IntroductionZend_CodeGenerator provides facilities to generate
arbitrary code using an object oriented interface, both to create new
code as well as to update existing code. While the current
implementation is limited to generating PHP code, you can easily extend
the base class in order to provide code generation for other tasks:
JavaScript, configuration files, apache vhosts, etc.
Theory of Operation
In the most typical use case, you will simply instantiate a code
generator class and either pass it the appropriate configuration or
configure it after instantiation. To generate the code, you will
simply echo the object or call its generate() method.
array(
new Zend_CodeGenerator_Php_Class(array(
'name' => 'World',
'methods' => array(
new Zend_CodeGenerator_Php_Method(array(
'name' => 'hello',
'body' => 'echo \'Hello world!\';',
)),
),
)),
)
));
// Configuring after instantiation
$method = new Zend_CodeGenerator_Php_Method();
$method->setName('hello')
->setBody('echo \'Hello world!\';');
$class = new Zend_CodeGenerator_Php_Class();
$class->setName('World')
->setMethod($method);
$file = new Zend_CodeGenerator_Php_File();
$file->setClass($class);
// Render the generated file
echo $file;
// or write it to a file:
file_put_contents('World.php', $file->generate());
]]>
Both of the above samples will render the same result:
Another common use case is to update existing code -- for instance,
to add a method to a class. In such a case, you must first inspect
the existing code using reflection, and then add your new method.
Zend_CodeGenerator makes this trivially simple, by
leveraging Zend_Reflection.
As an example, let's say we've saved the above to the file
"World.php", and have already included it. We could then do the
following:
setName('mrMcFeeley')
->setBody('echo \'Hello, Mr. McFeeley!\';');
$class->setMethod($method);
$file = new Zend_CodeGenerator_Php_File();
$file->setClass($class);
// Render the generated file
echo $file;
// Or, better yet, write it back to the original file:
file_put_contents('World.php', $file->generate());
]]>
The resulting class file will now look like this: