Extensibility - A collection of research and ideas

if you had code to modify the product.php file, you would put your file into:
/otf_mods/catalog/controller/product/product.php/my_product_mod.inc

Note that the /product.php/ is a directory name to allow multiple mods to be applied to the same file.
Now if another person had a mod for that same file you could just add that mod as well to the product.php directory.
The code would loop through all the files in the directory that matched the current filename that was being loaded and apply the modifications on-the-fly.

There would need a syntax defined to tell the code where it should go. I'm thinking something like the SMF xml style mod scripts idea I offered here. There also needs to be some method of sorting for which mod goes first. Also some checks in place to ensure that the attempted changes can be achieved. But that would all be handled by the on-the-fly extension function.

Qphoria wrote:My latest idea that I'm working on I've dubbed "On-the-Fly" modifications or maybe "FlyMod for OpenCart".

Basically the concept is simple. Controllers, modules, models, templates, and languages all get included/required at some point in one of the system/engine files. So we can:
1. Intercept the file
2. Get the contents of the file before php evaluates it in the require/include function
3. Change the contents with str_replace, regex, line insert, etc to make it look how it should look if it was modified
4. Save that file to a tmp file
5. Then pass that newly modified tmp file into the include step.

Now the file loads with the modifications but the actual core file has not be touched.

Thoughts?

JAY6390 wrote:I don't really understand why you would need the temp file tbh

imaginetech wrote:What are the advantages over what Daniel has done with tpl files falling back to the default path if they are not present?

Couldn't this be replicated with core files

Qphoria wrote:

JAY6390 wrote:I don't really understand why you would need the temp file tbh

requires and includes have filename arguments

JAY6390 wrote:

Qphoria wrote:

JAY6390 wrote:I don't really understand why you would need the temp file tbh

requires and includes have filename arguments

lol I'm well aware of how a require/include works! What I mean is your process seems a bit weird imo, you're going to load the file, modify, save, load again then execute the code inside it. Why not just load the file, modify, execute? Plus you would need to ensure each temp file would be unique

$file = DIR_TEMPLATE . $filename;

if (file_exists($file)) {
	extract($this->data);

	ob_start();

	require($file);

	$content = ob_get_contents();

	ob_end_clean();

	return $content;
} else {
	exit('Error: Could not load template ' . $file . '!');
}

$file = $this->virtualmod->applyMod($file);

$file = DIR_TEMPLATE . $filename;

Xsecrets wrote:I guess my big question is still will Daniel allow it in the core, otherwise we now have two mod systems which was my big gripe in readymans thread.

Qphoria wrote:There is this or nothing at this point. Even if this is a stepping stone, its better than nothing, especially since its virtual.

imaginetech wrote:Can see your points Q, earlier you said you did some benchmarking or some performance testing. Was there anything noticeable? Any idea at what point it might cause performance issues if you applied x amount of mods and received x amount of server requests?

Johnathan wrote: I agree. Even if it's not ideal (although personally I agree with Qphoria), it would be much better than how modifications work now.

Since it's only three files needing changes, any chance this will make it into 1.5.0?

SapporoGuy wrote:Since it sounds like that it's not 1.5 or 1.4.9 dpendent, when are you planning on releasing this?

I do have 1 major worry and that is will developers go crazy and start polluting a relatively clean cart?
I say this since there are several mods that actually abuse the system rather than conform and embrace the opencart way of doing things.

ORDER BY p.date_added DESC LIMIT " . (int)$limit);

ORDER BY rand() DESC LIMIT " . (int)$limit);

<modification>
	<id>Latest Products Use Rand</id>
	<version>1.0.0</version>
	<author>qphoria</author>
	<file name="catalog/model/catalog/product.php">
		<operation>
			<search position="replace"><![CDATA[
ORDER BY p.date_added DESC LIMIT " . (int)$limit);
			]]></search>
			<add><![CDATA[
ORDER BY rand() DESC LIMIT " . (int)$limit);
			]]></add>
		</operation>
	</file>
</modification>

#
#-----[ OPEN ]------------------------------------------
#
catalog/model/catalog/product.php
#
#-----[ FIND ]------------------------------------------
#
ORDER BY p.date_added DESC LIMIT " . (int)$limit);
#
#-----[ REPLACE WITH ]------------------------------------------
#
ORDER BY rand() DESC LIMIT " . (int)$limit);
#
#-----[ SAVE/CLOSE ALL FILES ]------------------------------------------
#
# EoM