simple PHP code sample to serve backbone.js

Question

Experience level: newbie.

The backbone.js Todos demo uses localStorage. This question is about how to use PHP to serve the page instead, assuming that a MySQL DB has bee

Answer 1

The following should give you an idea (php controllers are implemented using Silex framework + Paris library for the data access):

// GET  /{resource}/{id}    Show
$app->get('/api/todos/{id}', function ($id) use ($app) {
    $todo =  $app['paris']->getModel('Todo')->find_one($id);

    return new Response(json_encode($todo->as_array()), 200, array('Content-Type' => 'application/json'));
});

// POST     /{resource}     Create
$app->post('/api/todos', function (Request $request) use ($app) {
    $data = json_decode($request->getContent());

    $todo =  $app['paris']->getModel('Todo')->create();
    $todo->title = $data->title;
    $todo->save();

    return new Response(json_encode($todo->as_array()), 200, array('Content-Type' => 'application/json'));
});

// PUT  /{resource}/{id}    Update
$app->put('/api/todos/{id}', function ($id, Request $request) use ($app) {
    $data = json_decode($request->getContent());

    $todo =  $app['paris']->getModel('Todo')->find_one($id);
    $todo->title = $data->title;
    $todo->save();

    return new Response('Todo updated', 200);
});

// DELETE   /{resource}/{id}    Destroy
$app->delete('/api/todos/{id}', function ($id) use ($app) {
    $todo =  $app['paris']->getModel('Todo')->find_one($id);
    $todo->delete(); 

    return new Response('Todo deleted', 200);
});

To get your backbone collection working with the above interface, all you have to do is to set the url property like:

window.TodoList = Backbone.Collection.extend({
    model: Todo,

    url: "api/todos",

    ...
});

Recently, I have written a tutorial on how to do GET/POST/PUT/DELETE with Backbone.js and PHP http://cambridgesoftware.co.uk/blog/item/59-backbonejs-%20-php-with-silex-microframework-%20-mysql, might be helpful.