 | Level: Intermediate Duane O'Brien, PHP developer, Freelance
21 Nov 2006
Updated 02 Jun 2009 CakePHP is a stable production-ready, rapid-development aid for
building Web sites in PHP. This
"Cook up Web sites fast with CakePHP"
series shows you how to build an online product catalog using
CakePHP. Part 1 focuses on getting CakePHP up and running, and the basics of how to put together a simple application allowing users to register for an account and log in to the application.
Before you start
Editor's note: This series was originally published in 2006, and updated in 2007 and
2008. Since its last publication, CakePHP developers made changes to
CakePHP resulting in multiple revisions of this series. This revision
was written for CakePHP V1.2.2.8120.
This "Cook up Web sites fast with CakePHP"
series is designed for PHP application developers who want to
start using CakePHP to make their lives easier. In the end, you will
have learned how to install and configure CakePHP, the basics of
Model-View-Controller (MVC) design, how to validate user data in
CakePHP, how to use CakePHP helpers, and how to get an application up
and running quickly using CakePHP. It might sound like a lot to learn,
but don't worry — CakePHP does most of it for you.
About this series
- Part 1 focuses on getting CakePHP up and running, and the basics
of how to put together a simple application allowing users to
register for an account and log in to the application.
-
Part 2
demonstrates how to use scaffolding and Bake to get a jump start
on your application, and using CakePHP's access control lists
(ACLs).
-
Part 3
shows how to use Sanitize, a handy CakePHP class, which helps
secure an application by cleaning up user-submitted data. Part 3
also covers the CakePHP Security component, handling invalid
requests and other advanced request authentication.
-
Part 4
focuses primarily on the Session component of CakePHP,
demonstrating three ways to save session data, as well as the
Request Handler component to help you manage multiple types of
requests (mobile browsers, requests containing XML or HTML,
etc).
- Part 5
deals with caching, specifically view and layout caching, which
can help reduce server resource consumption and speed up your
application.
About this
tutorial
This tutorial shows how to get started using CakePHP. You'll go
through the installation process, then get down and dirty by writing
the user registration code. Through it all, you'll see how much time
you could have saved had you been using CakePHP all along. This part
of the tutorial builds the online product application, Tor,
which includes a "request dealership username and password" page and a
login page.
CakePHP topics include:
- MVC design
- Helpers
- CakePHP data validation
Prerequisites
It is assumed that you are familiar with PHP,
have a fundamental grasp of database design, and are comfortable
getting your hands dirty. A full grasp of the MVC design pattern is
not necessary, as the fundamentals will be covered during this
tutorial. More than anything, you should be eager to learn, ready to
jump in, and anxious to speed up your development time.
System requirements
Before you begin, you need to have an environment in which you can
work. CakePHP has reasonably minimal server requirements:
- An HTTP server that supports sessions (and preferably
mod_rewrite). This tutorial was written
using Apache V2.2.4 with mod_rewrite
enabled.
- PHP V4.3.2 or later (including PHP V5). This tutorial was written
using PHP V2.3.
- A supported database engine. This tutorial was written using MySQL
V5.0.4.
You'll also need a database ready for your application to use. The
tutorial will provide syntax for creating any necessary tables in
MySQL.
The simplest way to download CakePHP is to visit
CakeForge.org and
download the latest stable version. This tutorial was written using
V1.2.2.8120 nightly builds, and copies straight from Subversion are
also available. Details are in the CakePHP Manual (see
Resources).
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