a new method Set::apply(), which allows you to apply callbacks (http://ca2.php.net/callback) to the results of Set::extract and do so in either a map or reduce fashion:
Set::apply(/Movie/rating, $data, array_sum);

Would return the sum of all Movie ratings in $data. L10N All languages in the catalog now have a direction key. This can be used to determine/dene the text direction of the locale being used. File File now has a copy() method. It copies the le represented by the le instance, to a new location. Congure Configure::load() can now load conguration les from plugins. Configure::load(plugin.file); to load conguration les from plugins. conguration les in your application that use . in the name should be updated to used _ App/libs In addition to app/vendors a new app/libs directory has been added. This directory can also be part of plugins, located at $plugin/libs. Libs directories are intended to contain 1st party libraries that do not come from 3rd parties or external vendors. This allows you to separate your organizations internal libraries from vendor libraries. App::import() has also been updated to import from libs directories: Use Any

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App::import(Lib, ImageManipulation); //imports app/libs/image_manipulation.php

You can also import libs les from plugins:

App::import(Lib, Geocoding.Geocode); //imports app/plugins/geocoding/libs/geocode.php

The remainder of lib importing syntax is identical to vendor les. So if you know how to import vendor les with unique names, you know how to import libs les with unique names. Conguration The default Security.level in 1.3 is medium instead of high There is a new conguration value Security.cipherSeed this value should be customized to ensure more secure encrypted cookies, and a warning will be generated in development mode when the value matches its default value. i18n Now you can use locale denition les for the LC_TIME category to retrieve date and time preferences for a specic language. Just use any POSIX compliant locale denition le and store it at app/locale/language/ (do not create a folder for the category LC_TIME, just put the le in there). For example, if you have access to a machine running debian or ubuntu you can nd a french locale le at: /usr/share/i18n/locales/fr_FR. Copy the part corresponding to LC_TIME into app/locale/fr_fr/LC_TIME le. You can then access the time preferences for French language this way:
Configure::write(Config.language,fr-fr); // set the current language $monthNames = __c(mon,LC_TIME,true); // returns an array with the month names in French $dateFormat = __c(d_fmt,LC_TIME,true); // return the preferred dates format for France

You can read a complete guide of possible values in LC_TIME denition le in this page (http://sunsson.iptime.org/susv3/basedefs/xbd_chap07.html) Miscellaneous Error Handling Subclasses of ErrorHandler can more easily implement additional error methods. In the past you would need to override __construct() and work around ErrorHandlers desire to convert all error methods into error404 when debug = 0. In 1.3, error methods that are declared in subclasses are not converted to error404. If you want your error methods converted into error404, then you will need to do it manually. Scaffolding With the addition of Routing.prefixes scaffolding has been updated to allow the scaffolding of any one prex:
Configure::write(Routing.prefixes, array(admin, member)); class PostsController extends AppController { var $scaffold = member; }

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Would use scaffolding for member prexed urls. Validation After 1.2 was released, there were numerous requests to add additional localizations to the phone() and postal() methods. Instead of trying to add every locale to Validation itself, which would result in large bloated ugly methods, and still not afford the exibility needed for all cases, an alternate path was taken. In 1.3, phone() and postal() will pass off any country prex it does not know how to handle to another class with the appropriate name. For example if you lived in the Netherlands you would create a class like:
class NlValidation { public function phone($check) { ... } public function postal($check) { ... } }

This le could be placed anywhere in your application, but must be imported before attempting to use it. In your model validation you could use your NlValidation class by doing the following:
public $validate = array( phone_no => array(rule => array(phone, null, nl)), postal_code => array(rule => array(postal, null, nl)) );

When your model data is validated, Validation will see that it cannot handle the nl locale and will attempt to delegate out to NlValidation::postal() and the return of that method will be used as the pass/fail for the validation. This approach allows you to create classes that handle a subset or group of locales, something that a large switch would not have. The usage of the individual validation methods has not changed, the ability to pass off to another validator has been added. IP Address Validation Validation of IP Addresses has been extended to allow strict validation of a specic IP Version. It will also make use of PHP native validation mechanisms if available:
Validation::ip($someAddress); // Validates both IPv4 and IPv6 Validation::ip($someAddress, IPv4); // Validates IPv4 Addresses only Validation::ip($someAddress, IPv6); // Validates IPv6 Addresses only

Validation::uuid() A uuid() pattern validation has been added to the Validation class. It will check that a given string matches a uuid by pattern only. It does not ensure uniqueness of the given uuid.

