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Views are responsible for presenting the data to end users. In web applications, Views are just PHP script files containing HTML and PHP code.
Creating Views
Step 1 − Let us have a look at the ‘About’ view of the basic application template.
<?php /* @var $this yiiwebView */ use yiihelpersHtml; $this->title = ''About''; $this->params[''breadcrumbs''][] = $this->title; ?> <div class="site-about"> <h1><?= Html::encode($this->title) ?></h1> <p> This is the About page. You may modify the following file to customize its content: </p> <code><?= __FILE__ ?></code> </div>
The $this variable refers to the view component that manages and renders this view template.
This is how the ‘About’ page looks like −
It is important to encode and/or filter the data coming from the end user in order to avoid the XSS attacks. You should always encode a plain text by calling yiihelpersHtml::encode() and HTML content by calling yiihelpersHtmlPurifier.
Step 2 − Modify the ‘About’ View in the following way.
<?php /* @var $this yiiwebView */ use yiihelpersHtml; use yiihelpersHtmlPurifier; $this->title = ''About''; $this->params[''breadcrumbs''][] = $this->title; ?> <div class="site-about"> <h1><?= Html::encode($this->title) ?></h1> <p> This is the About page. You may modify the following file to customize its content: </p> <p> <?= Html::encode("<script>alert(''alert!'');</script><h1>ENCODE EXAMPLE</h1>>") ?> </p> <p> <?= HtmlPurifier::process("<script>alert(''alert!'');</script><h1> HtmlPurifier EXAMPLE</h1>") ?> </p> <code><?= __FILE__ ?></code> </div>
Step 3 − Now type http://localhost:8080/index.php?r=site/about. You will see the following screen.
Notice, that the javascript code inside the Html::encode() function is displayed as plain text. The same thing is for HtmlPurifier::process() call. Only h1 tag is being displayed.
Views follow these conventions −
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Views, which are rendered by a controller, should be put into the @app/views/controllerID folder.
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Views, which are rendered in a widget, should be put into the widgetPath/views folder.
To render a view within a controller, you may use the following methods −
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render() − Renders a view and applies a layout.
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renderPartial() − Renders a view without a layout.
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renderAjax() − Renders a view without a layout, but injects all registered js and css files.
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renderFile() − Renders a view in a given file path or alias.
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renderContent() − Renders a static string and applies a layout.
To render a view within another view, you may use the following methods −
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render() − Renders a view.
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renderAjax() − Renders a view without a layout, but injects all registered js and css files.
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renderFile() − Renders a view in a given file path or alias.
Step 4 − Inside the views/site folder, create two view files: _part1.php and _part2.php.
_part1.php −
<h1>PART 1</h1>
_part2.php −
<h1>PART 2</h1>
Step 5 − Finally, render these two newly created views inside the ‘About’ View.
<?php /* @var $this yiiwebView */ use yiihelpersHtml; $this->title = ''About''; $this->params[''breadcrumbs''][] = $this->title; ?> <div class="site-about"> <h1><?= Html::encode($this->title) ?></h1> <p> This is the About page. You may modify the following file to customize its content: </p> <?= $this->render("_part1") ?> <?= $this->render("_part2") ?> <code><?= __FILE__ ?></code> </div>
You will see the following output −
When rendering a view, you can define the view using as a view name or a view file path/alias. A view name is resolved in the following way −
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A view name can omit the extension. For example, the about view corresponds to the about.php file.
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If the view name starts with “/”, then if currently active module is forum, and the view name is comment/post, the path would be @app/modules/forum/views/comment/post. If there is no active module, the path would be @app/views/comment/post.
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If the view name starts with “//”, the corresponding path would be @app/views/ViewName. For example, //site/contact corresponds to @app/views/site/contact.php.
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If the view name is contact, and the context controller is SiteController, then the path would be @app/views/site/contact.php.
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If the price view is rendered within the goods view, then price would be resolved as @app/views/invoice/price.php if it is being rendered in the @app/views/invoice/goods.php.
Accessing Data in Views
To access data within a view, you should pass the data as the second parameter to the view rendering method.
Step 1 − Modify the actionAbout of the SiteController.
public function actionAbout() { $email = "[email protected]"; $phone = "+78007898100"; return $this->render(''about'',[ ''email'' => $email, ''phone'' => $phone ]); }
In the code given above, we pass two variables $email and $phone to render in the About view.
Step 2 − Change the about view code.
<?php /* @var $this yiiwebView */ use yiihelpersHtml; $this->title = ''About''; $this->params[''breadcrumbs''][] = $this->title; ?> <div class = "site-about"> <h1><?= Html::encode($this->title) ?></h1> <p> This is the About page. You may modify the following file to customize its content: </p> <p> <b>email:</b> <?= $email ?> </p> <p> <b>phone:</b> <?= $phone ?> </p> <code><?= __FILE__ ?></code> </div>
We have just added two variables that we received from the SiteController.
Step 3 − Type the URL http://localhost:8080/index.php?r=site/about in the web browser, you will see the following.
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