appropiate MVC structure for a forum

Question

i want to use a good mvc naming convention for a forum im creating.

i wonder, should i use this structure:

controller: threads
model: threads_model (eg. $threads_model->get_all_threads, $threads_model->add_thread, $threads_model->add_post, $threads_model->add_comment)

controller: tags
model: tags_model (eg. $tags_model->get_all_tags, $tags_model->add_tag)

controller: users
model: users_model (eg. $users_model->get_all_users, $users_model->add_user)

or

controller: content
model: content_model (eg. $content_model->get_all_tags, $content_model->get_all threads...)

controller: users
model: users_model (eg. $users_model->get_all_users, $users_model->add_user)

this is my first time using mvc so i want to know what is best practice for this. should i like in the first example separate every "thing" (tags, threads, users...) or should i use the second one? further more, should i in the first example separate comments and posts as well so they will be their own controllers/models?

would be good if someone gave me some good mvc pattern for forums.

Answer 1

Your first structure would be better, separate it all from the start, you never know when a future feature will need some tags index json or something.

Each (most) controller has it's CRUD actions index, view, edit, new, save etc

The php auto load function can take a model name and then look into the models directory for a file to require().

Yes separate comments and posts, into different models and controllers, the post controller will have a view/show action to render the post that might have a form with an action="" pointing to the save/create action of the comments controller.

The "normal" MVC filesystem structure might be:

/app/
     controllers/
                 content/                <- controller name
                       home.php          <- actions that require(../../views/content/home.php)
                       view.php
                 users/
                       index.php
                       view.php
                 tags/
                       edit.php
     models/
                 content.php             <-   class Content{ }
                 user.php
                 tag.php
     helpers/
                 application.php       <- grouped up functions for areas of the system
                 tag_helper.php
                 content_helper.php
     views/                             <- templates
                 users/
                        index.php
                        user.php
                        views.php
     public/
                 css/
                        layout.css
                        typography.css
                        style.css
                 images/
                        logo.png
                 js/
                        global.js
                        content.js
                 assets/
                        users/
                                000234.png     <- e.g. profile images

This structure is largely taken from the Rails structure which is very organized.

Answer 2

Over the 2 you have posted, id say the 1st structure is best. Think about your system as separate entities, and the realations between them. As a simple example

Thread
Reply
User
Tag

In this case som appropriate associations would be..

User can create many threads
User can create many replies

Reply Belongs to a User
Reply Belongs to a thread

Thread belongs to a user
Thread has many replies
Thread has many tags

Tag has many threads

Once the associations are made its a bit clearer to think of the methods needed, such as:

**User**
Get Threads: Returns all threads created by thhis user
Get Replies: Returns all replies created by thgis user

**Thread**
Get User: Returns the User that created this thread
Get Replies: Return all replies to this thread

**Reply**
Get User: Returns the User that created this reply
Get Thread: Returns the Thread that this user belongs to

There would obviously be more methods for example in the user model you may want to return a particular thread by an id so you would also have a GetThread method that you would pass an id.

Hope this gets you thinking a bit!

One further point is that in your models, such as your Tag model, you have a mehtod addTag, as far as i am aware, you wouldnt really want this method in your model, as then it could only be called by a tag. If you had to create a tag to add a tag youd get pretty stuck. Id move this into the controller.