Adding an autoloader

[willdurand]

Hi,

What about adding an autoloader for this lib ? And to set a "standard" directory structure as below:

 Faker
    |_ src/
    |    |_  Faker/
    |        |_ Provider/
    |        |_ Factory.php
    |        |_ Generator.php
    |_ tests/
         |_  Faker/
             |_ Provider/
             |_ FactoryTest.php
             |_ GeneratorTest.php

That will follow the PSR-0 standard and will ease integration in other projects. You won't have to provide a dependency with ClassLoader except for unit test or standalone usage (which is more or less the same thing).

See: https://github.com/knplabs/Gaufrette Note: Propel2 will follow the same standard.

[fzaninotto]

Yeah, not sure about that. The factory will work if you add an autoloaded Provider. But I'm not sure I'll add Yet Another Autoloader - or a dependency to PSR-0 autoloader.

[willdurand]

You should avoid require() methods too. And a PSR-0 autoloader is a standard, I guess you want to follow conventions for this lib :)

Le 15 oct. 2011 à 14:15, Francois Zaninottoreply@reply.github.com a écrit :

Yeah, not sure about that. The factory will work if you add an autoloaded Provider. But I'm not sure I'll add Yet Another Autoloader - or a dependency to PSR-0 autoloader.

Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://github.com/fzaninotto/Faker/issues/5#issuecomment-2415259

[fzaninotto]

Why should I avoid require()? Not way to to otherwise if I don't want to use an autoloader.

A PSR-0 autoloader is a dependency. For now, this project has none, and therefore is very easy to install. I'd like to keep that.

Besides, there are a lot of good libs that don't feel obliged to use an autoloader. See, for instance:

https://github.com/fabpot/yaml

2011/10/15 William DURAND < reply@reply.github.com>

You should avoid require() methods too. And a PSR-0 autoloader is a standard, I guess you want to follow conventions for this lib :)

Le 15 oct. 2011 14:15, Francois Zaninottoreply@reply.github.com a crit :

Yeah, not sure about that. The factory will work if you add an autoloaded Provider. But I'm not sure I'll add Yet Another Autoloader - or a dependency to PSR-0 autoloader.

Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://github.com/fzaninotto/Faker/issues/5#issuecomment-2415259

Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://github.com/fzaninotto/Faker/issues/5#issuecomment-2415796

[ruudk]

+1 for this.. I can't use this in my Symfony2 application because you don't have the "Faker" directory inside the src/ dir.

[ruudk]

Btw, the fabpot/yaml library is made for PHP 5.2 not 5.3

[fzaninotto]

So now we have a standard directory structure. But do we need an autoloader?

[willdurand]

If you want to avoid require and add use instead, probably yes. Otherwise no but I don't know if it will work fine.

[fzaninotto]

We already use use. And the Factory has some sort of autoloading for Providers with a cascade to default locale, that an autoloader won't allow. So I think we don't need a PSR-0 autoloader, and I think Faker works fine in projects that already have an autoloader.

I'll wait for more feedback, but I'll probably close this one.

[willdurand]

Mmmmh I meant to avoid this kind of statement: https://github.com/fzaninotto/Faker/blob/master/src/Faker/Factory.php#L5

[fzaninotto]

Yes, I got you loud and clear. But require isn't a bad word per se. There, requires allow any developer to start using the library without installing a third-party autoloader - right away.

[yohang]

Why not add a small autoload.php file (like the autoload function in https://wiki.php.net/rfc/splclassloader) for people that doesn't use an autoloader or use a not PSR-0 compatible autoloader ?

It could be a compromise beetween the requires and the dependency to an autoloader...

[fzaninotto]

Fixed by #13

[willdurand]

\o/