Inflector¶

Summary of Inflector Methods and Their Output¶

Quick summary of the Inflector built-in methods and the results they output when provided a multi-word argument:

Creating Plural & Singular Forms¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::singularize($singular)¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::pluralize($singular)¶

Both pluralize and singularize() work on most English nouns. If you need to support other languages, you can use Inflection Configuration to customize the rules used:

// Apples
echo Inflector::pluralize('Apple');

// Person
echo Inflector::singularize('People');

Creating CamelCase and under_scored Forms¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::camelize($underscored)¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::underscore($camelCase)¶

These methods are useful when creating class names, or property names:

// ApplePie
Inflector::camelize('Apple_pie')

// apple_pie
Inflector::underscore('ApplePie');

It should be noted that underscore will only convert camelCase formatted words. Words that contains spaces will be lower-cased, but will not contain an underscore.

Creating Human Readable Forms¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::humanize($underscored)¶

This method is useful when converting underscored forms into “Title Case” forms for human readable values:

// Apple Pie
Inflector::humanize('apple_pie');

Creating Table and Class Name Forms¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::classify($underscored)¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::dasherize($dashed)¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::tableize($camelCase)¶

When generating code, or using CakePHP’s conventions you may need to inflect table names or class names:

// UserProfileSetting
Inflector::classify('user_profile_settings');

// user-profile-setting
Inflector::dasherize('UserProfileSetting');

// user_profile_settings
Inflector::tableize('UserProfileSetting');

Creating Variable Names¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::variable($underscored)¶

Variable names are often useful when doing meta-programming tasks that involve generating code or doing work based on conventions:

// applePie
Inflector::variable('apple_pie');

Creating URL Safe Strings¶

static Cake\Utility\Inflector::slug($word, $replacement = '-')¶

Slug converts special characters into latin versions and converting unmatched characters and spaces to dashes. The slug method expects UTF-8 encoding:

// apple-puree
Inflector::slug('apple purée');

Inflection Configuration¶

CakePHP’s naming conventions can be really nice - you can name your database table big_boxes, your model BigBoxes, your controller BigBoxesController, and everything just works together automatically. The way CakePHP knows how to tie things together is by inflecting the words between their singular and plural forms.

There are occasions (especially for our non-English speaking friends) where you may run into situations where CakePHP’s inflector (the class that pluralizes, singularizes, camelCases, and under_scores) might not work as you’d like. If CakePHP won’t recognize your Foci or Fish, you can tell CakePHP about your special cases.

Inflector::rules('singular', ['/^(bil)er$/i' => '\1', '/^(inflec|contribu)tors$/i' => '\1ta']);
Inflector::rules('uninflected', ['singulars']);
Inflector::rules('irregular', ['phylum' => 'phyla']); // The key is singular form, value is plural form