Best Practices for Custom Helpers in Laravel 5
Create a helpers.php file in your app folder and load it up with composer:
"autoload": { "classmap": [ ... ], "psr-4": { "App\\": "app/" }, "files": [ "app/helpers.php" // <---- ADD THIS ]},After adding that to your composer.json file, run the following command:
composer dump-autoloadIf you don't like keeping your helpers.php file in your app directory (because it's not a PSR-4 namespaced class file), you can do what the laravel.com website does: store the helpers.php in the bootstrap directory. Remember to set it in your composer.json file:
"files": [ "bootstrap/helpers.php"]Tip:If you want to use the different file name instead of helpers, you can change the file name and path.Also, you can create multiple helper files.It will look like this:
"autoload": { "classmap": [ ... ], "psr-4": { "App\\": "app/" }, "files": [ "app/Helpers/base.php", // <---- ADD THIS "app/Helpers/metrics.php" // <---- Create `metrics.php` file in this path and add the path in composer.json file. ]},
Custom Classes in Laravel 5, the Easy Way
This answer is applicable to general custom classes within Laravel. For a more Blade-specific answer, see Custom Blade Directives in Laravel 5.
Step 1: Create your Helpers (or other custom class) file and give it a matching namespace. Write your class and method:
<?php // Code within app\Helpers\Helper.phpnamespace App\Helpers;class Helper{ public static function shout(string $string) { return strtoupper($string); }}Step 2: Create an alias:
<?php // Code within config/app.php 'aliases' => [ ... 'Helper' => App\Helpers\Helper::class, ...Step 3: Run composer dump-autoload in the project root
Step 4: Use it in your Blade template:
<!-- Code within resources/views/template.blade.php -->{!! Helper::shout('this is how to use autoloading correctly!!') !!}Extra Credit: Use this class anywhere in your Laravel app:
<?php // Code within app/Http/Controllers/SomeController.phpnamespace App\Http\Controllers;use Helper;class SomeController extends Controller{ public function __construct() { Helper::shout('now i\'m using my helper class in a controller!!'); } ...Source: http://www.php-fig.org/psr/psr-4/
Why it works: https://github.com/laravel/framework/blob/master/src/Illuminate/Support/ClassLoader.php
Where autoloading originates from:http://php.net/manual/en/language.oop5.autoload.php
my initial thought was the composer autoload as well, but it didn't feel very Laravel 5ish to me. L5 makes heavy use of Service Providers, they are what bootstraps your application.
To start off I created a folder in my app directory called Helpers. Then within the Helpers folder I added files for functions I wanted to add. Having a folder with multiple files allows us to avoid one big file that gets too long and unmanageable.
Next I created a HelperServiceProvider.php by running the artisan command:
artisan make:provider HelperServiceProviderWithin the register method I added this snippet
public function register(){ foreach (glob(app_path().'/Helpers/*.php') as $filename){ require_once($filename); }}lastly register the service provider in your config/app.php in the providers array
'providers' => [ 'App\Providers\HelperServiceProvider',]now any file in your Helpers directory is loaded, and ready for use.
UPDATE 2016-02-22
There are a lot of good options here, but if my answer works for you, I went ahead and made a package for including helpers this way. You can either use the package for inspiration or feel free to download it with Composer as well. It has some built in helpers that I use often (but which are all inactive by default) and allows you to make your own custom helpers with a simple Artisan generator. It also addresses the suggestion one responder had of using a mapper and allows you to explicitly define the custom helpers to load, or by default, automatically load all PHP files in your helper directory. Feedback and PRs are much appreciated!
composer require browner12/helpersGithub: browner12/helpers