NAME

Jifty::ClassLoader - Loads the application classes

DESCRIPTION

Jifty::ClassLoader loads all of the application's model and action classes, generating classes on the fly for Collections of pre-existing models.

new

Returns a new ClassLoader object. Doing this installs a hook into @INC that allows Jifty::ClassLoader to dynamically create needed classes if they do not exist already. This works because if use/require encounters a blessed reference in @INC, it will invoke the INC method with the name of the module it is searching for on the reference.

Takes one mandatory argument, base, which should be the the application's base path; all of the classes under this will be automatically loaded.

INC

The hook that is called when a module has been require'd that cannot be found on disk. The following stub classes are auto-generated:

Application

An empty application base class is created that doen't provide any methods or inherit from anything.

Application::Record

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Record is created.

Application::Event

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Event is created.

Application::Collection

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Collection is created.

Application::Notification

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Notification.

Application::Dispatcher

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Dispatcher.

Application::Handle

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Handle is created.

Application::Bootstrap

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Bootstrap.

Application::Upgrade

An empty class that descends from Jifty::Upgrade.

Application::CurrentUser

An empty class that descends from Jifty::CurrentUser.

Application::Model::AnythingCollection

If Application::Model::Something is a valid model class, then it creates a subclass of Jifty::Collection whose record_class is Application::Model::Something.

Application::Action::(Create or Update or Delete or Search)Anything

If Application::Model::Something is a valid model class, then it creates a subclass of Jifty::Action::Record::Create, Jifty::Action::Record::Update, Jifty::Action::Record::Delete or Jifty::Action::Record::Search whose record_class is Application::Model::Something.

return_class CODE

A helper method; takes CODE as a string and returns an open filehandle containing that CODE.

require

Loads all of the application's Actions and Models. It additionally require's all Collections and Create/Update actions for each Model base class -- which will auto-create them using the above code if they do not exist on disk.

require_classes_from_database

Jifty supports model classes that aren't files on disk but instead records in your database. It's a little bit mind bending, but basically, you can build an application entirely out of the database without ever writing a line of code(*).

* As of early 2007, this forward looking statement is mostly a lie. But we're working on it.

This method finds all database-backed models and instantiates jifty classes for them it returns a list of classnames of the models it created.

require_views

Load up $appname::View, the view class for the application.

models

Accessor to the list of models this application has loaded.

In scalar context, returns a mutable array reference; in list context, return the content of the array.

DESTROY

When the ClassLoader gets garbage-collected, its entry in @INC needs to be removed.

Writing your own classes

If you require more functionality than is provided by the classes created by ClassLoader then you should create a class with the appropriate name and add your extra logic to it.

For example you will almost certainly want to write your own dispatcher, so something like:

package MyApp::Dispatcher;
use Jifty::Dispatcher -base;

If you want to add some application specific behaviour to a model's collection class, say for the User model, create UserCollection.pm in your applications Model directory.

package MyApp::Model::UserCollection;
use base 'MyApp::Collection';

cpanm Jifty

perl -MCPAN -e shell
install Jifty