Categorising FlashMessenger messages in Zend Framework - zend-framework

Question

What is the easiest way to categorise (warning, success, error) flash messages in Zend Framework using the FlashMessenger helper? I also want a single method to check for messages where the controller may not necessarily have forward the request on. At the moment, I believe this is done via FlashMessenger::getCurrentMessage()?

Answer 1

In you're controller you can do this :
$this->_helper->FlashMessenger(
array('error' => 'There was a problem with your form submission.')
);
$this->_helper->FlashMessenger(
array('notice' => 'Notice you forgot to input smth.')
);
In you're view you can echo the notice like this :
<?php echo $this->flashMessenger('notice'); ?>
And the error like this :
<?php echo $this->flashMessenger('error'); ?>
Edit:
Check this link :
... Calling the regular getMessages() method here won't work. This only returns messages which were stored in the appropriate ZendSession namespace when the FlashMessenger was instantiated. Since any messages added this request were not in the ZendSession namespace at that time (because the FlashMessenger was instantiated in order to add the messages) they won't be returned by getMessages().
For just this use-case, the FlashMessenger also provides a getCurrentMessages() method (and a related family of current methods) which returns those messages set on the current request.

Answer 2

Okay, thanks for everyone's input I have however implemented a different approach.
I already had a parent controller that extends Zend_Controller_Action where I've placed common logic across the application, so in the postDispatch() method I merged the getCurrentMessages and getMessages into a view variable.
public function postDispatch()
{
$messages = array_merge(
$this->_helper->flashMessenger->getCurrentMessages(),
$this->_helper->flashMessenger->getMessages()
);
$this->view->messages = count($messages) > 0 ? $messages[0] : array();
}
I set the message via a controller action like;
$this->_helper->flashMessenger(array('error'=>'This is an error'));
And in my layout file, I use a conditional on the $messages variable;
<?php if(count($this->messages) > 0) : ?>
//.. my HTML e.g. key($this->messages) returns 'error'
// current($this->messages) returns 'This is an error'
<?php endif; ?>
This works for me as the messages is categorised and can be obtained from the current request in addition to the next redirect.

Answer 3

Two ideas.
1. PHPPlaneta
Check out the source code of PHPlaneta by Robert Basic:
https://github.com/robertbasic/phpplaneta
He uses the standard FlashMessenger action helper:
$this->_helper->flashMessenger()->addMessage(array('fm-bad' => 'Error occurred')
Then defines a view helper called FlashMessenger so that he can access the messages. In his layout or view script, he simply calls:
<?php echo $this->flashMessenger(); ?>
The view helper uses the key (ex: 'fm-bad') to set up CSS styling for the output message.
2. PriorityMessenger
Check out the Priority Messenger view helper from Sean P. O. MacCath-Moran:
http://emanaton.com/code/php/zendprioritymessenger
The thing I like about this is that this whole business of saving messages for display on the next page load strikes me as something that should be completely within the view. So in your action, before your redirect, you populate the view helper with your messages and your priorities. Then, in your layout or view script, you output those messages with their priorities via the same view helper.