Live Templates

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Now that we have our form rendering, we want to be able to submit it! Crazy idea, I know but let's see what we can do. We'll use our standard code for this $form->handleRequest($request);. Now we don't have the $request object yet, so let's put our type hint in for it. And like always, make sure you have the right one and let it autocomplete to get the use statement for you. And real quick, plug request in here too:

            
            46 lines
            
            src/AppBundle/Controller/MovieController.php
        
                                                    ... lines 1 - 9
                            
            use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Request;
        
                                                    ... line 11
                            
            class MovieController extends Controller
        
            {
        
                                                    ... lines 14 - 16
                            
                public function newAction(Request $request)
        
                {
        
                                                    ... lines 19 - 35
                            
                }
        
                                                    ... lines 37 - 44
                            
            }

Below, let's add if ($form->isValid()) with a TODO to remind us to actually start saving stuff. Next, there are two things we typically do here: first add a flash message, like "Sam would be proud". And I truly think he would. And second, we redirect with return $this->redirectToRoute() and let's send our users to the movies_list route, which of course we get a nice autocomplete on:

            
            46 lines
            
            src/AppBundle/Controller/MovieController.php
        
                                                    ... lines 1 - 16
                            
                public function newAction(Request $request)
        
                {
        
                                                    ... lines 19 - 22
                            
                    $form->handleRequest($request);
        
                    if ($form->isValid()) {
        
                        // todo do some work, like save ...
        
                        $this->addFlash('success', 'Sam would be pleased');
        
                        return $this->redirectToRoute('movies_list');
        
                    }
        
                                                    ... lines 31 - 35
                            
                }
        
                                                    ... lines 37 - 46

Creating a Live Template

That was pretty easy, but we'll be writing those 8 lines of code over and over and over again inside of our project. There must be a better way! To fix that we are going to use something called a "Live Template". That's what lets us just type a in a twig template, hit tab and get a full a tag printed out. We want to do the same type of thing and have it generate all this form handling boiler plate code for us.

To make this, first select all the code that you want included. Then click on the Tools dropdown menu, and select "Save as Live Template". Let's give this a name, like formhandle with a description of "Adds controller form handling code". Inside the template text tweak the indentation but other than that, let's just leave this alone for now. Hit 'ok'.

Now that we have this, we can delete our hard work. Replace it by typing formhandle, hitting tab, and then... boom!

            
            46 lines
            
            src/AppBundle/Controller/MovieController.php
        
                                                    ... lines 1 - 16
                            
                public function newAction(Request $request)
        
                {
        
                                                    ... lines 19 - 22
                            
                    $form->handleRequest($request);
        
                    if ($form->isValid()) {
        
                        // todo do some work, like save ...
        
                        $this->addFlash('success', 'Sam would be pleased');
        
                        return $this->redirectToRoute('movies_list', array());
        
                    }
        
                                                    ... lines 31 - 35
                            
                }
        
                                                    ... lines 37 - 46

Enjoy that autocompletion.

Live Template Variables

Of course now we need to make parts of this dynamic. We'll need to edit our live template...how do we do that? Well, it's probably in the preferences menu and if we search for it, it is!

We'll assume that the variable is always called $form because it usually is, but we do want to change our success message here. Let's swap it out for '$SUCCESSMESSAGE$' with dollar signs on both sides and surrounded in quotes. Let's do the same thing down here in the redirect, we'll change that to '$ROUTENAME$'. In the event that the route has parameters add in array next to it for convenience. Save this.

Get rid of the code and again type in formhandle and tab. Type in 'Sam would be proud', hit tab, type movie_list for our redirect, then tab one more time. Now that is awesome and so much faster than typing it all out again and again and again.

Another great spot to use Live Templates is inside of this form row stuff since we'll be typing this all the time. Copy one of our rows, go to Tools and "Save as Live Template". We'll call this one formrow with a description of "Renders form_row in Twig". Below, there's a note saying its applicable for HTML, HTML text and HTML Twig files - so that's right. Let's update this line of code to be form.$FIELD$. Click ok and now we can try this out.

Type formrow, hit tab and now we can just start typing in the field property name and select it from the list that pops up. Now, as great as formrow is, sometimes you can't use it. womp womp. That's when you'll end up rendering a field manually, which will probably be a div and the three parts: {{ form_label(form.releasedAt) }}. Copy that and update for form_widget, and form_errors:

            
            15 lines
            
            app/Resources/views/movie/_form.html.twig
        
            {{ form_start(form) }}
        
                                                    ... lines 2 - 6
                            
                <div class="form-group">
        
                    {{ form_label(form.releasedAt) }}
        
                    {{ form_widget(form.releasedAt) }}
        
                    {{ form_errors(form.releasedAt) }}
        
                </div>
        
                                                    ... lines 12 - 13
                            
            {{ form_end(form) }}

Clearly this is also begging to be turned into a Live Template.

You know the drill! Select the full div, go to Tools, Save as Live Template. Let's name this one formrowfull, and it "Renders widget/label/errors". What's cool here is that there's just one variable that's duplicated 3 times. So we can just say $FIELD$ and repeat that each time. Just a quick indentation fix there and click ok. Awesome!

Let's get rid of the div we had, type formrowfull, hit the tab key, and as we start typing the property name we get the autocomplete and it's filling instantly on each of the three lines. I'll fix the spacing here to wrap it up!

So, live templates: big win.

What PHP libraries does this tutorial use?

// composer.json
{
    "require": {
        "php": ">=5.3.9, <7.3.0",
        "symfony/symfony": "2.8.*", // v2.8.15
        "doctrine/orm": "^2.4.8", // v2.4.8
        "doctrine/dbal": "<2.5", // v2.4.5
        "doctrine/doctrine-bundle": "~1.4", // 1.6.4
        "symfony/assetic-bundle": "~2.3", // v2.8.1
        "symfony/swiftmailer-bundle": "~2.3,>=2.3.10", // v2.4.2
        "symfony/monolog-bundle": "^3.0.2", // v3.0.2
        "sensio/distribution-bundle": "~5.0", // v5.0.17
        "sensio/framework-extra-bundle": "^3.0.2", // v3.0.18
        "incenteev/composer-parameter-handler": "~2.0" // v2.1.2
    },
    "require-dev": {
        "sensio/generator-bundle": "~3.0", // v3.1.2
        "symfony/phpunit-bridge": "~2.7" // v2.8.15
    }
}

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Lean and Mean Dev with PhpStorm (for Symfony)

Live Templates

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Creating a Live Template

Live Template Variables

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What PHP libraries does this tutorial use?

	... lines 1 - 9
	use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Request;
	... line 11
	class MovieController extends Controller
	{
	... lines 14 - 16
	public function newAction(Request $request)
	{
	... lines 19 - 35
	}
	... lines 37 - 44
	}

	... lines 1 - 16
	public function newAction(Request $request)
	{
	... lines 19 - 22
	$form->handleRequest($request);
	if ($form->isValid()) {
	// todo do some work, like save ...

	$this->addFlash('success', 'Sam would be pleased');

	return $this->redirectToRoute('movies_list');
	}
	... lines 31 - 35
	}
	... lines 37 - 46

	{{ form_start(form) }}
	... lines 2 - 6
	<div class="form-group">
	{{ form_label(form.releasedAt) }}
	{{ form_widget(form.releasedAt) }}
	{{ form_errors(form.releasedAt) }}
	</div>
	... lines 12 - 13
	{{ form_end(form) }}