Question

I’m building an authentication module for my application and I don’t quite understand the relation between CWebUser and CUserIdentity.

To set the user id to Yii::app()->user->id I have to do that in my UserIdentity class and create a method:

public function getId() {
    return $this->_id;
}

But to set isAdmin to Yii::app()->user->isAdmin I have to create a method in my WebUser class:

function getIsAdmin() {
    $user = $this->loadUser(Yii::app()->user->id);
    return intval($user->user_level_id) == AccountModule::USER_LEVEL_ADMIN;
}

Why can’t I just create the methods the UserIdentity class? What is the division of labour here?

Answer 1

The UserIdentity (UI) class is like an ID card, where as the WebUser class is the actual person plus everything you know about them.

The UI class gives you authentication via database, webservices, textfile, whatever. It lets you know what the key attributes are and allows you to manipulate them. The user however can give you more information about what they’re allowed to do, there names, granular permissions and such.

OK, end metaphor

The UI class holds the key information, so when asking for the users ID it will refer to the User Identity class to get the Identifier for the user.

Anything that isn’t related to identifying or authenticating a user is in the WebUser class

Clear it up at all?

Your example

You gave the getId function as an example, but that can be created on WebUser to override the default, which is to pull from the state.

So not sure what you mean here.