App::ZofCMS::Plugin::Base - base class for App::ZofCMS plugins

    package App::ZofCMS::Plugin::Example;

    use strict;
    use warnings;
    use base 'App::ZofCMS::Plugin::Base';

    sub _key { 'plug_example' }
    sub _defaults {
        return (
        qw/foo bar baz beer/
        );
    }
    sub _do {
        my ( $self, $conf, $t, $q, $config ) = @_;

        $self->_dbh->do('DELETE FROM `foo`')
            if _has_value( $q->{foo} );
    }

The module is a base class for App::ZofCMS plugins. I'll safely assume that you've already read the docs for App::ZofCMS, App::ZofCMS::Config and App::ZofCMS::Template

The base class (currently) is only for plugins who take their "config" as a single first-level key in either Main Config File or ZofCMS Template. That key's value must be a hashref or a subref that returns a hashref, empty list or undef.

    sub _key { 'plug_example' }

The _key needs to return a scalar containing the name of first level key in ZofCMS template or Main Config file. Study the source code of this module to find out what it's used for if it's still unclear. The value of that key can be either a hashref or a subref that returns a hashref or undef. If the value is a subref, its return value will be assigned to the key and its @_ will contain (in that order): $t, $q, $conf where $t is ZofCMS Template hashref, $q is hashref of query parameters and $conf is App::ZofCMS::Config object.

    sub _defaults { qw/foo bar baz beer/ }

The _defaults sub needs to return a list of default arguments in a form of key/value pairs. By default it returns an empty list.

    sub _do {
        my ( $self, $conf, $template, $query, $config ) = @_;
    }

The _do sub is where you'd do all of your processing. The @_ will contain $self, $conf, $template, $query and $config (in that order) where $self is your plugin's object, $conf is the plugin's configuration hashref (what the user would specify in ZofCMS Template or Main Config File, the key of which is returned by _key() sub), the $template is the hashref of ZofCMS template that is being processed, the $query is a query parameters hashref where keys are names of the params and values are their values. Finally, the $config is App::ZofCMS::Config object.

The module provides these utility subs that are meant to give you a hand during coding:

    sub _has_value {
        my $v = shift;

        return 1
            if defined $v and length $v;

        return 0;
    }

This sub is shown above and is meant to provide a shorter way to test whether a given variable has any meaningful content.

    sub _dbh {
        my $self = shift;

        return $self->{DBH}
            if $self->{DBH};

        $self->{DBH} = DBI->connect_cached(
            @{ $self->{CONF} }{ qw/dsn user pass opt/ },
        );

        return $self->{DBH};
    }

This sub (shown above) has marginally narrower spectrum of usability as opposed to the rest of this module; nevertheless, I found needing it way too often. The sub is an accessor to a connected DBI's database handle that autoconnects if it hasn't already. Note that the sub expects dns, user, pass and opt arguments located in $self->{CONF} hashref. For descriptionof these arguments, see DBI's connect_cached() method.

Feel free to email me the requests for extra functionality for this base class.

Below is a "template" documentation. If you're going to use it, make sure to read through the entire thing as some things may not apply to your plugin; I've added those bits as they are very common in the plugins that I write, some of them (but not all) I marked with word [EDIT].

    =head1 DESCRIPTION

    The module is a plugin for L<App::ZofCMS> that provides means to [EDIT].

    This documentation assumes you've read L<App::ZofCMS>,
    L<App::ZofCMS::Config> and L<App::ZofCMS::Template>

    =head1 FIRST-LEVEL ZofCMS TEMPLATE AND MAIN CONFIG FILE KEYS

    =head2 C<plugins>

        plugins => [ qw/[EDIT]/ ],

    B<Mandatory>. You need to include the plugin in the list of
    plugins to execute.

    =head2 C<[EDIT]>

        [EDIT] => {
        },

        # or
        [EDIT] => sub {
            my ( $t, $q, $config ) = @_;
            return $hashref_to_assign_to_this_key_instead_of_subref;
        },

    B<Mandatory>. Takes either a hashref or a subref as a value.
    If subref is specified, its return value will be assigned to
    C<[EDIT]> as if it were already there. If sub returns an C<undef>
    or an empty list, then plugin will stop further processing. The
    C<@_> of the subref will contain C<$t>, C<$q>, and C<$config>
    (in that order), where C<$t> is ZofCMS Template hashref, C<$q> is
    query parameter hashref, and C<$config> is L<App::ZofCMS::Config>
    object. Possible keys/values for the hashref are as follows:

    =head3 C<cell>

        [EDIT] => {
            cell => 't',
        },

    B<Optional>. Specifies ZofCMS Template first-level key where to
    [EDIT]. Must be pointing to either a hashref or an C<undef>
    (see C<key> below). B<Defaults to:> C<t>

    =head3 C<key>

        [EDIT] => {
            key => '[EDIT]',
        },

    B<Optional>. Specifies ZofCMS Template second-level key where to
    [EDIT]. This key will be inside C<cell> (see above)>.
    B<Defaults to:> C<[EDIT]>

The following is the documentation I use for the DBI configuration part of arguments that are used by DBI-using modules:

    =head3 C<dsn>

        [EDIT] => {
            dsn => "DBI:mysql:database=test;host=localhost",
        ...

    B<Mandatory>. The C<dsn> key will be passed to L<DBI>'s
    C<connect_cached()> method, see documentation for L<DBI> and
    C<DBD::your_database> for the correct syntax for this one.
    The example above uses MySQL database called C<test> that is
    located on C<localhost>.

    =head3 C<user>

        [EDIT] => {
            user => '',
        ...

    B<Optional>. Specifies the user name (login) for the database.
    This can be an empty string if, for example, you are connecting
    using SQLite driver. B<Defaults to:> C<''> (empty string)

    =head3 C<pass>

        [EDIT] => {
            pass => undef,
        ...

    B<Optional>. Same as C<user> except specifies the password for the
    database. B<Defaults to:> C<undef> (no password)

    =head3 C<opt>

        [EDIT] => {
            opt => { RaiseError => 1, AutoCommit => 1 },
        ...

    B<Optional>. Will be passed directly to L<DBI>'s
    C<connect_cached()> method as "options". B<Defaults to:>
    C<< { RaiseError => 1, AutoCommit => 1 } >>

'Zoffix, <'zoffix at cpan.org'> (http://zoffix.com/, http://haslayout.net/, http://mind-power-book.com/)

Please report any bugs or feature requests to bug-app-zofcms-plugin-base at rt.cpan.org, or through the web interface at http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/ReportBug.html?Queue=App-ZofCMS-Plugin-Base. I will be notified, and then you'll automatically be notified of progress on your bug as I make changes.

You can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command.

    perldoc App::ZofCMS::Plugin::Base

You can also look for information at:

* RT: CPAN's request tracker

http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/Bugs.html?Dist=App-ZofCMS-Plugin-Base

* AnnoCPAN: Annotated CPAN documentation

http://annocpan.org/dist/App-ZofCMS-Plugin-Base

* CPAN Ratings

http://cpanratings.perl.org/d/App-ZofCMS-Plugin-Base

* Search CPAN

http://search.cpan.org/dist/App-ZofCMS-Plugin-Base

Copyright 2008 'Zoffix, all rights reserved.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.