While most of your day-to-day work in CakePHP will be utilizing core classes and methods, CakePHP features a number of global convenience functions that may come in handy. Many of these functions are for use with CakePHP classes (loading model or component classes), but many others make working with arrays or strings a little easier.
We’ll also cover some of the constants available in CakePHP applications. Using these constants will help make upgrades more smooth, but are also convenient ways to point to certain files or directories in your CakePHP application.
Here are CakePHP’s globally available functions. Most of them are just convenience wrappers for other CakePHP functionality, such as debugging and translating content.
This function handles localization in CakePHP applications. The
$string_id
identifies the ID for a translation. You can supply
additional arguments to replace placeholders in your string:
__('You have {0} unread messages', $number);
You can also provide a name-indexed array of replacements:
__('You have {unread} unread messages', ['unread' => $number]);
Note
Check out the Internationalization & Localization section for more information.
Allows you to override the current domain for a single message lookup.
Useful when internationalizing a plugin:
echo __d('PluginName', 'This is my plugin');
Allows you to override the current domain for a single plural message
lookup. Returns correct plural form of message identified by $singular
and $plural
for count $count
from domain $domain
.
Allows you to override the current domain for a single message lookup. It also allows you to specify a context.
The context is a unique identifier for the translations string that makes it unique within the same domain.
Allows you to override the current domain for a single plural message
lookup. It also allows you to specify a context. Returns correct plural
form of message identified by $singular
and $plural
for count
$count
from domain $domain
. Some languages have more than one form
for plural messages dependent on the count.
The context is a unique identifier for the translations string that makes it unique within the same domain.
Returns correct plural form of message identified by $singular
and
$plural
for count $count
. Some languages have more than one form for
plural messages dependent on the count.
The context is a unique identifier for the translations string that makes it unique within the same domain.
Returns correct plural form of message identified by $singular
and
$plural
for count $count
from domain $domain
. It also allows you
to specify a context. Some languages have more than one form for plural
messages dependent on the count.
The context is a unique identifier for the translations string that makes it unique within the same domain.
Convenience wrapper for instantiating a new Cake\Collection\Collection
object, wrapping the passed argument. The $items
parameter takes either
a Traversable
object or an array.
Changed in version 3.3.0: Calling this method will return passed $var
, so that you can, for instance,
place it in return statements.
If the core $debug
variable is true
, $var
is printed out.
If $showHTML
is true
or left as null
, the data is rendered to be
browser-friendly. If $showFrom
is not set to false
, the debug output
will start with the line from which it was called. Also see
Debugging
It behaves like debug()
, but execution is also halted.
If the core $debug
variable is true
, $var
is printed.
If $showHTML
is true
or left as null
, the data is rendered to be
browser-friendly. Also see Debugging
Changed in version 3.3.0: Calling this method will return passed $var
, so that you can, for instance,
place it in return statements.
Convenience wrapper for print_r()
, with the addition of
wrapping <pre>
tags around the output.
Changed in version 3.3.0: Calling this method will return passed $var
, so that you can, for instance,
place it in return statements.
JSON pretty print convenience function, with the addition of
wrapping <pre>
tags around the output.
It is meant for debugging the JSON representation of objects and arrays.
Changed in version 3.1.1: The $default
parameter has been added.
Gets an environment variable from available sources. Used as a backup if
$_SERVER
or $_ENV
are disabled.
This function also emulates PHP_SELF
and DOCUMENT_ROOT
on
unsupporting servers. In fact, it’s a good idea to always use env()
instead of $_SERVER
or getenv()
(especially if you plan to
distribute the code), since it’s a full emulation wrapper.
Convenience wrapper for htmlspecialchars()
.
Splits a dot syntax plugin name into its plugin and class name. If $name
does not have a dot, then index 0 will be null
.
Commonly used like list($plugin, $name) = pluginSplit('Users.User');
Split the namespace from the classname.
Commonly used like list($namespace, $className) = namespaceSplit('Cake\Core\App');
Most of the following constants refer to paths in your application.
Absolute path to your application directory, including a trailing slash.
Equals app
or the name of your application directory.
Path to the cache files directory. It can be shared between hosts in a multi-server setup.
Path to the cake directory.
Path to the root lib directory.
Path to the config directory.
Path to the CakePHP directory with ending directory slash.
Short for PHP’s DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR
, which is /
on Linux and \
on Windows.
Path to the logs directory.
Path to the root directory.
Path to the tests directory.
Path to the temporary files directory.
Full path to the webroot.
Unix timestamp in microseconds as a float from when the application started.
Equals 1
Equals 60
Equals 3600
Equals 86400
Equals 604800
Equals 2592000
Equals 31536000