The Data Package

Data\DataObject

Data\DataObject is a class that is used to store data but allowing you to access the data by mimicking the way PHP handles class properties. Rather than explicitly declaring properties in the class, Data\DataObject stores virtual properties of the class in a private internal array. Concrete properties can still be defined but these are separate from the data.

Construction

The constructor for a new Data\DataObject object can optionally take an array or an object. The keys of the array or the properties of the object will be bound to the properties of the Data\DataObject object.

use Joomla\Data\DataObject;

// Create an empty object.
$object1 = new DataObject;

// Create an object with data. You can use an array or another object.
$data = array(
    'foo' => 'bar',
);

$object2 = new DataObject($data);

// The following should echo "bar".
echo $object2->foo;

General Usage

Data\DataObject includes magic getters and setters to provide access to the internal property store as if they were explicitly declared properties of the class.

The bind method allows for injecting an existing array or object into the Data\DataObject object.

The dump method gets a plain stdClass version of the Data\DataObject object's properties. It will also support recursion to a specified number of levels where the default is 3 and a depth of 0 would return a stdClass object with all the properties in native form. Note that the dump method will only return virtual properties set binding and magic methods. It will not include any concrete properties defined in the class itself.

The JsonSerializable interface is implemented. This method proxies to the dump method (defaulting to a recursion depth of 3). Note that this interface only takes effect implicitly in PHP 5.4 so any code built for PHP 5.3 needs to explicitly use either the jsonSerialize or the dump method before passing to json_encode.

The Data\DataObject class also implements the IteratorAggregate interface so it can easily be used in a foreach statement.

use Joomla\Data\DataObject;

// Create an empty object.
$object = new DataObject;

// Set a property.
$object->foo = 'bar';

// Get a property.
$foo = $object->foo;

// Binding some new data to the object.
$object->bind(array('goo' => 'car');

// Get a plain object version of the data object.
$stdClass = $object->dump();

// Get a property with a default value if it is not already set.
$foo = $object->foo ?: 'The default';

// Iterate over the properties as if the object were a real array.
foreach ($object as $key => $value)
{
    echo "\n$key = $value";
}

if (version_compare(PHP_VERSION, '5.4') >= 0)
{
	// PHP 5.4 is aware of the JsonSerializable interface.
	$json = json_encode($object);
}
else
{
	// Have to do it the hard way to be compatible with PHP 5.3.
	$json = json_encode($object->jsonSerialize());
}

Data\DataSet

Data\DataSet is a collection class that allows the developer to operate on a list of Data\DataObject objects as if they were in a typical PHP array (Data\DataSet implements the ArrayAccess, Countable and Iterator interfaces).

Construction

A typical Data\DataSet object will be instantiated by passing an array of Data\DataObject objects in the constructor.

use Joomla\Data\DataObject;
use Joomla\Data\DataSet;

// Create an empty object.
$players = new DataSet(
    array(
        new DataObject(array('race' => 'Elf', 'level' => 1)),
        new DataObject(array('race' => 'Chaos Dwarf', 'level' => 2)),
    )
);

General Usage

Array elements can be manipulated with the offsetSet and offsetUnset methods, or by using PHP array nomenclature.

The magic __get method in the Data\DataSet class effectively works like a "get column" method. It will return an array of values of the properties for all the objects in the list.

The magic __set method is similar and works like a "set column" method. It will set all a value for a property for all the objects in the list.

The clear method will clear all the objects in the data set.

The keys method will return all of the keys of the objects stored in the set. It works like the array_keys function does on an PHP array.

use Joomla\Data\DataObject;

// Add a new element to the end of the list.
$players[] => new DataObject(array('race' => 'Skaven', 'level' => 2));

// Add a new element with an associative key.
$players['captain'] => new DataObject(array('race' => 'Human', 'level' => 3));

// Get a keyed element from the list.
$captain = $players['captain'];

// Set the value of a property for all objects. Upgrade all players to level 4.
$players->level = 4;

// Get the value of a property for all object and also the count (get the average level).
$average = $players->level / count($players);

// Clear all the objects.
$players->clear();

Data\DataSet supports magic methods that operate on all the objects in the list. Calling an arbitrary method will iterate of the list of objects, checking if each object has a callable method of the name of the method that was invoked. In such a case, the return values are assembled in an array forming the return value of the method invoked on the Data\DataSet object. The keys of the original objects are maintained in the result array.

use Joomla\Data\DataObject;
use Joomla\Data\DataSet;

/**
 * A custom data object.
 *
 * @since  1.0
 */
class PlayerObject extends DataObject
{
    /**
     * Get player damage.
     *
     * @return  integer  The amount of damage the player has received.
     *
     * @since   1.0
     */
    public function hurt()
    {
        return (int) $this->maxHealth - $this->actualHealth;
    }
}

$players = new DataSet(
    array(
        // Add a normal player.
        new PlayerObject(array('race' => 'Chaos Dwarf', 'level' => 2,
        	'maxHealth' => 40, 'actualHealth' => '32')),
        // Add an invincible player.
        new PlayerObject(array('race' => 'Elf', 'level' => 1)),
    )
);

// Get an array of the hurt players.
$hurt = $players->hurt();

if (!empty($hurt))
{
    // In this case, $hurt = array(0 => 8);
    // There is no entry for the second player
    // because that object does not have a "hurt" method.
    foreach ($hurt as $playerKey => $player)
    {
        // Do something with the hurt players.
    }
};

Data\DumpableInterface

Data\DumpableInterface is an interface that defines a dump method for dumping the properties of an object as a stdClass with or without recursion.

Installation via Composer

Add "joomla/data": "~3.0" to the require block in your composer.json and then run composer install.

{
	"require": {
		"joomla/data": "~3.0"
	}
}

Alternatively, you can simply run the following from the command line:

composer require joomla/data "~3.0"

If you want to include the test sources, use

composer require --prefer-source joomla/data "~3.0"