Question

I’m working on a MVC application in which the Model is implemented using an abstract base class that all actual models have to extend. In every model there is some info about that model, currently implemented as an array, let call that protected static $info. So, every model has a different $info array. Now, the base class has lots of functions that use data from that array, and at the moment every one of those functions starts with something like the example save() function below.

abstract class BaseModel {
    function save(){
        $className = get_called_class();
        $modelInfo = $className::$info;
        /* lots of other stuff */
    }
}

class User extends BaseModel {
    protected static $info = array("tableName" => "tblUsers", etc...)
}

In my understanding, this can be resolved by making the BaseModel a trait instead of a constructor, since when traits define static properties, each inheriting class does have their own values. I would copy the $info array from the implementation of the Model to the trait, probably in the constructor, so that I can use self::info['tableName'] in all the functions in the BaseModel…

Would this be a good idea?

Answer 1

The simplest and most appropriate tool for the job would be to use late static binding:

function save(){
    $modelInfo = static::$info;
    /* lots of other stuff */
}