Smarty

[gajdaw]

Hello everyone,

I use Smarty + Propel and very often get the problem of accessing properties returned by methods.

Example

1. Database consists of three tables: Author, Book, BookHasAuthor

2. PHP/Propel code to retrieve all the books by first author:

$a = AuthorPeer::retrieveByPK(1);
$info = $a->getAuthorHasBookJoinBook(new Criteria);
$s->assign('info', $info);

3. The template:

{$info[0]->getAuthor()->getFirstName()}

This code will produce an error message.




To solve this problem I modify regular expressions that parse the template. If the original line #155 of Smarty_compiler.class.php:



$this->_obj_ext_regexp = '\->(?:\$?' . $this->_dvar_guts_regexp . ')';



is modified to:


$this->_obj_ext_regexp = '\->(?:\$?' . $this->_dvar_guts_regexp . '(?:\(\))?)';



then multiple method calls are allowed within the template.


Does anyone know better solution?

Will Smarty 3.0 allow multiple method calls?


thx in advance,
gajdaw

[shannera]

As you can see in the thread http://www.phpinsider.com/smarty-forum/viewtopic.php?t=4989, there aren't many fixed plans for Smarty 3.0, and no development startet, so I doubt someone can say if this feature will be supported.

[U.Tews]

The problem of method chaining was discussed already several times. PHP4 does not support this. Your modification will only work with PHP5. It was not implemented in Smarty because of its requirement to be compatible with PHP4.

[/code]

[mohrt]

I'm not against adding this patch to Smarty 2.x, so long as it is understood that method chaining on PHP4 will come up with a syntax error. When PHP5 was new, this patch wasn't so appealing because of the large PHP4 user base. PHP4 is getting further into the past now. This can be an undocumented feature, for those that wish to use it.

[U.Tews]

Monte what's about introducing a configuration parameter like php5 = true and implement for PHP4 a workaround. If you like I could look into it.

[mohrt]

The only work around would be to display an error, as PHP4 will not handle method chaining. You can also detect the PHP version without a setting.

[U.Tews]

Monte the work around would be to evaluate the chain step by step.

[U.Tews]

An updated version of Smarty_Compiler.class.php is now in the SVN.

It allows method chaining in both PHP4 and PHP5.

[gajdaw]