Cakephp load element with BBcode/shortcode - cakephp

Question

I am looking for input/help on how to do this. Might be some PHP/cake developers could provide some good solutions here. Cakephp 2.3 something :)
Problem; How to put shortcodes in wysiwyg editor (example: [slideshow=1]slideshow here[/slideshow]) and render an element (in this case, loading and displaying the slideshow with ID=1).
ShortcodeHelper.php
App::import('Helper', 'Html', 'Router');
class ShortcodeHelper extends AppHelper {
public $shortcodes = array(
'slideshow' => '/(\[slideshow=)(.+?)(\])(.+?)(\[\/slideshow\])/'
);
public $returncodes = array(
//'slideshow' => $this->render('/elements/slideshow', array('id'=>'\\2'))
'slideshow' => '<strong rel="\\2">\\4</strong>'
);
public function render($content, $render=null) {
$shortcodes = $this->shortcodes;
$returncodes = $this->returncodes;
if(isset($render)) {
$temp_shortcodes = array();
$temp_returncodes = array();
foreach ($render as $key => $value) {
$temp_shortcodes[$key] = $shortcodes[$value];
$temp_returncodes[$key] = $returncodes[$value];
}
$returncodes = $temp_returncodes;
$shortcodes = $temp_shortcodes;
}
$return = preg_replace($shortcodes, $returncodes, $content);
return $this->output($return);
}
}
view.ctp (call render function from helper, and run the page-content trough it):
<?php echo $this->Shortcode->render($page['Page']['body']); ?>
Thanks. You are awesome!! :)
-Tom

Answer 1

You need to turn the short code string into a method call, parse it.
Your helper will need to be able to detect them and then break them up. Your code needs to be mapped somehow to a callback.
// [slideshow=1]slideshow here[/slideshow]
$this->requestAction(array('controller' => 'slideshows', 'action' => 'view', $id);
For example.
I think the best way here would be to just always map the first arg, the "function call" to an element instead and pass all other args to the element. This way you can do there whatever you want and request the data or just simply display HTML only.
I would put the mapping of short codes into something like Configure::write('ShortCodes', $shortCodeArray); this way plugins could even register their callback mapping by simply adding them to that array.
array(
'slideshow' => array('controller' => 'slideshows', 'action' => 'view')
);
You'll have to merge that with args from the parsed short code.
Why requestAction()? You should not violate the MVC pattern, for this reason you'll have to request the data via requestAction().