Load third-party non-CakePHP library

Question

I'm trying to integrate a proprietary third-party library into my CakePHP app. All I could find in the manual is the App Class section but it's basically a set of examples rather than a proper explanation so I'm trying to guess.

I got the impression that you should use the App::uses() alternative when possible and at first I thought I was lucky because this code:

App::build(
    array(
        'Vendor' => array(
            APP . 'Vendor' . DS . 'Acme' . DS. 'API-1.0' . DS . 'base',
            APP . 'Vendor' . DS . 'Acme' . DS. 'API-1.0' . DS . 'foo',
            APP . 'Vendor' . DS . 'Acme' . DS. 'API-1.0' . DS . 'bar',
        )
    )
);
debug(App::objects('Vendor'));

... produces this output:

array(
    (int) 0 => 'Autoload',
    (int) 1 => 'ConstantsBase',
    (int) 2 => 'Foo',
    (int) 3 => 'Bar',
)

However, I can't do anything like this:

App::uses('Foo', 'Vendor');
new Foo();

... triggers:

Error: Class 'Foo' not found

How comes CakePHP does know about the library classes but won't load them?

Are you using composer in your project and does the vendor libs support composer as well? — floriank
I see composer.json files all around but I'm not familiar with it. — Álvaro González
Are you familiar with other Package Managers like bower? Composer is pretty similar and is a common tool now in the php world. I would recommend you to use it because it comes with a standard autoloader and you can manage your dependencies through it as well. book.cakephp.org/2.0/en/installation/… — floriank
@burzum I've used Node's npm and Composer is definitively in my todo list. But this particular library is not Composer-friendly. — Álvaro González

Álvaro González Álvaro González · Accepted Answer · 2015-01-02T11:07:27

Apparently, directory paths need to have a trailing slash:

// Incorrect
APP . 'Vendor' . DS . 'Acme' . DS. 'API-1.0' . DS . 'base',

// Correct
APP . 'Vendor' . DS . 'Acme' . DS. 'API-1.0' . DS . 'base' . DS,

It's just mandatory, though its omission doesn't seem to trigger any error message.

Load third-party non-CakePHP library

1 Answers