Should have asked someone this a long time ago.
What is the best way to use other classes within another class?
For instance, lets say I have an application class:
class Application
{
public function displayVar() {
echo 'hello world';
}
}
and a database class
class Database
{
// connects to db on construct
public function query() {
// queries db
}
}
now, i want to add a function to my application class that uses a function from the db class
class Application
{
public function displayVar() {
echo 'hello world';
}
public function getVar() {
global $db;
$sql = foo;
$db->query($sql);
}
}
so then I have
$db = new Database();
$app = new Application();
$app->getVar('var');
Is there a better way of doing this? Really what I am looking for is the standard way of doing it, not another way of rigging it.
There are a couple of ways of doing that. Global variables is certainly one way and the most looked down upon too. You can create a Singleton and all other classes that need database access would call upon this singleton.
final class Database {
private static $connection;
public static function getInstance() {
if(self::$connection == NULL) {
self::$connection = // init your database connection
}
return self::$connection;
}
}
And use this database connection object in whatever class needs it.
class Application {
public function displayVar() {
echo 'hello world';
}
public function getVar() {
$db = Database::getInstance();
$sql = foo;
$db->query($sql);
}
}
This is all well for a start and a great step beyond using global variables, but you can do better with Dependency Injection. Dependency Injection is a simple concept that if a class has any external dependencies, such as the database connection in your example, you explicitly pass those to the needy class in its constructor or a method. So the new code would look something like Jonathan's solution. A major advantage of using dependency injection is in unit testing, where you can easily replace this actual database object with a mock object and pass it to whoever needs it.
class Application {
private $db;
public function __construct(Database $db) {
$this->db = $db;
}
public function displayVar() {
echo 'hello world';
}
public function getVar() {
$sql = foo;
$this->db->query($sql);
}
}
For smaller projects, you can easily do it yourself. For large projects, there are various DI frameworks available for PHP
$db
could be a property of your Application
class. Any reference to it from within an instance of Application
would be done via $this
- $this->db
class Application {
private $db = null;
public function setDB($name) {
$this->db = new Database($name);
}
}
Include the class file (or set up autoinclude) in each PHP file that needs the class in question. Then instantiate it as needed.
If you need to have a "common" instance of an object, you can look at the Singleton and Factory patterns:
Singleton Pattern
Factory Pattern