Namespaces, Filenames and Autoload

PHP
1

Hi all, I have started work on my new PHP web app and before getting too far would like to ensure I am following best practices for file naming and namespaces so that I can use an autoload function effectively.

I have read up on PSR-0 and have a question: What would the vendor name be in an web application I am building, simply the project name?

Additionally, I currently have the following structure (no namespaces and my class names match the filenames), I’d like to work out the best way to name the folders, filenames, namespaces and classes?


myProject.com
  /app
    /core
      /BaseController.php
      /BaseMapper.php
      /BaseModel.php
      /Loader.php
    /controllers
      /BookController.php
    /datamappers
      /BookMapper.php
    /models
      /domain
        /Book.php
      /BookModel.php
    /views
      /Book
        /List.php
        /Details.php
  /public
    /index.php
  • Should the namespace for BaseController be MyProject\App\Core, or
  • Should the namespace for BaseController be MyProject\App and the class name Core_BaseController?
  • Should I rename my folders to all use upper camel case? (eg. App, Core, etc)
  • Should my class names remain in upper camel case?
  • Should my directories all be singular or plural? Does it matter?

Lastly, I have had a look at the recommended SplClassLoader here: https://gist.github.com/jwage/221634

If I follow the above standards would I then need to register with:


$classLoader = new SplClassLoader('MyProject\\App\\Core', '../App/Core');
$classLoader->register();

$classLoader = new SplClassLoader('MyProject\\App\\Controllers', '../App/Controllers');
$classLoader->register();

$classLoader = new SplClassLoader('MyProject\\App\\DataMappers', '../App/DataMappers');
$classLoader->register();
...

This seems like horrible overkill. Can this be done more efficiently?

Thanks,
Jordan

2

Yup. Or the client name. Or a combination of the two.

\ClientName\ProjectName\

The most common structure starts with two folders:

    src/
    vendor/

“src” is where you put the code that you write specifically for this project. “vendor” is where you put third-party code and libraries.

Within “src”, your folder structure would match your namespaces.

    src/
        ClientName/
            ProjectName/
                Controller/
                DataMapper/
                Model/
                View/
    vendor/

I think “core” might be too general of a name. It seems like you’re putting base classes of all kinds in there. It would probably be better if BaseController lived in the Controller namespace, BaseMapper in the DataMapper namespace, and so forth.

It’s most important that your folder names – case and all – match your class and namespace names – case and all – because file systems can be case sensitive. With that being said, the prevailing standard for class and namespace names is upper camel case, which means that, yes, your folder names would also be upper camel case.

Mostly it doesn’t matter. Though, the PHP community seems to have settled on singular for namespace names (and thus also for folder names).

Using the new structure above, you should only need:

$classLoader = new SplClassLoader('ClientName\\\\ProjectName', '../src');
$classLoader->register();
3

Thanks Jeff, going to have a play with this now. Appreciate your advice.