Introduction
Instead of defining all of your request handling logic in
a single routes.php file, you may wish to
organize this behavior using Controller classes.
Controllers can group related HTTP request handling
logic into a class. Controllers are typically stored in
the app/Http/Controllers directory.
Basic Controllers
Here is an example of a basic controller class. All Laravel controllers should extend the base controller class included with the default Laravel installation:
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use App\User;
use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* Show the profile for the given user.
*
* @param int $id
* @return Response
*/
public function showProfile($id)
{
return view('user.profile', ['user' => User::findOrFail($id)]);
}
}
We can route to the controller action like so:
Route::get('user/{id}', 'UserController@showProfile');
Now, when a request matches the specified route URI, the
showProfile method on the
UserController class will be executed. Of
course, the route parameters will also be passed to the
method.
Controllers & Namespaces
It is very important to note that we did not need to
specify the full controller namespace when defining the
controller route. We only defined the portion of the
class name that comes after the
App\Http\Controllers namespace
"root". By default, the
RouteServiceProvider will load the
routes.php file within a route group
containing the root controller namespace.
If you choose to nest or organize your controllers using
PHP namespaces deeper into the
App\Http\Controllers directory, simply use
the specific class name relative to the
App\Http\Controllers root namespace. So, if
your full controller class is
App\Http\Controllers\Photos\AdminController,
you would register a route like so:
Route::get('foo', 'Photos\AdminController@method');
Naming Controller Routes
Like Closure routes, you may specify names on controller routes:
Route::get('foo', ['uses' => 'FooController@method', 'as' => 'name']);
URLs To Controller Actions
You may also use the route helper to
generate a URL to a named controller route:
$url = route('name');
You may also use the action helper method to
generate a URL using the controller's class and method
names. Again, we only need to specify the part of the
controller class name that comes after the base
App\Http\Controllers namespace:
$url = action('FooController@method');
You may access the name of the controller action being
run using the currentRouteAction method on
the Route facade:
$action = Route::currentRouteAction();
Controller Middleware
Middleware may be assigned to the controller's routes like so:
Route::get('profile', [
'middleware' => 'auth',
'uses' => 'UserController@showProfile'
]);
However, it is more convenient to specify middleware
within your controller's constructor. Using the
middleware method from your controller's
constructor, you may easily assign middleware to the
controller. You may even restrict the middleware to only
certain methods on the controller class:
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* Instantiate a new UserController instance.
*
* @return void
*/
public function __construct()
{
$this->middleware('auth');
$this->middleware('log', ['only' => ['fooAction', 'barAction']]);
$this->middleware('subscribed', ['except' => ['fooAction', 'barAction']]);
}
}
RESTful Resource Controllers
Resource controllers make it painless to build RESTful
controllers around resources. For example, you may wish
to create a controller that handles HTTP requests
regarding "photos" stored by your application.
Using the make:controller Artisan command,
we can quickly create such a controller:
php artisan make:controller PhotoController
The Artisan command will generate a controller file at
app/Http/Controllers/PhotoController.php.
The controller will contain a method for each of the
available resource operations.
Next, you may register a resourceful route to the controller:
Route::resource('photo', 'PhotoController');
This single route declaration creates multiple routes to handle a variety of RESTful actions on the photo resource. Likewise, the generated controller will already have methods stubbed for each of these actions, including notes informing you which URIs and verbs they handle.
Actions Handled By Resource Controller
| Verb | Path | Action | Route Name |
|---|---|---|---|
| GET | /photo |
index | photo.index |
| GET | /photo/create |
create | photo.create |
| POST | /photo |
store | photo.store |
| GET | /photo/{photo} |
show | photo.show |
| GET | /photo/{photo}/edit |
edit | photo.edit |
| PUT/PATCH | /photo/{photo} |
update | photo.update |
| DELETE | /photo/{photo} |
destroy | photo.destroy |
Partial Resource Routes
When declaring a resource route, you may specify a subset of actions to handle on the route:
Route::resource('photo', 'PhotoController',
['only' => ['index', 'show']]);
Route::resource('photo', 'PhotoController',
['except' => ['create', 'store', 'update', 'destroy']]);
Naming Resource Routes
By default, all resource controller actions have a route
name; however, you can override these names by passing a
names array with your options:
Route::resource('photo', 'PhotoController',
['names' => ['create' => 'photo.build']]);
Nested Resources
Sometimes you may need to define routes to a "nested" resource. For example, a photo resource may have multiple "comments" that may be attached to the photo. To "nest" resource controllers, use "dot" notation in your route declaration:
Route::resource('photos.comments', 'PhotoCommentController');
This route will register a "nested" resource
that may be accessed with URLs like the following:
photos/{photos}/comments/{comments}.
