Publishing to alternate assets directory

Sometimes, it's not possible to use the standard 'assets' directory for publishing assets. After struggling with this for a while, I discovered that the solution is, as is typical with Yii, even simpler than I could have hoped for.

Action paramater binding in Yii 1.1.4

The new Yii 1.1.4 contains numerous improvements. One that I wasn't clear on from the changelog was  the line saying "automatic action parameter binding" for $_GET values.  This is a very subtle way of saying that they've made it much easier to handle some of the 'grunt work' for actions that work with multiple $_GET variables.


http://www.yiiframework.com/doc/guide/basics.controller#action-parameter-binding

Quite simply pass in the name of the $_GET variables to the controller action method as parameters, including any default value you would like applied if they did not specify a value. 

Easily looked over, but very nice addition to the framework!!

Using Controller Filters

So, I'm sure by now everyone's used the very familiar "accessControl" filter, but so much of that happens behind the scenes. This post goes into how to create your own filters and how they can be useful.

Information about how to set up filters can be found here: http://www.yiiframework.com/doc/guide/basics.controller#filter

The method-based implementation of the filters is extremely straight forward, simply add the method to the controller in the form of public function filterXYZ( $c ) then add XYZ to your array of filters:

Adding Foreign Keys Manually

Using MyISAM tables (in MySQL), I'm unable to set foreign keys in the database. However, I'm working with several tables which utilize foreign key type relationships. The problem was how to get Yii to recognize those relationships properly.

This one took me a while to figure out. With the help of the experts over at the Yii Forums, I was able to put together this solution.

Saving encrypted passwords for new users

When using PASSWORD() encrypted passwords for users, I need to save the encrypted version when the file is created or when the password is changed. However, I don't want it to run the encryption every time the file is saved if it's pulled in the encrypted value already.

Putting the job of encrypting the password on the User model, I've added an encryptPassword() function to the model, which can be called by the controller after it receives the post data as such:

public function encryptPassword()
{
    $p = $this->userpass;
    $this->userpass = new CDbExpression('PASSWORD(:up)', array(':up'=>$p));
}

And modify the actionCreate as such:

...
$model->attributes = $_POST['User']; // existing line
if ( $model->validate()){    
   $model->encryptPassword();
   if ( $model->save( false )){   // modify existing line to pass in false param
      // .. existing code here
   }
} 

- OR -
To automate the process, alter the User model further by adding:

protected function beforeSave()
{
  if ( $this->isNewRecord )
     $this->encryptPassword();
  return parent::beforeSave();
}

Then, if you have a change password form, you can handle it in the same fashion.

Yii User Authentication using MySQL PASSWORD()

This is a pretty simple thing, but it hitched me up for a while, so I thought it worth sharing/recording the solution.

If you use passwords stored with the MySQL PASSWORD() function, the suggested methods of authentication with UserIdentity need to be tweaked.

There are two ways that I have come up with to run the comparison. The first way is more secure, as it doesn't ever send the encrypted password back through the connection, but the second way allows you a more specific 'user found, but password is wrong' error.

Using Gii

This feature is new to the 1.1.2 release of Yii. I finally had a chance to look at it today, and I'm quite impressed thus far. This module allows for web access to the old yiic shell commands, and is extremely straight forward and easy to use. It shows you previews of the files to be generated, including whether the file is new or overwriting an existing file. It comes with 5 default Generators: Controller, crud, Form, Model and Module.

To use it, you need to first enable it in your config for the site. Be sure to note that it's only set to work on a localhost by default, so if you need to use it on a remote machine make sure to enter in your IP to the IP filters array.  Also note that if you're configured for path urls, you're going to have to modify the settings there as directed in the guide.

The link to the guide for Gii is here:
http://www.yiiframework.com/doc/guide/topics.gii