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General Information
CakePHP Development Process
Here we attempt to explain the process we use when developing the CakePHP framework. We rely heavily on community interaction through tickets and IRC chat. IRC is the best place to nd members of the development team (https://github.com/cakephp?tab=members) and discuss ideas, the latest code, and make general comments. If something more formal needs to be proposed or there is a problem with a release, the ticket system is the best place to share your thoughts. We currently maintain 4 versions of CakePHP. stable : Tagged releases intended for production where stability is more important than features. Issues led against these releases will be xed in the related branch, and be part of the next release. maintenance branch : Development branches become maintenance branches once a stable release point has been reached. Maintenance branches are where all bugxes are committed before making their way into a stable release. Maintenance branches have the same name as the major version they are for example 1.2. If you are using a stable release and need xes that havent made their way into a stable release check here. development branches : Development branches contain leading edge xes and features. They are named after the version number they are for example 1.3. Once development branches have reached a stable release point they become maintenance branches, and no further new features are introduced unless absolutely necessary. feature branches : Feature branches contain unnished or possibly unstable features and are recommended only for power users interested in the most advanced feature set and willing to contribute back to the community. Feature branches are named with the following convention version-feature. An example would be 1.3-router Which would contain new features for the Router for 1.3. Hopefully this will help you understand what version is right for you. Once you pick your version you may feel compelled to contribute a bug report or make general comments on the code. If you are using a stable version or maintenance branch, please submit tickets or discuss with us on IRC. If you are using the development branch or feature branch, the rst place to go is IRC. If you have a comment and cannot reach us in IRC after a day or two, please submit a ticket. If you nd an issue, the best answer is to write a test. The best advice we can offer in writing tests is to look at the ones included in the core. As always, if you have any questions or comments, visit us at #cakephp on irc.freenode.net.

Glossary
routing array An array of attributes that are passed to Router::url(). They typically look like:
array(controller => posts, action => view, 5)

html attributes An array of key => values that are composed into html attributes. For example: 752 Chapter 13. Appendices

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// Given array(class => my-class, target => _blank) // Would generate class="my-class" target="_blank"

If an option can be minimized or accepts its name as the value, then true can be used:
// Given array(checked => true) // Would generate checked="checked"

plugin syntax Plugin syntax refers to the dot separated classname indicating classes are part of a plugin. E.g. DebugKit.Toolbar The plugin is DebugKit, and the classname is Toolbar. dot notation Dot notation denes an array path, by separating nested levels with . For example:
Asset.filter.css

Would point to the following value:

array( Asset => array( filter => array( css => got me ) ) )

CSRF Cross Site Request Forgery. Prevents replay attacks, double submissions and forged requests from other domains. routes.php A le in APP/Cong that contains routing conguration. This le is included before each request is processed. It should connect all the routes your application needs so requests can be routed to the correct controller + action. DRY Dont repeat yourself. Is a principle of software development aimed at reducing repetition of information of all kinds. In CakePHP DRY is used to allow you to code things once and re-use them across your application.

General Information

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CHAPTER 14

Indices and tables

genindex modindex

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Index

Symbols

addPathElement() (Folder method), 435 addScript() (View method), 87 :action, 568 addSubcommand() (ConsoleOptionParser method), :controller, 568 536 :plugin, 568 admin routing, 573 $this->request, 56 afterDelete() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 $this->response, 62 afterFilter() (Controller method), 48 __() (global function), 201 afterFind() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 __c() (global function), 202 afterLayout() (Helper method), 98, 236 __construct() (Component method), 75, 232 afterRender() (Helper method), 98, 236 __d() (global function), 202 afterRenderFile() (Helper method), 98, 236 __dc() (global function), 202 afterSave() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 __dcn() (global function), 202 afterScaffoldSave() (Controller method), 51 __dn() (global function), 203 afterScaffoldSaveError() (Controller method), 51 __n() (global function), 203 ajaxLogin (AuthComponent property), 291 A alert() (CakeLog method), 460 alert() (JsHelper method), 370 acceptLanguage() (CakeRequest method), 62 allow() (AuthComponent method), 292 accepts() (CakeRequest method), 62 accepts() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 298 allowedActions (SecurityComponent property), 311 allowedControllers (SecurityComponent property), AclBehavior (class), 240 311 AclComponent (class), 266 alphaNumeric() (Validation method), 165 action (RssHelper property), 392 addArgument() (ConsoleOptionParser method), 533 am() (global function), 203 addArguments() (ConsoleOptionParser method), App (class), 206 APP (global constant), 204 534 APP_DIR (global constant), 204 addCrumb() (HtmlHelper method), 360 append() (File method), 440 addDetector() (CakeRequest method), 62 append() (View method), 88 addFormat() (CakeNumber method), 422 appError, 595 addFormat() (NumberHelper method), 375 addInputType() (RequestHandlerComponent APPLIBS (global constant), 204 application exceptions, 593 method), 300 apply() (Set method), 478 addOption() (ConsoleOptionParser method), 534 AppShell (class), 539 addOptions() (ConsoleOptionParser method), 535 757