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;
class PhotoCommentController extends Controller
{
/**
* Show the specified photo comment.
*
* @param int $photoId
* @param int $commentId
* @return Response
*/
public function show($photoId, $commentId)
{
//
}
}
Supplementing Resource Controllers
If it becomes necessary to add additional routes to a
resource controller beyond the default resource routes,
you should define those routes before your call to
Route::resource; otherwise, the routes
defined by the resource method may
unintentionally take precedence over your supplemental
routes:
Route::get('photos/popular', 'PhotoController@method');
Route::resource('photos', 'PhotoController');
Implicit Controllers
Laravel allows you to easily define a single route to
handle every action in a controller class. First, define
the route using the Route::controller
method. The controller method accepts two
arguments. The first is the base URI the controller
handles, while the second is the class name of the
controller:
Route::controller('users', 'UserController');
Next, just add methods to your controller. The method names should begin with the HTTP verb they respond to followed by the title case version of the URI:
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* Responds to requests to GET /users
*/
public function getIndex()
{
//
}
/**
* Responds to requests to GET /users/show/1
*/
public function getShow($id)
{
//
}
/**
* Responds to requests to GET /users/admin-profile
*/
public function getAdminProfile()
{
//
}
/**
* Responds to requests to POST /users/profile
*/
public function postProfile()
{
//
}
}
As you can see in the example above, index
methods will respond to the root URI handled by the
controller, which, in this case, is
users.
Assigning Route Names
If you would like to name some of
the routes on the controller, you may pass an array of
names as the third argument to the
controller method:
Route::controller('users', 'UserController', [
'getShow' => 'user.show',
]);
Dependency Injection & Controllers
Constructor Injection
The Laravel service container is used to resolve all Laravel controllers. As a result, you are able to type-hint any dependencies your controller may need in its constructor. The dependencies will automatically be resolved and injected into the controller instance:
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use Illuminate\Routing\Controller;
use App\Repositories\UserRepository;
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* The user repository instance.
*/
protected $users;
/**
* Create a new controller instance.
*
* @param UserRepository $users
* @return void
*/
public function __construct(UserRepository $users)
{
$this->users = $users;
}
}
Of course, you may also type-hint any Laravel contract. If the container can resolve it, you can type-hint it.
Method Injection
In addition to constructor injection, you may also
type-hint dependencies on your controller's action
methods. For example, let's type-hint the
Illuminate\Http\Request instance on one of
our methods:
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use Illuminate\Routing\Controller;
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* Store a new user.
*
* @param Request $request
* @return Response
*/
public function store(Request $request)
{
$name = $request->input('name');
//
}
}
If your controller method is also expecting input from a route parameter, simply list your route arguments after your other dependencies. For example, if your route is defined like so:
Route::put('user/{id}', 'UserController@update');
You may still type-hint the
Illuminate\Http\Request and access your
route parameter id by defining your
controller method like the following:
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use Illuminate\Routing\Controller;
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* Update the specified user.
*
* @param Request $request
* @param int $id
* @return Response
*/
public function update(Request $request, $id)
{
//
}
}
Route Caching
Note: Route caching does not work with Closure based routes. To use route caching, you must convert any Closure routes to use controller classes.
If your application is exclusively using controller based
routes, you may take advantage of Laravel's route cache.
Using the route cache will drastically decrease the
amount of time it takes to register all of your
application's routes. In some cases, your route
registration may even be up to 100x faster! To generate
a route cache, just execute the route:cache
Artisan command:
php artisan route:cache
That's all there is to it! Your cached routes file will
now be used instead of your
app/Http/routes.php file. Remember, if you
add any new routes you will need to generate a fresh
route cache. Because of this, you may wish to only run
the route:cache command during your
project's deployment.
To remove the cached routes file without generating a new
cache, use the route:clear command:
php artisan route:clear