Laravel MVC example

This is a simple example of using the MVC framework in Laravel.

The project show a list of students through a web page (http://localhost/overview) or through a RESTful JSON call (http://localhost/students).

There are no students in the database, so the web page and call will be empty, and you'll have to add the students first by hand through a database management tool.

How do I run this project?

You will need to set up your environment first to run this project with Sail. The HOWTO: Build a Laravel project with Sail instructs you on how to set up your environment with the right tools and to set up a new Laravel project in a Docker container.

You will need to do the following steps to get this project up and running:

• Clone the project to a local directory.

• Use the following command inside the directory to install the dependencies of the project:

  docker run --rm \
    -u "$(id -u):$(id -g)" \
    -v "$(pwd):/var/www/html" \
    -w /var/www/html \
    laravelsail/php84-composer:latest \
    composer install --ignore-platform-reqs

See Laravel Sail - Installing Composer dependencies for existing projects.

• Use the command ./vendor/bin/sail up in the directory to get the project up and running.
• Use the command ./vendor/bin/sail artisan migrate in the directory to build the tables of the database.

Which commands were used to create the files?

The advantage of using Laravel is that it's a MVC framework in which the content of each file may be different but the structure remains the same. For example, all models go into the Models folder and all extend the Model class. We could create each Model file on our own, but we can also use the Artisan console of Laravel to generate a Model for us.

Most files in this project were first generated with the Artisan console and got their content added afterwards.

How can we generate the Student migration?

We can generate a migration with the Artisan console through the Sail container.

./vendor/bin/sail artisan make:migration create_student_table

This command created the following file: database/2024_11_13_134137_create_student_table.php.

How can we generate the Student model?

We can generate a model with the Artisan console through the Sail container.

• ./vendor/bin/sail artisan make:model Student

This command created the following file: app/Models/Student.php.

How can we generate the Student controller?

We can generate a controller with the Artisan console through the Sail container.

./vendor/bin/sail artisan make:controller StudentController

This created the following file file: app/Http/Controllers/StudentController.php.

How can we add a GET route to the method in the controller?

We put a route in the web to be reachable by an URL in the web app.

We added the GET route in the following file: routes/web.php

How can we generate the Student view?

We can generate a view with the Artisan console through the Sail container.

• ./vendor/bin/sail artisan make:view overview

This created the following file file: resources/views/overview.blade.php.