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cache() (CakeResponse method), 67 CacheEngine (class), 408 CacheHelper (class), 317 CAKE (global constant), 204 CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH (global constant), 204 CakeBaseException, 593 CakeEmail (class), 413 CakeException, 593 CakeLog (class), 458 CakeNumber (class), 420 B CakeRequest (class), 61 BadRequestException, 591 CakeResponse (class), 67 base (CakeRequest property), 62 CakeRoute (class), 584 base (RssHelper property), 392 CakeSession (class), 590 baseUrl() (Router method), 584 CakeTime (class), 426 beforeDelete() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 camelize() (Inector method), 450 beforeFilter() (Controller method), 47 cc() (Validation method), 166 beforeFind() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 cd() (Folder method), 435 beforeLayout() (Helper method), 98, 236 channel() (RssHelper method), 392 beforeRedirect() (Component method), 75, 232 charset() (CakeResponse method), 67 beforeRender() (Component method), 75, 232 charset() (HtmlHelper method), 345 beforeRender() (Controller method), 48 check() (Congure method), 561 beforeRender() (Helper method), 98, 236 check() (CookieComponent method), 296 beforeRenderFile() (Helper method), 98, 236 check() (Hash method), 469 beforeSave() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 check() (SessionComponent method), 315 beforeScaffold() (Controller method), 51 check() (SessionHelper method), 393 beforeValidate() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 check() (Set method), 479 between() (Validation method), 165 checkbox() (FormHelper method), 334 bindTranslation() (TranslateBehavior method), 251 checkNotModied() (CakeResponse method), 68 blackHole() (SecurityComponent method), 309 childCount() (TreeBehavior method), 260 blackHoleCallback (SecurityComponent property), children() (TreeBehavior method), 259 310 chmod() (Folder method), 435 blank() (Validation method), 166 cipher() (Security method), 461 Blocks (View property), 88 classicExtract() (Set method), 479 blocks() (View method), 87 classify() (Inector method), 450 body() (CakeResponse method), 68 clean() (Sanitize method), 432 boolean() (Validation method), 166 cleanInsert() (String method), 507 buffer() (JsHelper method), 364 cleanup() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 build() (App method), 208 clear() (Cache method), 412 build() (Xml method), 516 clear() (CacheEngine method), 409 buildFromArray() (ConsoleOptionParser method), clear() (Shell method), 539 537 clearGroup() (Cache method), 412 button() (FormHelper method), 340 clearGroup() (CacheEngine method), 409 clientIp() (CakeRequest method), 61 C close() (File method), 440 Cache (class), 411 combine() (Hash method), 465 CACHE (global constant), 204 combine() (Set method), 483 assign() (View method), 88 attachments() (CakeEmail method), 418 AuthComponent (class), 279 authenticate (AuthComponent property), 291 authError (AuthComponent property), 291 authorize (AuthComponent property), 291 autoLink() (TextHelper method), 396 autoLinkEmails() (TextHelper method), 395 autoLinkUrls() (TextHelper method), 395 autoParagraph() (TextHelper method), 396 758 Index

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comparison() (Validation method), 167 compile() (CakeRoute method), 584 Component (class), 75, 231 components (AuthComponent property), 291 components (Controller property), 56 compress() (CakeResponse method), 68 cong() (Cache method), 411 cong() (CakeLog method), 458 cong() (Congure method), 561 cong() (global function), 203 CongReaderInterface (interface), 565 conguration, 557 Congure (class), 560 congured() (CakeLog method), 458 congured() (Congure method), 562 CongureException, 565 conrm() (JsHelper method), 370 connect() (Router method), 581 connectNamed() (Router method), 583 ConsoleOptionParser (class), 532 constructAuthenticate() (AuthComponent method), 292 constructAuthorize() (AuthComponent method), 292 constructClasses() (Controller method), 51 ContainableBehavior (class), 242 contains() (Hash method), 468 contains() (Set method), 487 Controller (class), 47 convert() (CakeTime method), 426 convert() (TimeHelper method), 400 convertSlash() (global function), 203 convertSpeciers() (CakeTime method), 426 convertSpeciers() (TimeHelper method), 401 CookieComponent (class), 294 copy() (File method), 441 copy() (Folder method), 436 core() (App method), 207 core.php, 557 CORE_PATH (global constant), 204 correctSlashFor() (Folder method), 436 countDim() (Set method), 487 counter() (PaginatorHelper method), 384 create() (File method), 441 create() (Folder method), 436 create() (FormHelper method), 319 createFile() (Shell method), 539 critical() (CakeLog method), 460 Index

