New posting API

[igorw]

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/**
* Submit Post
* @todo Split up and create lightweight, simple API for this.
*/

Let's face it. submit_post is not only a monster function. It's a pain to use. Same holds true for submit_pm. It would be great to have a posting API that is sane.

Just to prove my point, take a look at this:

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// Many thanks to paul999 for helping me with this!
include_once($phpbb_root_path . 'includes/functions_posting.' . $phpEx);
include_once($phpbb_root_path . 'includes/message_parser.' . $phpEx);

$sql = 'SELECT forum_name
	FROM ' . FORUMS_TABLE . '
	WHERE forum_id = ' . (int) $config['contact_bot_forum'];
$result = $db->sql_query($sql);
$forum_name = $db->sql_fetchfield('forum_name');
$db->sql_freeresult($result);

$post_data = array(
	'topic_title'			=> $data['subject'],
	'topic_first_post_id'	=> 0,
	'topic_last_post_id'	=> 0,
	'topic_time_limit'		=> 0,
	'topic_attachment'		=> 0,
	'post_id'				=> 0,
	'topic_id'				=> 0,
	'forum_id'				=> (int) $config['contact_bot_forum'],
	'icon_id'				=> 0,
	'poster_id'				=> 0,
	'enable_sig'			=> true,
	'enable_bbcode'			=> (bool) $allow_bbcode,
	'enable_smilies'		=> (bool) $allow_smilies,
	'enable_urls'			=> (bool) $allow_urls,
	'enable_indexing'		=> false,
	'message_md5'			=> (string) md5($text),
	'post_time'				=> time(),
	'post_checksum'			=> '',
	'post_edit_reason'		=> '',
	'post_edit_user'		=> 0,
	'forum_name'			=> $forum_name,
	'notify'				=> false,
	'notify_set'			=> false,
	'poster_ip'				=> $user->ip,
	'post_edit_locked'		=> 0,
	'bbcode_bitfield'		=> $bitfield,
	'bbcode_uid'			=> $uid,
	'message'				=> $text,
	'attachment_data'		=> 0,
	'filename_data'			=> 0,

	'topic_approved'		=> 1,
	'post_approved'			=> 1,
);

$poll = array();

// Submit the post!
submit_post('post', $data['subject'], $user->data['username'], POST_NORMAL, $poll, $post_data);

Required information

So let's see what's actually going in there.

• post/topic subject
• post text
• forum_id
• topic_id (if it's a reply)
• bbcode allow options
• index post?
• time of post
• ip of poster
• post locked?
• attachments
• poll

All the other stuff could be computed from within the function. And many of these can also have default values, submit_post relies on all of those to be present. And it gets even worse. submit_post relies heavily on $user (which represents the current user). For example:

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$poster_id = ($mode == 'edit') ? $data['poster_id'] : (int) $user->data['user_id'];

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'poster_id'                     => (int) $user->data['user_id'],

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poster_ip'                     => $user->ip

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'post_username'         => (!$user->data['is_registered']) ? $username : '',

And the list goes on. What does this mean? It means that if I want to submit a post as an other user (a bot maybe), I have to replace $user! And up to 3.0.6 you even had to replace $auth and give that user posting permissions, otherwise it created a non-approved post. (I wrote a helper for that).

There were some efforts by DavidMJ to clean this up. You can take a look at that here.

Design

Here's what a new posting API should be like imo:

• Not depend on globals (dependency injection, pass things like $db into the constructor), this makes testing easier
• provide defaults for required info
• separate topic and reply into separate methods
• not depend on $user, except maybe for defaults
• simple to use API for setting required options
• (use exceptions?)

Backward compatibility

submit_post should be converted to a legacy wrapper around the new API.

[idiotnesia]

Good idea. The problem I found so far is to submit post with other users.

[DavidIQ]

The entire MOD writing community would love you for this

[halindrome]

I agree - it would be great if this API were simplified. And while we are at it... I noticed today that the post_time parameter of the $data structure is ignored. If I choose to set a time of the post, the system should really honor it! The change is pretty simple. Is there a sensible way to propose patches to the existing function?

[Oleg]

Is there a sensible way to propose patches to the existing function?

Yes there is - please see http://wiki.phpbb.com/Get_Involved#Creating_Patches.

[sajaki]

it would be great if you could encapsulate the posting function in a neat class. the way it is now i always forget bits and it makes it harder to add posting forms to my custom pages.

edit: oh i didn't realise it was an older post.