What Are Views in PHP MVC and How Do They Differ from Templates?

Understanding Views in PHP MVC

MVC is an advanced design pattern used in large-scale codebases to improve maintainability through Separation of Concerns. In MVC, Views are responsible for presentation, separate from the Model (data) and Controller (interaction).

What Views Are Not:

Views are not merely templates, contrary to common misconceptions. Using them as such violates MVC principles and pushes presentation logic into the Controller or Model, which is undesirable.

Responsibilities of Views:

Views handle presentation logic, such as assembling responses using data from the Model layer. They also render templates or send HTTP redirects.

Example MVC Workflow:

• Controller interacts with services to modify the Model layer.
• View obtains data from the Model and prepares a response based on the request method ("action").
• Response is sent to the client (typically a browser).

Dealing with DRY:

Repeating logic in views, such as pagination, violates SRP. Consider using presentation objects to handle these repeated tasks, making views more concise and mirroring the data mappers in the Model layer.

Do I Need Complex MVC?

Full MVC is suitable for complex applications. For simpler UIs or REST APIs, merging Controller-View pairs into single classes can be a pragmatic solution. This approach allows for incremental refactoring and isolation of legacy code.

Note:

Views alone do not make an application MVC-compliant. The entire application must follow the MVC design pattern to achieve the benefits of Separation of Concerns and maintainability.

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