CSRF, 753 csrfCheck (SecurityComponent property), 311 csrfExpires (SecurityComponent property), 311 csrfUseOnce (SecurityComponent property), 311 CSS (global constant), 204 css() (HtmlHelper method), 346 CSS_URL (global constant), 204 currency() (CakeNumber method), 420 currency() (NumberHelper method), 374 current() (PaginatorHelper method), 383 custom() (Validation method), 167

D
data (CakeRequest property), 62 data (RssHelper property), 392 data() (CakeRequest method), 61 database.php, 555 database.php.default, 555 date() (Validation method), 168 dateTime() (FormHelper method), 341 datetime() (Validation method), 168 DAY (global constant), 205 day() (FormHelper method), 342 dayAsSql() (CakeTime method), 426 dayAsSql() (TimeHelper method), 401 daysAsSql() (CakeTime method), 427 daysAsSql() (TimeHelper method), 401 debug() (CakeLog method), 460 debug() (global function), 203, 599 Debugger (class), 600 decimal() (Validation method), 169 decrement() (Cache method), 412 decrement() (CacheEngine method), 409 defaultCurrency() (CakeNumber method), 421 defaultCurrency() (NumberHelper method), 375 defaultLevels() (CakeLog method), 459 defaultModel() (PaginatorHelper method), 388 defaultRouteClass() (Router method), 584 delete() (Cache method), 412 delete() (CacheEngine method), 409 delete() (CakeSession method), 590 delete() (Congure method), 561 delete() (CookieComponent method), 296 delete() (File method), 441 delete() (Folder method), 436 delete() (HttpSocket method), 444 delete() (SessionComponent method), 315 deny() (AuthComponent method), 292 759

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

description() (ConsoleOptionParser method), 533 destroy() (CookieComponent method), 296 destroy() (SessionComponent method), 315 diff() (Hash method), 474 diff() (Set method), 488 dimensions() (Hash method), 472 dirsize() (Folder method), 437 disable() (CakeLog method), 460 disableCache() (CakeResponse method), 68 disableCache() (Controller method), 52 dispatchShell() (Shell method), 539 div() (HtmlHelper method), 353 docType() (HtmlHelper method), 348 document() (RssHelper method), 392 domain() (CakeRequest method), 61 domId() (Helper method), 98, 236 domReady() (JsHelper method), 370 dot notation, 753 download() (CakeResponse method), 68 drag() (JsHelper method), 367 drop() (CakeLog method), 459 drop() (Congure method), 562 drop() (JsHelper method), 367 DRY, 753 DS (global constant), 204 dump() (CongReaderInterface method), 565 dump() (Congure method), 563 dump() (Debugger method), 600

error() (SessionHelper method), 393 error() (Shell method), 540 errors() (Folder method), 437 escape() (Sanitize method), 433 etag() (CakeResponse method), 68 event() (JsHelper method), 369 ExceptionRenderer (class), 593 excerpt() (Debugger method), 601 excerpt() (String method), 510 excerpt() (TextHelper method), 399 executable() (File method), 441 exists() (File method), 441 expand() (Hash method), 470 expires() (CakeResponse method), 68 exportVar() (Debugger method), 602 ext() (File method), 441 extend() (View method), 88 extension() (Validation method), 169 extract() (Hash method), 463 extract() (Set method), 490

F
fetch() (View method), 88 eld (RssHelper property), 392 File (class), 440 le extensions, 574 le() (CakeResponse method), 68 le() (FormHelper method), 338 leExistsInPath() (global function), 203 leSize() (Validation method), 170 lter() (Hash method), 469 lter() (Set method), 491 nd() (Folder method), 437 ndRecursive() (Folder method), 437 rst() (PaginatorHelper method), 383 ash (AuthComponent property), 291 ash() (AuthComponent method), 292 ash() (Controller method), 50 ash() (SessionHelper method), 394 atten() (Hash method), 470 atten() (Set method), 491 Folder (class), 435 Folder (File property), 440 Folder() (File method), 441 ForbiddenException, 591 format() (CakeNumber method), 424 format() (CakeTime method), 427 format() (Hash method), 467 Index

