Calling on a class with an Ajax request

Question

Currently, I am using my own MVC framework. What I'm trying to do is make an Ajax call with jQuery(got that part down), and call on a method from the controller so that I can pass the get variables to it and get the output I want returned from the Ajax call.

I can't refresh the page because it is a page full of forms and I don't want each to be reset on a refresh. I also can't pass it to a "handle.php" where I could have the function I need, because what would be the point of the Model and Controller?

What can I do? Or rather, more importantly, what is the best way to approach such a thing? Can I load the classes I need again (would need about 6 because of the extends I use) and instantiate a new object which calls the appropriate method?

I guess it is my own fault for trying to build my own MVC framework instead of learning something like Zend, but whats done is done. Any help would be appreciated, just need to be pointed in the right direction.

Answer 1

From your question it's a bit difficult to find out what kind of data you're trying to get. Do you need to get data to fill the forms? Or do you need to pass data from the forms back to the database using your PHP script?

In both cases, i guess a 'handle.php' script would probably work fine. Just make some kind of bare-bones script that can handle your incoming data, validate it and load up the appropriate classes (maybe using __autoload) to save it in the database.

Answer 2

You would more than likely want to make a request to a page much the same way you would call any other controller/method combination. For example, suppose you are trying to call controller Ajax and method Update... You would hopefully have URL routing so you would simply link to /ajax/update. This is the ideal solution.

Within such a method you would want to echo your results as opposed to trying to display a template/layout/view combination. This may mean you need to tweak your CMS to allow for such a thing but hopefully not.

Your method Update should more than likely have access to the globals $_POST and $_GET so that you may retrieve the data submitted from the AJAX request.

Answer 3

You should have some way to determine which command you are calling, so the controller can determine where you need to go.

For example, if you pass in a form # and command, your controller may pass this off to the controller for that specific form, who can then determine how to do the operation you need.

I think it is risky to have all this logic in one controller, as it will mean a very long switch statement, at some point.

You may want to explain more about how your controller handles input from the javascript (client), to determine routing, as, currently, it is just guesswork as to how to help you.

Answer 4

You're saying;

As of right now I don't have a controller handling javascript which is my problem

As I understand your controller doesn't need a controller handling an ajax request. You make the ajax request as you would a normal request. So if your controller knows what to do with a normal request its already handling javascript.

Again if I understand correctly for the books example you should do something like that;

$.get("/books/search/plato",  function(data){
    alert("Data Loaded: " + data);
});

And for the /playground and gradient thing this should work; You can invoke this from handle.php and it will request the playground controller and return the data;

$.get("/playground/gradient",  function(data){ //data is what is returned from playground file
    alert("Data Loaded: " + data);
});

Hope this helps