Question

I wanted to display a simple exception message in zend form which is thrown by an exception. I check whether there is a duplicate record existing in the database and if exits then I want to throw an error saying the the record with that name already exists in the database. This I wanted to show in the add.phtml file exactly after the record name textfield.

This is how I am trying to do:

In my Controller:

public function addAction()
{
    try {
        $records->validateDuplicateRecords($recordTitle);

        if ($form->isValid()) {
            //doing all the stuff like saving data to database
        }
    } catch (\Exception $e) {
         echo $e->getMessage(); //Not sure with this part
    }
}

And the class where I am checking for duplicate records:

records.php

public function validateDuplicateRecords($recordTitle)
{
    //fetching all titles from database

   //comparing with $recordTitle using foreach and if
   //all these here in the loop works, I am giving the skeleton of my code
    foreach($records as $record)
    {
        if($record == $recordTitle) {
            throw new \Exception("Record with title '$recordTitle' already exists");
        }
        return true;
    }   
}

So that is basically how im doing, I know how this try and catch works with pure php stuff, but I don’t know how I can use the exceptions with Zend Framework 2 and zend forms. In case if anybody has a solution for this would be glad if it can be shared.

P.S. I followed the Album Module so basically my structure resembles more or less same from the official Module

EDIT: add.phtml has been addded

add.phtml

<?php
$title = "Add New Record Title";
$this->headTitle($title);
?>
<h2><?php echo $this->escapeHtml($title); ?></h2>

<?php
$form = $this->form;
$form->setAttribute("action", $this->url("addRecordTitle", array('controller' => "album", 'action' => "add")));
$form->prepare();

echo $this->form()->openTag($form);
echo $this->formRow($form->get('recordTitle'));
echo $this->formInput($form->get('submit')); 
echo $this->form()->closeTag($form); 
?>

Answer 1

Given your example, a way to do it would be this. However i suggest you read yourself into the inbuilt validators Db\RecordExists and Db\RecordNoExists, as they may already do what you’re trying to do.

public function addAction() 
{
     $form = $this->getForm(); //theoretical

     try {
         $records->validateDuplicateRecords($recordTitle);
     } catch (\Exception $e) {
         $form->setMessages(array(
             'recordTitle' => array($e->getMessage())
         ));
         return new ViewModel(array(
             'form' => $form
         ));
     }

     if ($form->isValid()) { 
         //usual stuff
     }
}

With this code you’d attach the error message onto your title-FormElement, be sure to edit the name into the name of your title element.