Blueprint

Defining Controllers

Similar to defining models, Blueprint also supports defining controllers. You may do so within the controllers section, listing controllers by name. For each controller, you may define multiple actions which contain a list of statements.

Consider the controllers section of the following draft file:

controllers:
  Post:
    index:
      query: all
      render: post.index with:posts
    create:
      render: post.create
    store:
      validate: title, content
      save: post
      redirect: post.index

  Comment:
    show:
      render: comment.show with:comment

From this definition, Blueprint will generate two controllers. A PostController with index, create, and store actions. And a CommentController with a show action.

While you may specify the full name of a controller, Blueprint will automatically suffix controller names with Controller to follow Laravel's naming conventions. So, for convenience, you may simply specify the root name of the controller - be it singular or plural.

Blueprint will generate the methods for each controller's actions. In addition, Blueprint will register routes for each action. The HTTP method will be inferred based on the action name. For example, Blueprint will register a post route for the store action. Otherwise, a get route will be registered.

For these reasons, Blueprint recommends defining resource controllers. Doing so allows Blueprint to infer details and generate even more code automatically.

If you wish to namespace a controller, you may prefix the controller name. Blueprint will use this prefix as the namespace and properly save the generated controller class following Laravel conventions. For example, defining an Api\Post controller will generate a App\Http\Controllers\Api\PostController class saved as app/Http/Controllers/Api/PostController.php.

Review the advanced configuration to customize these namespaces and paths further.

Finally, Blueprint will analyze each of the statements listed within the action to generate the body of each controller method. For example, the above definition for the index action would generate the following controller method:

public function index(Request $request): View
{
    $posts = Post::all();

    return view('post.index', compact('posts'));
}

Blueprint has statements for many of the common actions within Laravel. Some statements generate code beyond the controller. Review the Controller Statements section for a full list of statements and the code they generate.