E
each() (JsHelper method), 370 effect() (JsHelper method), 369 elem() (RssHelper method), 393 element() (View method), 87 elementCache (View property), 88 email() (Validation method), 169 emailPattern() (CakeEmail method), 419 emergency() (CakeLog method), 460 enable() (CakeLog method), 460 enabled() (CakeLog method), 460 end() (FormHelper method), 322 end() (View method), 88 enum() (Set method), 490 env() (global function), 203 epilog() (ConsoleOptionParser method), 533 equalTo() (Validation method), 169 err() (Shell method), 540 error() (FormHelper method), 343 760

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

format() (NumberHelper method), 377 format() (Set method), 492 format() (TimeHelper method), 401 formatDelta() (CakeNumber method), 425 formatDelta() (NumberHelper method), 378 FormHelper (class), 319 fromReadableSize() (CakeNumber method), 423 fromReadableSize() (NumberHelper method), 377 fromString() (CakeTime method), 428 fromString() (TimeHelper method), 402 FULL_BASE_URL (global constant), 204

G
gc() (Cache method), 413 gc() (CacheEngine method), 409 generateAuthKey() (Security method), 461 generateTreeList() (TreeBehavior method), 260 get() (Hash method), 463 get() (HttpSocket method), 443 get() (JsHelper method), 366 getAjaxVersion() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 300 getBuffer() (JsHelper method), 364 getCrumbList() (HtmlHelper method), 360 getCrumbs() (HtmlHelper method), 360 getInstance() (Security method), 461 getOptionParser() (Shell method), 540 getParentNode() (TreeBehavior method), 261 getPath() (TreeBehavior method), 261 getType() (Debugger method), 602 getVar() (View method), 87 getVars() (View method), 87 gmt() (CakeTime method), 428 gmt() (TimeHelper method), 402 group() (File method), 441 groupCongs() (Cache method), 413

header() (CakeResponse method), 67 Helper (class), 97, 236 helpers (Controller property), 56 helpers (RssHelper property), 392 here (CakeRequest property), 62 here (RssHelper property), 392 hidden() (FormHelper method), 334 highlight() (String method), 507 highlight() (TextHelper method), 396 host() (CakeRequest method), 61 HOUR (global constant), 205 hour() (FormHelper method), 342 hr() (Shell method), 540 html attributes, 752 html() (Sanitize method), 433 HtmlHelper (class), 345 HttpSocket (class), 443 humanize() (Inector method), 450

I
i18nFormat() (CakeTime method), 428 i18nFormat() (TimeHelper method), 403 identify() (AuthComponent method), 292 image() (HtmlHelper method), 349 IMAGES (global constant), 205 IMAGES_URL (global constant), 205 import() (App method), 210 in() (Shell method), 540 inactiveMins() (Security method), 462 inCakePath() (Folder method), 438 increment() (Cache method), 412 increment() (CacheEngine method), 409 Inector (class), 449 info (File property), 440 info() (CakeLog method), 460 info() (File method), 441 IniReader (class), 566 init() (App method), 212 initialize() (AuthComponent method), 293 initialize() (Component method), 75, 232 initialize() (Shell method), 541 inList() (Validation method), 170 inPath() (Folder method), 438 input() (CakeRequest method), 61 input() (FormHelper method), 323 inputs() (FormHelper method), 325 insert() (Hash method), 464 insert() (Set method), 493 761

H
h() (global function), 203 handle (File property), 440 Hash (class), 463 hash() (Security method), 462 hasMethod() (Shell method), 540 hasNext() (PaginatorHelper method), 384 hasPage() (PaginatorHelper method), 384 hasPrev() (PaginatorHelper method), 384 hasTask() (Shell method), 540 header() (CakeRequest method), 61 Index

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

insert() (String method), 507 InternalErrorException, 591 invoke() (Debugger method), 602 ip() (Validation method), 170 is() (CakeRequest method), 62 isAbsolute() (Folder method), 438 isAtom() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 298 isAuthorized() (AuthComponent method), 293 isFieldError() (FormHelper method), 343 isFuture() (CakeTime method), 431 isFuture() (TimeHelper method), 406 isMobile() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 298 isPast() (CakeTime method), 431 isPast() (TimeHelper method), 406 isRss() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 298 isSlashTerm() (Folder method), 438 isThisMonth() (CakeTime method), 431 isThisMonth() (TimeHelper method), 405 isThisWeek() (CakeTime method), 431 isThisWeek() (TimeHelper method), 405 isThisYear() (CakeTime method), 431 isThisYear() (TimeHelper method), 406 isToday() (CakeTime method), 431 isToday() (TimeHelper method), 405 isTomorrow() (CakeTime method), 431 isTomorrow() (TimeHelper method), 406 isWap() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 299 isWindowsPath() (Folder method), 438 isXml() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 298 item() (RssHelper method), 393 items() (RssHelper method), 393

