There are many PHP frameworks available for developers to choose from when creating a project. Frameworks such as CodeIgniter, CakePHP, Symfony and Zend are the most popular frameworks used by developers.

In this article I will compile a list of 5 frameworks that many developers may not know of.

Seagull

Supports:

• PHP4
• PHP5
• Multiple Database's
• ORM
• DB Objects
• Templates
• Caching
• Validation
• Ajax
• Auth Module
• Modules

PHP on TRAX

Supports:

• PHP5
• Multiple Database's
• ORM
• DB Objects
• Validation
• Ajax
• Modules

Yii

Supports:

• PHP5
• Multiple Database's
• ORM
• DB Objects
• Templates
• Caching
• Validation
• Ajax
• Auth Module
• Modules

Akelos

Supports:

• PHP4
• PHP5
• Multiple Database's
• ORM
• DB Objects
• Templates
• Caching
• Validation
• Ajax
• Auth Module
• Modules

Prado

Supports:

• PHP5
• Multiple Database's
• ORM
• DB Objects
• Templates
• Caching
• Validation
• Ajax
• Auth Module
• Modules

Other frameworks

If there are other frameworks that you know of that you think I have missed then please feel free to post a comment.

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I have already done this tutorial with CodeIgniter and jQuery it can be found here. I thought I would do this tutorial again but rewrite it for CakePHP because it is a popular PHP framework.

Before we start doing any PHP code make sure to copy in the code below into your MySQL database.

CREATE TABLE  `tutorials`.`twitter_messages` (
`id` INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY ,
`username` VARCHAR( 30 ) NOT NULL ,
`message` VARCHAR( 140 ) NOT NULL
) ENGINE = INNODB

Create the controller

Under the folder named controller create a file and call it twitter_controller.php.

We create a class inside it called TwitterController and it will extend AppController. We then set the name of the controller to twitter and tell CakePHP which table we are using in our database.

<?php
class TwitterController extends AppController {
	var $name = 'twitter';
	var $uses = 'twitter_messages';
 
}
<pre>
 
In this controller we will have two methods index and get_messages. Our index method will have no parameters and get_messages will have one parameter so that we know what the offset of the current number of messages loaded.
 
Inside our index method we will retrieve the number of messages in the table and also the first 10 records.
 
<pre lang="php">
function index()
{
	$this->set('num_messages', $this->twitter_messages->num_messages());
	$this->set('messages', $this->twitter_messages->get_messages());
}

In our second method called get_messages we grab the 10 latest messages for when it is called via jQuery.

function get_messages($offset)
{
	$this->set('latest_messages', $this->twitter_messages->get_messages($offset));
}

Model

Under the models folder create a file and name it twitter_messages.php.

<?php
class Twitter_messages extends AppModel {
 
	var $name = 'twitter_messages';
 
 
	function get_messages($offset=0)
	{
		$messages = $this->find('all', array('offset'=>$offset, 'limit'=>10));
		return $messages;
	}
 
	function num_messages()
	{
		return $this->find('count');
	}
 
}
?>

These two methods in the model are called from the controller.

View

Create a folder called twitter inside the views folder. Then create a file called index.ctp and get_messages.ctp.

index.ctp

Inside the index file copy this css and jQuery code.

<style>
#main_content {
	border: #999 1px solid;
	-webkit-border-radius: 5px;
	-moz-border-radius: 5px;
	padding: 5px;
}
 
#more_button {
	-webkit-border-radius: 5px;
	-moz-border-radius: 5px;
	color: #990000;
	text-align: center;
	padding: 5px;
	background-color: #fff;
	background-image: url("http://s.twimg.com/a/1261078355/images/more.gif");
	background-repeat: repeat-x;
	cursor: pointer;
	border: 1px solid #AAA;
}
 
#more_button:hover {
	border:1px solid #bbb;
	text-decoration:none;
	background-position:left -78px;
}
</style>
<script src="http://www.google.com/jsapi"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
google.load("jquery", "1.3.2");
</script>
 
<script type="text/javascript">
		$(document).ready(function(){
		var num_messages = <?=$num_messages?>;
		var loaded_messages = 0;
			$("#more_button").click(function(){
				loaded_messages += 10;
				$.get("twitter/get_messages/" + loaded_messages, function(data){
					$("#main_content").append(data);
 
				});
 
				if(loaded_messages >= num_messages - 10)
				{
					$("#more_button").hide();
					//alert('hide');
				}
			})
		})
	</script>

Below this copy in the following code:

<div id="main_content">
<?php
foreach($messages as $message)
{
	echo $message['twitter_messages']['username'] . ' - ' . $message['twitter_messages']['message'] . '<br />';
}
 
?>
</div>
 
<div id="more_button">
	more
</div>

Here we are displaying the first 10 records in the database then when the more button is clicked an ajax request will retrieve 10 more.

get_messages.ctp

This file is the file that is called upon the ajax request. This will display the 10 latest retrieve records.

<?php
foreach($latest_messages as $message)
{
	echo $message['twitter_messages']['username'] . ' - ' . $message['twitter_messages']['message'] . '<br />';
}
 
?>

Final words

I hope this tutorial has been useful to you, please Retweet it if it was useful for you. You can also follow me @wezpyke

Download

Download the resources for this tutorial

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There are a number of frameworks available for PHP such as CodeIgnitor, Zend, Symfony, Kohana and many more. In this article you will find tutorials that I have found on the web that will help PHP programmers that are new to the MVC pattern or CakePHP.

CakePHP is an amazing framework if you know how to use it, but the documentation for CakePHP is quite badly written and can cause confusion for new users. Here are a few links to try and make life easier for new and experienced CakePHP users.

1. Validation with CakePHP
2. Theming with CakePHP
3. Getting started quickly with Scriptaculous effects
4. Drag 'n drop tutorial with the CakePHP 1.2 Ajax helper, Prototype framework and Scriptaculous library
5. Secure CakePHP via Sessions & Magic (Login / Logout)
6. CakePHP ACL Tutorial
7. CakePHP Bake - Baking Models, Controllers and Views the CakePHP 1.2 Way
8. Cascading Dynamic Meta Tags and Page Titles in CakePHP 1.2
9. jQuery image upload & crop
10. Uploader - Plugin

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