Php – Array vs Object for View in Laravel

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First, yes This question is very similar to Arrays vs Objects in view template but my question sort of expands on this…

When deciding on whether to use an object or array to pass data to your view. Which would be a better approach when you're looking for a view that you can re-use for both….

Data passed through as an Eloquent object
Data that is manually created in your controller that does NOT originate from an Eloquent or any other object…

For example let's say I have a piece of code in my view that is simply…

{!! $foo->bar !!}

I have my Foo Model..

class Foo extends Model
{
    protected $fillable =[
      'bar',
    ];

and MyController controller…

class MyController extends Controller
{
    public function fromDB()
    {
        $foo = Foo:all();
    }

    public function manually()
    {
        $foo = array(
            'bar' => 'Hello World',
        );
    }

To re-use my view, should I.

Convert my foo Eloquent object to an array?
Convert my foo array to an object?
Other

If using option 2, should the object be the Foo model? Or another Foo class?

Best Answer

This is one of the reasons why view models were created. Define a class that holds the necessary data for the view and this question becomes moot. The source of the data could be an Eloquent object or array, but since the view is rendering its own model the original source and format of the data is irrelevant.

Related Solutions

Php – Arrays vs Objects in view template

It's a developer perception. The OOP design concept was introduced in PHP with introduction to version 5 and has been a successful one. At the initial level the use of array seems to be much easier than the use of Objects due to the use of pointer notation instead of dot notation as in other OOP based languages. But as you move ahead on the platform OBJECTS will be more preferred way of handling data. It makes the code much better to be maintained in the larger complex system and easier for the other developers from PHP background to understand.

PHP MVC – One view class for all controllers vs a view class for each controller

I will try to answer some of these questions. Having a single View Class helps makes the code easier to maintain if they share a lot of components. For most of the pages, it's common to always have the same header and footer. This is only different in pages that require authentication. For example, a login page will have its own header and footer.

In this design, the View class will have the render method to allow you to set the footer and header. Your mandatory parameters will be the main file and the data.

static function render(
  $main_file, 
  $data, 
  $header='default_header.html', 
  $footer='default_footer.html');

So with that, you only need one line on every controller that needs a view.

// inside LoginController
function Show($id){
  //...your regular code here

  // renders view 
  ViewClass::render('login.html', $data, 'login_header.html', 'login_footer.html');
}

// inside PostController
function Show($id){
  //...your code here

  // no need to specify header and footer
  ViewClass::render('post.html', $data);
}

To take care of dynamic contents inside the header and footer, I use hooking strategy. This means my PostController and other authentication zone extends another BaseController class that loads header and footer data.

It may seem like a lot of boilerplate code, but the other advantage is that you can change the view to render JSON without affecting your controller logic.

// inside PostController
function Show($id){
  //...your code here

  // now loading json templates
  ViewClass::render('post.json', $data, 'header.json', 'footer.json');
}

One more point is that true MVC design is meant to make it easier for your designer to work on the views. If you create classes for every view, it has implications on the designer's involvement. Designers should not be writing your classes.

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