--- /dev/null
+Painfree Handling of File Paths
+===============================
+
+Dealing with file paths usually involves some difficulties:
+
+* **System Heterogeneity**: File paths look different on different platforms.
+ UNIX file paths start with a slash ("/"), while Windows file paths start with
+ a system drive ("C:"). UNIX uses forward slashes, while Windows uses
+ backslashes by default ("\").
+
+* **Absolute/Relative Paths**: Web applications frequently need to deal with
+ absolute and relative paths. Converting one to the other properly is tricky
+ and repetitive.
+
+This package provides few, but robust utility methods to simplify your life
+when dealing with file paths.
+
+Canonicalization
+----------------
+
+*Canonicalization* is the transformation of a path into a normalized (the
+"canonical") format. You can canonicalize a path with `Path::canonicalize()`:
+
+```php
+echo Path::canonicalize('/var/www/vhost/webmozart/../config.ini');
+// => /var/www/vhost/config.ini
+```
+
+The following modifications happen during canonicalization:
+
+* "." segments are removed;
+* ".." segments are resolved;
+* backslashes ("\") are converted into forward slashes ("/");
+* root paths ("/" and "C:/") always terminate with a slash;
+* non-root paths never terminate with a slash;
+* schemes (such as "phar://") are kept;
+* replace "~" with the user's home directory.
+
+You can pass absolute paths and relative paths to `canonicalize()`. When a
+relative path is passed, ".." segments at the beginning of the path are kept:
+
+```php
+echo Path::canonicalize('../uploads/../config/config.yml');
+// => ../config/config.yml
+```
+
+Malformed paths are returned unchanged:
+
+```php
+echo Path::canonicalize('C:Programs/PHP/php.ini');
+// => C:Programs/PHP/php.ini
+```
+
+Converting Absolute/Relative Paths
+----------------------------------
+
+Absolute/relative paths can be converted with the methods `Path::makeAbsolute()`
+and `Path::makeRelative()`.
+
+`makeAbsolute()` expects a relative path and a base path to base that relative
+path upon:
+
+```php
+echo Path::makeAbsolute('config/config.yml', '/var/www/project');
+// => /var/www/project/config/config.yml
+```
+
+If an absolute path is passed in the first argument, the absolute path is
+returned unchanged:
+
+```php
+echo Path::makeAbsolute('/usr/share/lib/config.ini', '/var/www/project');
+// => /usr/share/lib/config.ini
+```
+
+The method resolves ".." segments, if there are any:
+
+```php
+echo Path::makeAbsolute('../config/config.yml', '/var/www/project/uploads');
+// => /var/www/project/config/config.yml
+```
+
+This method is very useful if you want to be able to accept relative paths (for
+example, relative to the root directory of your project) and absolute paths at
+the same time.
+
+`makeRelative()` is the inverse operation to `makeAbsolute()`:
+
+```php
+echo Path::makeRelative('/var/www/project/config/config.yml', '/var/www/project');
+// => config/config.yml
+```
+
+If the path is not within the base path, the method will prepend ".." segments
+as necessary:
+
+```php
+echo Path::makeRelative('/var/www/project/config/config.yml', '/var/www/project/uploads');
+// => ../config/config.yml
+```
+
+Use `isAbsolute()` and `isRelative()` to check whether a path is absolute or
+relative:
+
+```php
+Path::isAbsolute('C:\Programs\PHP\php.ini')
+// => true
+```
+
+All four methods internally canonicalize the passed path.
+
+Finding Longest Common Base Paths
+---------------------------------
+
+When you store absolute file paths on the file system, this leads to a lot of
+duplicated information:
+
+```php
+return array(
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/config/config.yml',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/config/routing.yml',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/config/services.yml',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/images/banana.gif',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/uploads/images/nicer-banana.gif',
+);
+```
+
+Especially when storing many paths, the amount of duplicated information is
+noticeable. You can use `Path::getLongestCommonBasePath()` to check a list of
+paths for a common base path:
+
+```php
+$paths = array(
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/config/config.yml',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/config/routing.yml',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/config/services.yml',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/images/banana.gif',
+ '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs/uploads/images/nicer-banana.gif',
+);
+
+Path::getLongestCommonBasePath($paths);
+// => /var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs
+```
+
+Use this path together with `Path::makeRelative()` to shorten the stored paths:
+
+```php
+$bp = '/var/www/vhosts/project/httpdocs';
+
+return array(
+ $bp.'/config/config.yml',
+ $bp.'/config/routing.yml',
+ $bp.'/config/services.yml',
+ $bp.'/images/banana.gif',
+ $bp.'/uploads/images/nicer-banana.gif',
+);
+```
+
+`getLongestCommonBasePath()` always returns canonical paths.
+
+Use `Path::isBasePath()` to test whether a path is a base path of another path:
+
+```php
+Path::isBasePath("/var/www", "/var/www/project");
+// => true
+
+Path::isBasePath("/var/www", "/var/www/project/..");
+// => true
+
+Path::isBasePath("/var/www", "/var/www/project/../..");
+// => false
+```
+
+Finding Directories/Root Directories
+------------------------------------
+
+PHP offers the function `dirname()` to obtain the directory path of a file path.
+This method has a few quirks:
+
+* `dirname()` does not accept backslashes on UNIX
+* `dirname("C:/Programs")` returns "C:", not "C:/"
+* `dirname("C:/")` returns ".", not "C:/"
+* `dirname("C:")` returns ".", not "C:/"
+* `dirname("Programs")` returns ".", not ""
+* `dirname()` does not canonicalize the result
+
+`Path::getDirectory()` fixes these shortcomings:
+
+```php
+echo Path::getDirectory("C:\Programs");
+// => C:/
+```
+
+Additionally, you can use `Path::getRoot()` to obtain the root of a path:
+
+```php
+echo Path::getRoot("/etc/apache2/sites-available");
+// => /
+
+echo Path::getRoot("C:\Programs\Apache\Config");
+// => C:/
+```
+
projects / yaffs-website / blobdiff