Using PHP classes to format html?

Question

I have a class designated for a certain site. In that site I have different functions to retrieve data from the database and store that data into an array. I have other functions within the same class that take the data and format it into html and returns the html containing the data from the database.

For example...

function GetUserProfile($userID){

  $query = 'SELECT * FROM users WHERE userID='.$userID; 

  ....... 

  blah blah blah 

  ....... 

  $user = mysqli->fetch_assoc(); 

  return $user;

}

function FormatUserProfile($user, $showDesc = false){ 

  $profile = '< h1 >'.$user['userName'].'< / h1 >'; 

  if($showDesc){ 

    $profile .= '< div >'.$user['description'].'< / div >'; 

  } 

  return $profile; 

}

...

So if i had a function to solely gather information, and another function to solely format that gathered information. Mainly because I will be showing the same data on different pages, but Different pages show different data, like a search would only bring up the users name, where as the users profile page would bring up the username and the description for example.

Is that good practice, or is there a better way to do this?

score 1 · Accepted Answer · 2009-08-15 04:49:02Z

1

It's a good practice. Personally, I use the following template "engine":

<?php
class Template{
    static function show($path, $arg = NULL){
        include "templates/$path.php";
    }

    static function get($path, $arg = NULL){
        ob_start();
        self::show($path, $info);
        $block = ob_get_contents();
        ob_end_clean();
        return $block;
    }
}

In your case the template would be like this:

<?php
echo '<h1>'.$arg['user']['userName'].'</h1>'; 
if($arg['showDesc']){
  echo '<div>'.$arg['user']['description'].'</div>'; 
}
?>

You could unpack the array with the template arguments, but I prefer to keep it all in one place, so the code is less confusing. (You always know what is coming from the input, and what's defined in the template this way. To keep things shorter, you might use $_ instead of $arg too.) For a small example like this, the benefit is not obvious, but for larger templates it save a lot of variable manipulation, as you can use PHP's own templating abilities.

edited Aug 15, 2009 at 4:49

answered Aug 15, 2009 at 4:42

Gambler

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1 Comment

BDuelz Over a year ago

I think i understand what your saying, instead of creating a function to do this, I should create a seperate file which is just a template and just pass the data to it and then display the contents of that file. So then what if i have streams of data to show, and I need a foreach, or a while loop, would this style still be suitable for that? So I guess when they say separate logic from presentation, they REALLY MEAN IT.

Tom Pažourek · Accepted Answer · 2009-08-15 14:30:23Z

0

You can use Smarty template engine or something similar.

It's templates are stored separately and look like this: http://www.smarty.net/sampleapp/sampleapp_p5.php

answered Aug 15, 2009 at 14:30

Tom Pažourek

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