link() (PaginatorHelper method), 387 listTimezones() (CakeTime method), 431 listTimezones() (TimeHelper method), 405 load() (App method), 212 load() (Congure method), 562 loadCong() (HtmlHelper method), 360 loadModel() (Controller method), 55 loadTasks() (Shell method), 541 location() (App method), 208 lock (File property), 440 log() (Debugger method), 601 LOG_ERROR (global constant), 560 LogError() (global function), 204 loggedIn() (AuthComponent method), 293 login() (AuthComponent method), 293 loginAction (AuthComponent property), 292 loginRedirect (AuthComponent property), 292 logout() (AuthComponent method), 293 logoutRedirect (AuthComponent property), 292 LOGS (global constant), 205 luhn() (Validation method), 171

M
map() (Hash method), 473 map() (Set method), 494 mapActions() (AuthComponent method), 293 mapResources() (Router method), 584 match() (CakeRoute method), 584 matches() (Set method), 496 maxDimensions() (Hash method), 473 maxLength() (Validation method), 171 md5() (File method), 442 media() (HtmlHelper method), 351 MediaView (class), 90 merge() (Hash method), 471 merge() (Set method), 497 mergeDiff() (Hash method), 474 meridian() (FormHelper method), 342 messages() (Folder method), 438 meta() (HtmlHelper method), 346 method() (CakeRequest method), 61 MethodNotAllowedException, 591 mime() (File method), 443 mimeType() (Validation method), 171 minLength() (Validation method), 171 MINUTE (global constant), 205 minute() (FormHelper method), 342 MissingActionException, 592 Index

J
JS (global constant), 205 JS_URL (global constant), 205 JsHelper (class), 361 JsonView (class), 93

L
label() (FormHelper method), 333 last() (PaginatorHelper method), 383 lastAccess() (File method), 441 lastChange() (File method), 441 layout (View property), 88 levels() (CakeLog method), 459 link() (HtmlHelper method), 350 link() (JsHelper method), 371 762

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

MissingBehaviorException, 592 MissingComponentException, 592 MissingConnectionException, 592 MissingControllerException, 592 MissingDatabaseException, 592 MissingHelperException, 592 MissingLayoutException, 592 MissingShellException, 592 MissingShellMethodException, 592 MissingTableException, 592 MissingTaskException, 592 MissingViewException, 592 mode (Folder property), 435 model (RssHelper property), 392 ModelBehavior (class), 184, 227 modied() (CakeResponse method), 68 money() (Validation method), 171 MONTH (global constant), 206 month() (FormHelper method), 341 move() (Folder method), 439 moveDown() (TreeBehavior method), 261 moveUp() (TreeBehavior method), 262 multiple() (Validation method), 172

numeric() (Hash method), 472 numeric() (Set method), 501 numeric() (Validation method), 172

O
object() (JsHelper method), 365 objects() (App method), 209 offset() (File method), 442 onlyAllow() (CakeRequest method), 61 open() (File method), 442 options() (PaginatorHelper method), 385 out() (Shell method), 541 output (View property), 88 owner() (File method), 442

P
paginate() (Controller method), 53 PaginatorComponent (class), 303 PaginatorHelper (class), 379 para() (HtmlHelper method), 353 param() (CakeResponse method), 68 param() (PaginatorHelper method), 388 params (CakeRequest property), 62 params (RssHelper property), 392 params() (PaginatorHelper method), 388 paranoid() (Sanitize method), 434 parse() (CakeRoute method), 584 parseExtensions() (Router method), 584 passed arguments, 575 password() (AuthComponent method), 293 password() (FormHelper method), 334 patch() (HttpSocket method), 444 path (File property), 440 path (Folder property), 435 path() (App method), 207 paths() (App method), 207 perms() (File method), 442 phone() (Validation method), 172 PhpReader (class), 565 plugin routing, 574 plugin syntax, 753 pluginPath() (App method), 209 pluginSplit() (global function), 204 pluralize() (Inector method), 449 post() (HttpSocket method), 444 postal() (Validation method), 173 postButton() (FormHelper method), 340 postConditions() (Controller method), 52 763

