Vanilla’s base Controller class (the class from which all controllers are extended) accepts a DeliveryType parameter on every request. Depending on the type of delivery being requested, a controller in Garden will deliver all of a page, part of a page, or part of a page plus extra information as JSON.
DeliveryType
There are four delivery types available:
DELIVERY_TYPE_ALL: Entire page (default).DELIVERY_TYPE_ASSET: Content for the requested asset.DELIVERY_TYPE_VIEW: Only the requested view.DELIVERY_TYPE_BOOL: Only report request success (true/false).
If no delivery type is provided in the request, DELIVERY_TYPE_ALL is assumed.
In order to made the controller deliver content other than DELIVERY_TYPE_ALL, you would have to append the request URL (or post data) with the DeliveryType parameter set to the above value you want.
A DELIVERY_TYPE_VIEW request can be easily used for progressive data loading. That or a DELIVERY_TYPE_ASSET request could be used to update part of a page. A DELIVERY_TYPE_BOOL request is used for actions like closing a discussion.
DeliveryMethod
The DeliveryMethod defines what format you want the response in.
DELIVERY_METHOD_XHTML: Delivered as HTML (default).DELIVERY_METHOD_JSON: As JSON.DELIVERY_METHOD_XML: As XML.DELIVERY_METHOD_TEXT: As text/plain (since 2.1).DELIVERY_METHOD_PLAIN: No Content-Type is set (since 2.1).DELIVERY_METHOD_RSS: An RSS feed (since 2.1).
Vanilla builds datasets for its pages in generic collections that can be output in any of the above formats, assuming an appropriate view is available.
You can define a DeliveryMethod by appending it to your request like DeliveryType, or by appending an extension to your request after the method. For example, try viewing /profile on your forum vs. /profile.json. Note that arguments are added normally after another slash. Supposing you wanted to view userid 2’s profile with the name Lincoln, you would use /profile.json/2/Lincoln.
Parsing Requests
Vanilla parses incoming URLs and parameters for you. There is rarely any reason to directly access PHP globals like $_GET. The Gdn_Request class (in /library/core/class.request.php) handles this for you.
Gdn::request()->domain() will return the current domain. These methods also work as you’d expect: host, ipAddress, path, and port. You can also call get and post with a parameter name to see its current value. See Gdn_Request for more request data.
A few more useful methods:
Use Gdn::request()->isAuthenticatedPostback() to check that the current user sent a POST request along with their TransientKey to protect against CSRF attacks. All forms built with Vanilla include a TransientKey.
Use Gdn::request()->url() to build safe URLs to other parts of Vanilla. The url() function is a shortcut to this method.
Use Gdn::request()->requestMethod() to find out which Vanilla method was called by the current request.
