First glance at the framework¶

Now that you have successfully installed SlaxWeb Framework, you can finally take a first glance at the complete framework. We will primarily focus on the directory structure in this part of the documentation. It is strongly advised that you do not skip this part of the documentation, as it holds information that will make developing application with the SlaxWeb Framework a lot easier.

Root directory¶

Root directory contains quite a bit of files and directories. Here is the whole of files and directories that you should see in the directory into which you installed the SlaxWeb Framework. If you have followed the Installation guide on the previous page, this should be in /var/www/framework:

app/ - Main Application directory
bootstrap/ - Bootstrap directory
docs/ - Documentation directory
public/ - Public directory
CHANGELOG.md - Changes between version in the framework
composer.json - Composer Files
composer.lock - Composer Lock File
docker-compose.yml - Docker Container setup file
LICENSE - License file
README.md - Short read me file, containing basic information
slaxer - Slaxer

Above is only a simple list of all the directories and files that you will find in the root directory. Some directories and files do not have links attached, since they are simple enough to be explained in one sentence. For others, you may continue reading here, or click on the links above.

Main Application directory¶

Main Application directory is located in app/, in here you can find more directories into which you put you application files. This directory structure has been prepared for you, but you are not required to use it as is. Here, you will only find a list of all the directories and files found in the Main Application directory, further description of those directories that require more description can be found by their respective component documentation, but some are simple enough so that they can be explained with one or two short sentences right by the list:

Cache/ - Cache directory where different components, and your code, can write temporary cache files
Command/ - Slaxer
Config/ - Configuration
Controller/ - Controllers
Hook/ - Hooks
Library/ - Libraries
Logs/ - Logger
Model/ - Models
Provider/ - Providers
Routes/ - Router Component
Template/ - Template directory
View/ - View directory

Bootstrap directory¶

Bootstrap directory is located in bootstrap/, and it holds vital logic for starting of the Framework. You are not required to change anything in those files, and we strongly advise you do not change anything in here. SlaxWeb Framework is designed to be highly modular and adaptable, we are sure there are other ways to do, whatever it is that you are trying to do.

Documentation directory¶

The Documentation directory hold documentation sources, and is located in docs/. You can safely remove this directory, and we also strongly advise, that you do remove this directory before deploying on a production server. If you are contributing code to the SlaxWeb Framework Project, you are required to update the documentation found in this directory.

Public directory¶

Public directory is located in public/, and holds all the files that must be publicly available through a Web Server, so you can show your web application to the world. Those files typically include:

index.php - the main entry point for all document requests
CSS files - to give your application some style
JavaScript files - to give your front end some functionality
Images - because text only web pages are dull

After you have installed the framework, there are already directories prepared for those files. They are pretty self explanatory, and are not documented here. Of course, you can choose to rename those directories, or remove them completely. Just remember, this should be the only directory visible to the outside world through a Web Server in order to protect your application code from possible leaks.

Composer Files¶

Even if you have not installed SlaxWeb Framework with the help of composer, you will still find the composer.json and composer.lock files in the root of the installed SlaxWeb Framework, because we use composer extensively for development of the Framework, for maintaining all the dependencies that the Framework has.

Those files are not particularly required to run an application on the framework, however, you might need them at a later point, so it is advised that you do not remove them.

Autoloader¶

One of the feature that the Framework relies on composer, is the composer autoloader. It loads Class source files automatically when requested. Read more about it here. The Framework already defines the following namespace to path mappings for the autoloader:

App\Command\: app/Command/,
App\Controller\: app/Controller/,
App\Hook\: app/Hook/,
App\Library\: app/Library/,
App\Model\: app/Model/,
App\Provider\: app/Provider/,
App\Routes\: app/Routes/,
App\View\: app/View/

Changing Namespace Autoloading Settings¶

Easiest way to change the Autoloading Settings for a namespace is to use composer directly. To move one of the already autoloaded namespaces to a different directory or rename a namespace, you will have to edit the composer.json file, more specifically, the autoload section. Lets say you wish to move the Routes definitions to app/MyRoutes/, and rename Controller namespace to \MyApp\Controller you will have to change the following:

//...
"autoload": {
    "psr-4": {
        //...
        "App\\Controller\\": "app/Controller/",
        //..
        "App\\Routes\\": "app/Routes",
        //...
    }
},
//...

To:

//...
"autoload": {
    "psr-4": {
        //...
        "MyApp\\Controller\\": "app/Controller/",
        //..
        "App\\Routes\\": "app/MyRoutes",
        //...
    }
},
//...

Adding of your own namespaces to the autoloader is of course, allowed as well. To familiarize yourself more with composer autoloader, read more about the composer autoloader here and in the autoloading composer documentation.

The Framework also provides the autoloader instance as a service which you can use to add additional namespace definitions to the autoloader. Please see Services and Properties for more information.

URLs¶

The SlaxWeb Framework does not automatically map URL sections to Controllers and their methods, but requires you create URL mappings to your code in the routes manually. By default, the index.php is included in the URL, and is of course required, because the Web Server needs to know through which file it must process the request. There are however methods to hide the index.php section from the URL. For more information please see the Setting up a WebServer section on how to do just that.

Templating¶

SlaxWeb Framework does not provide means for templating of your web application, but does provide you with directories that you can store your templates and views into, but in you have to take care of loading, parsing, and presenting them to the world on your own. For now.

Template directory¶

The Template directory is located in app/Template/ and is meant to hold all of your template files, which you then load in your View Classes to present to the world. This directory should not publicly visible, as you will find explained bellow in Public directory section.

View directory¶

The View directory is located in app/View/ and is meant to hold all View Class files. Such classes are supposed to help the route handler and/or controller to present a bunch of templates to the world as a full blown web page.