=head2 What is Catalyst?
Catalyst is an elegant web application framework, extremely flexible
-yet extremely simple. It's similar to Ruby on Rails, Spring (Java),
-and L<Maypole>, upon which it was originally based. Its most important
-design philosphy is to provide easy access to all the tools you need
-to develop web applications, with few restrictions on how you need to
-use these tools. However, this does mean that it is always possible to
-do things in a different way. Other web frameworks are B<initially>
-simpler to use, but achieve this by locking the programmer into a
-single set of tools. Catalyst's emphasis on flexibility means that you
-have to think more to use it. We view this as a feature. For example,
-this leads to Catalyst being more suited to system integration tasks
-than other web frameworks.
+yet extremely simple. It's similar to Ruby on Rails, Spring (Java), and
+L<Maypole|Maypole>, upon which it was originally based. Its most
+important design philosphy is to provide easy access to all the tools
+you need to develop web applications, with few restrictions on how you
+need to use these tools. However, this does mean that it is always
+possible to do things in a different way. Other web frameworks are
+I<initially> simpler to use, but achieve this by locking the programmer
+into a single set of tools. Catalyst's emphasis on flexibility means
+that you have to think more to use it. We view this as a feature. For
+example, this leads to Catalyst being more suited to system integration
+tasks than other web frameworks.
=head3 MVC
Now http://localhost:3000/hello prints "Hello World!".
+Note that actions with the C< :Local > attribute are equivalent to
+using a C<:Path('/action_name') > attribute (note the leading slash).
+So our action could be equivalently:
+
+ sub hello : Path('/hello') {
+ my ( $self, $context ) = @_;
+ $context->response->body('Hello World!');
+ }
+
+
=item * B<Support for CGI, mod_perl, Apache::Request, FastCGI>
Use L<Catalyst::Engine::Apache> or L<Catalyst::Engine::CGI>. Other
a general discussion of these issues.
Model, View and Controller components must inherit from L<Catalyst::Model>,
-L<Catalyst::View> and L<Catalyst::Model>, respectively. These, in turn, inherit
+L<Catalyst::View> and L<Catalyst::Controller>, respectively. These, in turn, inherit
from L<Catalyst::Component> which provides a simple class structure and some
common class methods like C<config> and C<new> (constructor).
script/myapp_create.pl model MyModel DBIC::Schema MySchema create=static 'dbi:SQLite:/tmp/myapp.db'
-L<DBIx::Class::Schema::Loader> automatically loads table layouts and
-relationships, and converts them into a static schema definition C<MySchema>,
-which you can edit later.
+L<DBIx::Class::Schema::Loader> can automaticall load table layouts and
+relationships, and convert them into a static schema definition
+C<MySchema>, which you can edit later.
Use the stash to pass data to your templates.
package MyApp;
use strict;
- use Catalyst qw/-Debug/; # Add other plugins here, e.g.
- # for session support
-
+ use parent qw/Catalyst/;
+ __PACKAGE__->setup(qw/-Debug ConfigLoader Static::Simple/);
+ # note you can still use use Catalyst qw/@plugins/ instead of the
+ # above two lines
MyApp->config(
name => 'My Application',
# Sets the actions in this controller to be registered with no prefix
# so they function identically to actions created in MyApp.pm
__PACKAGE__->config->{namespace} = '';
- sub default : Private {
+ sub default : Path {
my ( $self, $context ) = @_;
- $context->response->body('Catalyst rocks!');
+ $context->response->status(404);
+ $context->response->body('404 not found');
}
1;
explanation of the pre-defined meaning of Catalyst component class
names.
+Note that actions with the C< :Local > attribute are equivalent to the
+<:Path('action_name') > so sub foo : Local { } is equivalent to -
+
+ sub foo : Path('foo') { }
+
=item * B<Chained>
Catalyst also provides a method to build and dispatch chains of actions,
=over 4
-=item * B<default : Private>
+=item * B<default : Path>
Called when no other action matches. Could be used, for example, for
displaying a generic frontpage for the main app, or an error page for
-individual controllers.
+individual controllers. B<Note>: in older Catalyst applications you
+will see C<default : Private> which is roughly speaking equivalent.
-If C<default> isn't acting how you would expect, look at using a
-L</Literal> C<Path> action (with an empty path string). The difference
-is that C<Path> takes arguments relative from the namespace and
-C<default> I<always> takes arguments relative from the root, regardless
-of what controller it's in. Indeed, this is now the recommended way of
-handling default situations; the C<default> private controller should
-be considered deprecated.
-=item * B<index : Private>
+=item * B<index : Path : Args (0) >
-C<index> is much like C<default> except that it takes no arguments
-and it is weighted slightly higher in the matching process. It is
-useful as a static entry point to a controller, e.g. to have a static
-welcome page. Note that it's also weighted higher than Path.
+C<index> is much like C<default> except that it takes no arguments and
+it is weighted slightly higher in the matching process. It is useful
+as a static entry point to a controller, e.g. to have a static welcome
+page. Note that it's also weighted higher than Path. Actually the sub
+name C<index> can be called anything you want. The sub attributes are
+what determines the behaviour of the action. B<Note>: in older
+Catalyst applications, you will see C<index : Private> used, which is
+roughly speaking equivalent.
=item * B<begin : Private>
Package MyApp::Controller::Foo;
sub begin : Private { }
- sub default : Private { }
+ sub default : Path { }
sub auto : Private { }
You can define built-in private actions within your controllers as