Using atkActionListener to capture action events

ATK Howto: Using atkActionListener to capture action events

Complexity: Advanced
Author: Boy Baukema <boy@achievo.org>

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You can use listeners to perform actions after an action has been performed. You only need to derive a class from atkActionListener and implement its actionPerformed method, like this:

  atkimport('atk.utils.atkactionlistener');
  class productListener extends atkActionListener
  {    
    function actionPerformed($action,$record)
    {
      $email = 'test@test.com';
      $user = getUser();
      switch ($action)
      {
        case 'save':
          mail($email,'New Product!',
               "User {$user['name']} has added product {$record['name']}\n");
          break;
        case 'delete':
          mail($email,'Product removed!',
               "User {$user['name']} has removed {$record['atkorgrec']['name']}\n");
          break;
        case 'update':
          mail($email,'Product changed!',
               "User {$user['name']} has changed a product.\n".
               "Was:\n name: {$record['atkorgrec']['name']}\n type: {$record['atkorgrec']['type']}\n".
               "Is now:\n name: {$record['name']}\n type: {$record['type']}\n");
          break;
      }
    }
  }

Next, you can use it in a node like this:

  class product extends atkNode
  {
    function product()
    {
      $this->atkNode('product',NF_TRACK_CHANGES);
      $this->add(new atkAttribute('id',AF_AUTOKEY));
      $this->add(new atkAttribute('name'));
      $this->add(new atkListAttribute('type',array('non-food','food')));
      $this->setTable('shop_product');
      $this->addListener(new productListener(array('delete','save','update')));
    }
  }

Action listeners are more flexible than postAdd/postUpdate/postDelete triggers, because they can be added dynamically, for example from a modifier.

Actions listeners can't be used as pre- triggers though.

See also