Kohana framework - Ajax implementation best practices

Question

I am developing an application in Kohana framework. I would like to know the best practices in implementing ajax in kohana. So far I am using different controller for ajax. I think the important concerns will be minimizing the resources requirement and handling sessions.

Thanks in advance

Brittanybritte

Answer 1

I'm using this:

In Controller_Template:

    public function before()
    {
        $this->auto_render = ! $this->request->is_ajax(); 
        if($this->auto_render === TRUE)
        {
            parent::before();
        }
    }

And inside my actions:

      if ($this->request->is_ajax())    
        {
            ...         
            $this->response->headers('Content-type','application/json; charset='.Kohana::$charset);
            $this->response->body($jsonEncoded);
        }

Forehead

this is good.. i will surely make use of this... thanks.. Anyway i expect more suggestions that will be useful for the whole community.. – Brittanybritte

Answer 2

As the fellas above said, you don't need a separate controller for your ajax actions. You may take advantage of Kohana's request object to identify the request type. This may be done in the following way:

<?php

class Controller_Test extends Controller_Template {
    /**
     * @var     View    Template container
     */
    protected $template = 'template';
    /**
     * @var     View    Content to render
     */
    protected $content = 'some/content/view';
    // Inherited from parent class
    protected $auto_template_render = TRUE;
    public function before()
    {
        parent::before();
        if ($this->request->is_ajax() OR !$this->request->is_initial()) {
            $this->auto_template_render = FALSE;
        }    
    }

    public function after()
    {
        if ($this->auto_template_render == FALSE) {
            // We have ajax or internal request here
            $this->template = $this->content;            
        } else {
            // We have regular http request for a page
            $this->template = View::factory($this->template)
                ->set('content', $this->content);
        }
        // Call parent method
        parent::after();
    }
}

Though the example is very simple it may be improved to what you want to archive. Basically I've finished up writing my own Controller_Template to do the stuff I need. Also you may consider adding the format parameter to your urls so that the .html urls returned the regular html representation of the data and .json urls did the same, but in json format. For more information (and probably ideas) see kerkness unofficial Kohana wiki

Congo

Answer 3

You don't really need a separate controller, you can use Kohana_Controller_Template for handling AJAX requests as well.

It's up to you to decide what will the response be in case of AJAX request (or subrequest, it's usually the same). I usually have the template actually rendered only in case of request being the initial one (and not-ajax), rendering it's $content var otherwise.

Also, you can easily check if a request is AJAX / subrequest:

if ($request->is_ajax())
if ( ! $request->is_initial()) 

Carpometacarpus

All my controllers extends Controller_DefaultTemplate which extends Kohana_Controller_Template. I am assigning many things in before() method of my DefaultTemplate which is not required while requesting through ajax. So I decided to use a different controller for ajax requests even though it extends Kohana_Controller_Template. Hope this makes sence. – Brittanybritte

Answer 4

Also, if using Kohana_Controller_Template as your controller parent/ancestor it is good to remember to disable auto-rendering when accessing via AJAX, to prevent loading and rendering whole template.

if ($request->is_ajax()) $this->auto_render = FALSE;

Bree