For a couple of years I have been working on my own lightweight MVC framework for PHP. Which I may at some point release under an opensource license.
Here is what I have been using for handling routes:
function routes($routes, $uriPath) {
// Loop through every route and compare it with the URI
foreach ($routes as $route => $actualPage) {
// Create a route with all identifiers replaced with ([^/]+) regex syntax
// E.g. $route_regex = shop-please/([^/]+)/moo (originally shop-please/:some_identifier/moo)
$route_regex = preg_replace('@:[^/]+@', '([^/]+)', $route);
// Check if URI path matches regex pattern, if so create an array of values from the URI
if(!preg_match('@' . $route_regex . '@', $uriPath, $matches)) continue;
// Create an array of identifiers from the route
preg_match('@' . $route_regex . '@', $route, $identifiers);
// Combine the identifiers with the values
$this->request->__get = array_combine($identifiers, $matches);
array_shift($this->request->__get);
return $actualPage;
}
// We didn't find a route match
return false;
}
$routes is a passed array formatted like this:
$routes = array(
// route => actual page
'page/:action/:id' => 'actualPage',
'page/:action' => 'actualPage',
)
$uriPath is the URI path without a leading forward-slash e.g. page/update/102
In my page controllers I can access the the route information like so:
echo $this->request->__get['action'];
// update
echo $this->request->__get['id'];
// 102
My question is essentially "can this be simplified or optimised?". With particular emphasis on simplifying the regex and the number of preg_replace and preg_match calls.
I find use of regex in such scenario very unwise, mostly because this can be done without it. I've put up a simply code below that does exactly the same without regex.
Code:
<?php
$routes = array
(
// actual path => filter
'foo' => array('page', ':action', ':id'),
'bar' => array('page', ':action')
);
/**
* @author Gajus Kuizinas <g.kuizinas@anuary.com>
* @copyright Anuary Ltd, http://anuary.com
* @version 1.0.0 (2011 12 06)
*/
function ay_dispatcher($url, $routes)
{
$final_path = FALSE;
$url_path = explode('/', $url);
$url_path_length = count($url_path);
foreach($routes as $original_path => $filter)
{
// reset the parameters every time in case there is partial match
$parameters = array();
// this filter is irrelevent
if($url_path_length <> count($filter))
{
continue;
}
foreach($filter as $i => $key)
{
if(strpos($key, ':') === 0)
{
$parameters[substr($key, 1)] = $url_path[$i];
}
// this filter is irrelevent
else if($key != $url_path[$i])
{
continue 2;
}
}
$final_path = $original_path;
break;
}
return $final_path ? array('path' => $final_path, 'parameters' => $parameters) : FALSE;
}
die(var_dump( ay_dispatcher('page/edit', $routes), ay_dispatcher('page/edit/12', $routes), ay_dispatcher('random/invalid/url', $routes) ));
Output:
array(2) {
["path"]=>
string(3) "bar"
["parameters"]=>
array(1) {
["action"]=>
string(4) "edit"
}
}
array(2) {
["path"]=>
string(3) "foo"
["parameters"]=>
array(2) {
["action"]=>
string(4) "edit"
["id"]=>
string(2) "12"
}
}
bool(false)