Question

Hello I am just learning more about using classes in PHP. I know the code below is crap but I need help.

Can someone just let me know if I am going in the right direction.

My goal is to have this class included into a user profile page, when a new profile object is created, I would like for it to retrieve all the profile data from mysql, then I would like to be able to display any item on the page by just using something like this

$profile = New Profile;
echo $profile->user_name;

Here is my code so far, please tell me what is wrong so far or if I am going in the right direction?

Also instead of using echo $profile->user_name; for the 50+ profile mysql fileds, sometimes I need to do stuff with the data, for example the join date and birthdate have other code that must run to convert them, also if a record is empty then I would like to show an alternative value, so with that knowlege, should I be using methods? Like 50+ different methods?

<?PHP
//Profile.class.php file

class Profile
{
    //set some profile variables
    public $userid;
    public $pic_url;
    public $location_lat;
    public $location_long;
    public $user_name;
    public $f_name;
    public $l_name;
    public $country;
    public $usa_state;
    public $other_state;
    public $zip_code;
    public $city;
    public $gender;
    public $birth_date;
    public $date_create;
    public $date_last_visit;
    public $user_role;
    public $photo_url;
    public $user_status;
    public $friend_count;
    public $comment_count;
    public $forum_post_count;
    public $referral_count;
    public $referral_count_total;
    public $setting_public_profile;
    public $setting_online;
    public $profile_purpose;
    public $profile_height;
    public $profile_body_type;
    public $profile_ethnicity;
    public $profile_occupation;
    public $profile_marital_status;
    public $profile_sex_orientation;
    public $profile_home_town;
    public $profile_religion;
    public $profile_smoker;
    public $profile_drinker;
    public $profile_kids;
    public $profile_education;
    public $profile_income;
    public $profile_headline;
    public $profile_about_me;
    public $profile_like_to_meet;
    public $profile_interest;
    public $profile_music;
    public $profile_television;
    public $profile_books;
    public $profile_heroes;
    public $profile_here_for;
    public $profile_counter;

    function __construct($session)
    {
    // coming soon
    }

    //get profile data
    function getProfile_info(){
        $sql = "SELECT user_name,f_name,l_name,country,usa_state,other_state,zip_code,city,gender,birth_date,date_created,date_last_visit,   
        user_role,photo_url,user_status,friend_count,comment_count,forum_post_count,referral_count,referral_count_total,
        setting_public_profile,setting_online,profile_purpose,profile_height,profile_body_type,profile_ethnicity,
        profile_occupation,profile_marital_status,profile_sex_orientation,profile_home_town,profile_religion,
        profile_smoker,profile_drinker,profile_kids,profile_education,profile_income,profile_headline,profile_about_me,
        profile_like_to_meet,profile_interest,profile_music,profile_television,profile_books,profile_heroes,profile_here_for,profile_counter
        FROM users WHERE user_id=$profileid AND user_role > 0";
        $result_profile = Database::executequery($sql);

        if ($profile = mysql_fetch_assoc($result_profile)) {
            //result is found so set some variables
            $this->user_name = $profile['user_name'];
            $this->f_name = $profile['f_name'];
            $this->l_name = $profile['l_name'];
            $this->country = $profile['country'];
            $this->usa_state = $profile['usa_state'];
            $this->other_state = $profile['other_state'];
            $this->zip_code = $profile['zip_code'];
            $this->city = $profile['city'];
            $this->gender = $profile['gender'];
            $this->birth_date = $profile['birth_date'];
            $this->date_created = $profile['date_created'];
            $this->date_last_visit = $profile['date_last_visit'];
            $this->user_role = $profile['user_role'];
            $this->photo_url = $profile['photo_url'];
            $this->user_status = $profile['user_status'];
            $this->friend_count = $profile['friend_count'];
            $this->comment_count = $profile['comment_count'];
            $this->forum_post_count = $profile['forum_post_count'];
            $this->referral_count = $profile['referral_count'];
            $this->referral_count_total = $profile['referral_count_total'];
            $this->setting_public_profile = $profile['setting_public_profile'];
            $this->setting_online = $profile['setting_online'];
            $this->profile_purpose = $profile['profile_purpose'];
            $this->profile_height = $profile['profile_height'];
            $this->profile_body_type = $profile['profile_body_type'];
            $this->profile_ethnicity = $profile['profile_ethnicity'];
            $this->profile_occupation = $profile['profile_occupation'];
            $this->profile_marital_status = $profile['profile_marital_status'];
            $this->profile_sex_orientation = $profile['profile_sex_orientation'];
            $this->profile_home_town = $profile['profile_home_town'];
            $this->profile_religion = $profile['profile_religion'];
            $this->profile_smoker = $profile['profile_smoker'];
            $this->profile_drinker = $profile['profile_drinker'];
            $this->profile_kids = $profile['profile_kids'];
            $this->profile_education = $profile['profile_education'];
            $this->profile_income = $profile['profile_income'];
            $this->profile_headline = $profile['profile_headline'];
            $this->profile_about_me = $profile['profile_about_me'];
            $this->profile_like_to_meet = $profile['profile_like_to_meet'];
            $this->profile_interest = $profile['profile_interest'];
            $this->profile_music = $profile['profile_music'];
            $this->profile_television = $profile['profile_television'];
            $this->profile_books = $profile['profile_books'];
            $this->profile_heroes = $profile['profile_heroes'];
            $this->profile_here_for = $profile['profile_here_for'];
            $this->profile_counter = $profile['profile_counter'];
        }
    //this part is not done either...........
    return $this->pic_url;
    }
}

Answer 1

You might want to take a look at PHP’s [magic methods][1] which allow you to create a small number of methods (typically "get" and "set" methods), which you can then use to return/set a large number of private/protected variables very easily. You could then have eg the following code (abstract but hopefully you’ll get the idea):

class Profile
{
  private $_profile;

  // $_profile is set somewhere else, as per your original code

  public function __get($name)
  {
    if (array_key_exists($name, $this->_profile)) {
      return $this->_profile[$name];
    }
  }

  public function __set($name, $value)
  {
    // you would normally do some sanity checking here too
    // to make sure you're not just setting random variables

    $this->_profile[$name] = $value;
  }
}

As others have suggested as well, maybe looking into something like an ORM or similar (Doctrine, ActiveRecord etc) might be a worthwhile exercise, where all the above is done for you 🙂

Edit: I should probably have mentioned how you’d access the properties after you implement the above (for completeness!)

$profile = new Profile;

// setting
$profile->user_name = "JoeBloggs";

// retrieving
echo $profile->user_name;

and these will use the magic methods defined above.
[1]: https://www.php.net/manual/en/language.oop5.overloading.php