N
name (Controller property), 55 name (File property), 440 name() (File method), 442 named parameters, 576 naturalNumber() (Validation method), 172 nest() (Hash method), 476 nest() (Set method), 498 nestedList() (HtmlHelper method), 355 next() (PaginatorHelper method), 383 nice() (CakeTime method), 428 nice() (TimeHelper method), 403 niceShort() (CakeTime method), 429 niceShort() (TimeHelper method), 403 nl() (Shell method), 541 normalize() (Hash method), 475 normalize() (Set method), 499 normalizePath() (Folder method), 439 notEmpty() (Validation method), 172 NotFoundException, 591 notice() (CakeLog method), 460 NotImplementedException, 591 NumberHelper (class), 374 numbers() (PaginatorHelper method), 381 Index

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

postLink() (FormHelper method), 341 pr() (global function), 204 precision() (CakeNumber method), 422 precision() (NumberHelper method), 376 prefers() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 302 prex routing, 573 prepare() (File method), 442 prepend() (View method), 88 prev() (PaginatorHelper method), 382 PrivateActionException, 592 promote() (Router method), 583 prompt() (JsHelper method), 370 pushDiff() (Set method), 502 put() (HttpSocket method), 444 pwd() (File method), 442 pwd() (Folder method), 439

Q
query (CakeRequest property), 62 query() (CakeRequest method), 61

R
radio() (FormHelper method), 335 range() (Validation method), 173 read() (Cache method), 411 read() (CacheEngine method), 408 read() (CakeSession method), 590 read() (CongReaderInterface method), 565 read() (Congure method), 561 read() (CookieComponent method), 295 read() (File method), 442 read() (Folder method), 439 read() (SessionComponent method), 314 read() (SessionHelper method), 393 readable() (File method), 442 realpath() (Folder method), 440 recover() (TreeBehavior method), 264 redirect() (AuthComponent method), 293 redirect() (Controller method), 50 redirect() (JsHelper method), 372 redirect() (Router method), 582 redirectUrl() (AuthComponent method), 293 reduce() (Hash method), 473 referer() (CakeRequest method), 61 referer() (Controller method), 51 remove() (Hash method), 464 remove() (Set method), 503 removeFromTree() (TreeBehavior method), 262 764

render() (Controller method), 49 renderAs() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 302 reorder() (TreeBehavior method), 263, 264 request (AuthComponent property), 292 request (View property), 88 request() (HttpSocket method), 444 request() (JsHelper method), 366 requestAction() (Controller method), 53 RequestHandlerComponent (class), 297 requireAuth() (SecurityComponent method), 310 requireDelete() (SecurityComponent method), 310 requireGet() (SecurityComponent method), 310 requirePost() (SecurityComponent method), 310 requirePut() (SecurityComponent method), 310 requireSecure() (SecurityComponent method), 310 reset() (Inector method), 450 respondAs() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 302 response (AuthComponent property), 292 responseHeader() (CakeBaseException method), 593 responseType() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 302 restore() (Congure method), 564 reverse() (Set method), 503 RFC RFC 2616, 446, 712 RFC 4122, 506 rijndael() (Security method), 461 ROOT (global constant), 205 Router (class), 581 routes.php, 568, 753 routing array, 752 RssHelper (class), 389 rules() (Inector method), 450 runCommand() (Shell method), 541

S
safe() (File method), 443 Sanitize (class), 432 scaffoldError() (Controller method), 51 script() (HtmlHelper method), 353 scriptBlock() (HtmlHelper method), 355 scriptEnd() (HtmlHelper method), 355 scriptStart() (HtmlHelper method), 355 SECOND (global constant), 205 secure() (FormHelper method), 344 Index

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

Security (class), 461 SecurityComponent (class), 309 select() (FormHelper method), 336 send() (CakeResponse method), 68 serializeForm() (JsHelper method), 372 serverOffset() (CakeTime method), 429 serverOffset() (TimeHelper method), 403 SessionComponent (class), 314 SessionHelper (class), 393 sessionKey (AuthComponent property), 292 Set (class), 478 set() (Cache method), 412 set() (Controller method), 48 set() (JsHelper method), 367 set() (View method), 87 setContent() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 300 setExtensions() (Router method), 584 setFlash() (SessionComponent method), 315 setHash() (Security method), 462 setup() (ModelBehavior method), 184, 227 sharable() (CakeResponse method), 68 Shell (class), 539 shortPath() (Shell method), 542 shutdown() (App method), 212 shutdown() (AuthComponent method), 293 shutdown() (Component method), 75, 232 singularize() (Inector method), 450 size() (File method), 443 slashTerm() (Folder method), 440 slider() (JsHelper method), 368 slug() (Inector method), 450 sort (Folder property), 435 sort() (Hash method), 473 sort() (PaginatorHelper method), 380 sort() (Set method), 505 sortable() (JsHelper method), 365 sortByKey() (global function), 204 sortDir() (PaginatorHelper method), 381 sortKey() (PaginatorHelper method), 381 ssn() (Validation method), 173 start() (View method), 88 startIfEmpty() (View method), 88 startup() (AuthComponent method), 293 startup() (Component method), 75, 232 startup() (Shell method), 542 statusCode() (CakeResponse method), 68 store() (Congure method), 563 Index

stream() (CakeLog method), 460 String (class), 506 stripLinks() (String method), 508 stripLinks() (TextHelper method), 397 stripslashes_deep() (global function), 204 style() (HtmlHelper method), 348 subdomains() (CakeRequest method), 61 submit() (FormHelper method), 340 submit() (JsHelper method), 370

