How to get the active component in Joomla! 1.5.x

For some time now I have been struggling to figure out how to get the active component in Joomla! 1.5.x without going through the GET/POST Requests. This problem was specifically for the frontpage.

What happens on the frontpage is that it is not possible to echo JRequest::getVar('option') and have the code tell you that you are on the frontpage. Instead the text that will be displayed will simply display com_content, which is the component for articles.

After searching throught the Joomla! Document Wiki I stumbled upon the solution; totally by chance I might add.

How to determine if the user is viewing the front page

The above document shows this piece of code:

$menu = & JSite::getMenu();
if ($menu->getActive() == $menu->getDefault()) 
{
echo 'This is the front page';
}

But what does the code actually do?

JSite::getMenu() returns a JMenu class called $menu that is inherited from the JObject class.

$menu->getActive() and $menu->getDefault() returns objects of the active and default menu items (by id).

If the active object is the same as the default object then naturally it must be the front page.

For other components the simplest option will still be to use the JRequest object to get the component name.

e.g. JRequest::getVar('option')

Note: I have not tested the above code with Search Engine Friendly URLs yet since they may, or may not, make a difference.

keepr

Today I would like to introduce keepr, a php cms/framework I am working on in my free time.

It all started in May/June 2007. I was without a job and needed something to help me deliver projects faster without forcing me to change the way I like to code. It impliments the way I see Model-View-Controller for the web environment using PHP XTemplate

I launched a GNU GPL version 3 at the following url http://code.google.com/p/keepr/ . There is no downloads yet by the full source is available at Source/Browse under trunk.

SQLite and SOCI

Now that I know that I can do SQL queries agains the SQLite database, my first objective is to create a C++ dataobject that will allow my yet to be created framework to interact with the database. But first I need to be able to actually access SQLite through code.

My search led me to SOCI which is a C++ Database Access Library. I quote from their website:

The idea is to provide C++ programmers a way to access SQL databases in the most natural and intuitive way.

From what I can see SOCI looks to be the best thing for what I want to achieve.

http://soci.sourceforge.net

SQLite - Updating Tables

What if I need to make changes to the data in my table? As an example, I forgot to insert Armourette's birthday and Johan is not active yet. This mean I will have to run an update query on the table.

SQLite query:

SQLite version 3.5.4
Enter ".help" for instructions
sqlite> .schema person
CREATE TABLE person
(
'ID' INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT,
'FIRSTNAMES' TEXT,
'SURNAME' TEXT,
'NAME' TEXT,
'BIRTHDATE' DEFAULT CURRENT_DATE,
'TITLE' TEXT,
'ACTIVE' TEXT(1) DEFAULT 'N'
);
sqlite> select * from person;
1|Johannes|Strydom|Johan|1977-02-22|Mr|N
2|Armourette|Strydom|Armourette|2008-01-17|Mrs|Y
sqlite> UPDATE person SET ACTIVE='Y' WHERE ID=1;
sqlite> UPDATE person SET BIRTHDATE='1983-07-05' WHERE ID=2;
sqlite> select * from person;
1|Johannes|Strydom|Johan|1977-02-22|Mr|Y
2|Armourette|Strydom|Armourette|1983-07-05|Mrs|Y
sqlite>

Using the primary key ID I am able to quickly update the correct data.

SQLite - Creating Tables

What is a database without tables?

My next chalenge in SQLite is to create tables. Using the SQLite create table documentation I am able to create tables without any hassle.

Say for example I want to store data about a person in the database and to do that I want to create a table with fields for firstnames, surname, preferred name, birthdate,title and some sort of primary reference that should be indexed and that should auto increment whenever a new row is added to the table. I also want to indicate in this table whether the person is active.

So I start up SQLite and attached my database;

SQLite version 3.5.4
Enter ".help" for instructions
sqlite> ATTACH DATABASE 'myDB.fl' AS myDB;
sqlite> .databases

Ok so I now have everything in place to start creating the table.

sqlite> CREATE TABLE myDB.person
...> (
...> 'ID' INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT,
...> 'FIRSTNAMES' TEXT,
...> 'SURNAME' TEXT,
...> 'NAME' TEXT,
...> 'BIRTHDATE' DEFAULT CURRENT_DATE,
...> 'TITLE' TEXT,
...> 'ACTIVE' TEXT(1) DEFAULT 'N'
...> );

Fine so far. Now to insert data!

sqlite> INSERT INTO myDB.person('FIRSTNAMES','SURNAME','NAME','BIRTHDATE','TITLE
') VALUES ('Johannes','Strydom','Johan','1977-02-22','Mr');

No problemo. To see whether everything works I do a SELECT

sqlite> SELECT * FROM myDB.person;
1|Johannes|Strydom|Johan|1977-02-22|Mr|N

And another insert to test the default date.

sqlite> INSERT INTO myDB.person('FIRSTNAMES','SURNAME','NAME','TITLE'
,'ACTIVE') VALUES ('Armourette','Strydom','Armourette','Mrs','Y');
sqlite> SELECT * FROM myDB.person;
1|Johannes|Strydom|Johan|1977-02-22|Mr|N
2|Armourette|Strydom|Armourette|2008-01-17|Mrs|Y
sqlite>

Wasn't that easy? Now If I can only get SQLite to show me the table schema. For some reason it does not want to do that.

sqlite> .schema myDB.person
sqlite>

So what worked:

• Create Table (passed)
• Insert (passed)
• Auto Increment (passed)
• Default values (passed)
• .schema (failed)

There must be a configuration or command somewhere for schema which I must have missed.

I solved the problem by exiting SQLite and opening my database as a parameter to the SQLite command line executable.

C:\sqlite-3_5_4\sqlite3.exe myDB.fl
SQLite version 3.5.4
Enter ".help" for instructions
sqlite> .schema person
CREATE TABLE person
(
'ID' INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT,
'FIRSTNAMES' TEXT,
'SURNAME' TEXT,
'NAME' TEXT,
'BIRTHDATE' DEFAULT CURRENT_DATE,
'TITLE' TEXT,
'ACTIVE' TEXT(1) DEFAULT 'N'
);
sqlite>

So the master database is now my SQLite database! Isn't that cool? :)

With my database as the master I am also able to get the schema by running the following SELECT statement

sqlite> SELECT * FROM sqlite_master WHERE type IN ('table') AND tbl_name NOT LIKE 'INFORMATION_SCHEMA_%' ;
table|person|person|2|CREATE TABLE person
(
'ID' INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT,
'FIRSTNAMES' TEXT,
'SURNAME' TEXT,
'NAME' TEXT,
'BIRTHDATE' DEFAULT CURRENT_DATE,
'TITLE' TEXT,
'ACTIVE' TEXT(1) DEFAULT 'N'
)
table|sqlite_sequence|sqlite_sequence|3|CREATE TABLE sqlite_sequence(name,seq)
sqlite>

Conclusion?

• .schema (!passed!)