HTTP Controllers

• Introduction
• Basic Controllers
• Controller Middleware
• Dependency Injection & Controllers

Introduction

Instead of defining all of your request handling logic in a single routes.php file, you may wish to organize this behavior using Controller classes. Controllers can group related HTTP request handling logic into a class. Controllers are typically stored in the app/Http/Controllers directory.

Basic Controllers

Here is an example of a basic controller class:

<?php namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use App\User;
use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;

class UserController extends Controller {

	/**
	 * Show the profile for the given user.
	 *
	 * @param  int  $id
	 * @return Response
	 */
	public function showProfile($id)
	{
		return view('user.profile', ['user' => User::findOrFail($id)]);
	}

}

We can route to the controller action like so:

$app->get('user/{id}', 'App\Http\Controllers\UserController@showProfile');

Note: All controllers should extend the base App\Http\Controllers\Controller class.

Naming Controller Routes

Like Closure routes, you may specify names on controller routes:

$app->get('foo', ['uses' => 'App\Http\Controllers\FooController@method', 'as' => 'name']);

These names can be used to generate URLs to the controller actions:

$url = route('name');

If the route has parameters, you may specify them like so:

$url = route('name', ['id' => 1]);

Controller Middleware

Middleware may be specified on controller routes like so:

$app->get('profile', [
	'middleware' => 'auth',
	'uses' => 'App\Http\Controllers\UserController@showProfile'
]);

Additionally, you may specify middleware within your controller's constructor:

class UserController extends Controller {

	/**
	 * Instantiate a new UserController instance.
	 */
	public function __construct()
	{
		$this->middleware('auth');

		$this->middleware('log', ['only' => ['fooAction', 'barAction']]);

		$this->middleware('subscribed', ['except' => ['fooAction', 'barAction']]);
	}

}

Dependency Injection & Controllers

Constructor Injection

The Lumen / Laravel service container is used to resolve all controllers. As a result, you are able to type-hint any dependencies your controller may need in its constructor:

<?php namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;
use App\Repositories\UserRepository;

class UserController extends Controller {

	/**
	 * The user repository instance.
	 */
	protected $users;

	/**
	 * Create a new controller instance.
	 *
	 * @param  UserRepository  $users
	 * @return void
	 */
	public function __construct(UserRepository $users)
	{
		$this->users = $users;
	}

}

Method Injection

In addition to constructor injection, you may also type-hint dependencies on your controller's methods. For example, let's type-hint the Request instance on one of our methods:

<?php namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;

class UserController extends Controller {

	/**
	 * Store a new user.
	 *
	 * @param  Request  $request
	 * @return Response
	 */
	public function store(Request $request)
	{
		$name = $request->input('name');

		//
	}

}

If your controller method is also expecting input from a route parameter, simply list your route arguments after your other dependencies:

<?php namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;

class UserController extends Controller {

	/**
	 * Store a new user.
	 *
	 * @param  Request  $request
	 * @param  int  $id
	 * @return Response
	 */
	public function update(Request $request, $id)
	{
		//
	}

}