T
tableCells() (HtmlHelper method), 357 tableHeaders() (HtmlHelper method), 356 tableize() (Inector method), 450 tag() (HtmlHelper method), 352 tagIsInvalid() (FormHelper method), 343 tail() (String method), 509 tail() (TextHelper method), 398 tasks (Shell property), 539 TESTS (global constant), 205 text() (FormHelper method), 333 textarea() (FormHelper method), 334 TextHelper (class), 395 themePath() (App method), 209 time() (RssHelper method), 393 time() (Validation method), 173 TIME_START (global constant), 205 timeAgoInWords() (CakeTime method), 429 timeAgoInWords() (TimeHelper method), 403 TimeHelper (class), 400 timezone() (CakeTime method), 431 timezone() (TimeHelper method), 405 TMP (global constant), 205 toArray() (Xml method), 516 toAtom() (CakeTime method), 430 toAtom() (TimeHelper method), 404 tokenize() (String method), 506 toList() (String method), 510 toList() (TextHelper method), 399 toPercentage() (CakeNumber method), 423 toPercentage() (NumberHelper method), 376 toQuarter() (CakeTime method), 430 toQuarter() (TimeHelper method), 404 toReadableSize() (CakeNumber method), 423 toReadableSize() (NumberHelper method), 377 toRSS() (CakeTime method), 430 toRSS() (TimeHelper method), 405 toServer() (CakeTime method), 431 765

CakePHP Cookbook Documentation, Release 2.x

toServer() (TimeHelper method), 405 toUnix() (CakeTime method), 431 toUnix() (TimeHelper method), 405 trace() (Debugger method), 601 TranslateBehavior (class), 248 tree() (Folder method), 440 TreeBehavior (class), 254, 259 truncate() (String method), 508 truncate() (TextHelper method), 397 type() (CakeResponse method), 67 type() (CookieComponent method), 296

View (class), 87 viewClassMap() (RequestHandlerComponent method), 303

wasWithinLast() (CakeTime method), 431 wasWithinLast() (TimeHelper method), 406 wasYesterday() (CakeTime method), 431 wasYesterday() (TimeHelper method), 406 webroot (CakeRequest property), 62 webroot() (Helper method), 97, 236 WEBROOT_DIR (global constant), 205 U WEEK (global constant), 205 unauthorizedRedirect (AuthComponent property), wrap() (String method), 507 wrapText() (Shell method), 542 292 writable() (File method), 443 underscore() (Inector method), 450 unlockedFields (SecurityComponent property), 311 write() (Cache method), 412 write() (CacheEngine method), 408 unlockField() (FormHelper method), 344 write() (CakeLog method), 459 uploadError() (Validation method), 173 write() (CakeSession method), 590 url() (Helper method), 97, 236 write() (Congure method), 560 url() (HtmlHelper method), 358 write() (CookieComponent method), 295 url() (PaginatorHelper method), 388 write() (File method), 443 url() (Router method), 583 write() (SessionComponent method), 314 url() (Validation method), 174 writeBuffer() (JsHelper method), 363 user() (AuthComponent method), 293 WWW_ROOT (global constant), 205 userDened() (Validation method), 174 uses (Controller property), 55 X uses (Shell property), 539 Xml (class), 511 uses() (App method), 206 XmlView (class), 93 useTag() (HtmlHelper method), 359 uuid() (String method), 506 Y uuid() (Validation method), 174 YEAR (global constant), 206 uuid() (View method), 87 year() (FormHelper method), 341

valid() (SessionHelper method), 394 validateAuthKey() (Security method), 462 validatePost (SecurityComponent property), 311 Validation (class), 165 ValidationisUnique() (ModelValidation method), 170 value() (Helper method), 98, 236 value() (JsHelper method), 372 variable() (Inector method), 450 VENDORS (global constant), 205 verify() (TreeBehavior method), 265 version (RssHelper property), 392 version() (Congure method), 561 766 Index