[TYPO3-ect] General feedback for lib/div

[Max Beutel]

Hello there,

after I already built some smaller extensions based on lib div I would 
like to give some feedback. I think the way you can program your 
extensions with lib/div is a very good one. It keeps the code a lot 
cleaner and more organized then the "traditional" approach.

Here are the points I noticed when working with lib/div and the MVC 
kickstarter (v. 0.0.1):

1. The kickstarter generates the view class "tx_sasda_views_sdaadsdas" 
but puts it in the file "views/class.tx_sasda_view_sdaadsdas.php". 
Notice the "view" and "views" difference.

2. As it seems I cant add a model without having a table to which the 
model get assigned.

3. A minor issue is that the kickstarter still offers the option that 
the view can be a subclass of smartyView, which does not exist.


4. This point is about image generation with lib/div. I tried to use the 
class tx_lib_image in one of my extensions but decided against it 
because of some disadvantages I thought I have noticed.

Consider a situation like this: You have an array of database rows, each 
contains among other an image which should be rendered as a thumbnail. 
If you use tx_lib_image it would be somewhat like this:

<code>
while($row = $db->sql_fetch_assoc($res)) {
     $thumb = new tx_lib_image();
     $thumb->alt = $row['title'];
     $thumb->height = 100;
     $thumb->path = $row['image'];

     $row['image_thumb'] = $thumb->make();
     $this->rows[] = $row;
}
</code>

That seems pretty much straight forward, but I cant imagine how this 
approch can work for more complex image operations. For example masking 
images onto each other, combining images etc. Can there be a way without 
the traditional $config-Typoscript array? I couldnt find one and used 
the traditional approach with a local CObj and passing a config array to 
it.

Apart from that, if you use the approch from above with new 
tx_lib_image() etc. for every thumb the class tx_lib_image makes a new 
instance of the huge tslib_cObj. Wouldnt it be more effecient to hold a 
global instance of tslib_cObj in a protected member var somewhere in the 
class lib?


5. Let me say something about the implementation of the smarty view. I 
too, made my own smarty integration, using the rtp_smarty extension. But 
here I read that some others already made similar approches. Wouldnt it 
be good if we would share our classes and create an "official" smarty 
view (extension) for lib/div? Or does something like this already exist?


Anyway, I think that Elmar did great on lib/div. This is how extension 
programming should be! After a  phase of learning I cant imagine not to 
continue using lib/div! What helped me a lot where the example extensions.

Regards,

Max