The Conventional Modular directory structure allows you to separate different MVC applications into self-contained units, and re-use them with different front controllers. To illustrate such a directory structure:

docroot/
    index.php
application/
    controllers/
        IndexController.php
        FooController.php
    blog/
        controllers/
            IndexController.php
        models/
        views/
    news/
        controllers/
            IndexController.php
            ListController.php
        models/
        views/

In this paradigm, the module name serves as a prefix to the controllers it contains. The above example contains three module controllers, 'Blog_IndexController', 'News_IndexController', and 'News_ListController'. Two global controllers, 'IndexController' and 'FooController' are also defined; neither of these will be namespaced. This directory structure will be used for examples in this chapter.

So, how do you implement such a directory layout using the Zend Framework MVC components?

The first step to making use of modules is to modify how you specify the controller directory list in the front controller. In the basic MVC series, you pass either an array or a string to setControllerDirectory(), or a path to addControllerDirectory(). When using modules, you need to alter your calls to these methods slightly.

With setControllerDirectory(), you will need to pass an associative array and specify key/value pairs of module name/directory paths. The special key 'default' will be used for global controllers (those not needing a module namespace). All entries should contain a string key pointing to a single path. As an example:

$front->setControllerDirectory(array(
      'default' => '/path/to/application/controllers',
      'blog'    => '/path/to/application/blog/controllers'
));

addControllerDirectory() will take an optional second argument. When using modules, pass the module name as the second argument; if not specified, the path will be added to the default namespace. As an example:

$front->addControllerDirectory('/path/to/application/news/controllers', 'news');

The default route in Zend_Controller_Router_Rewrite is an object of type Zend_Controller_Router_Route_Module. This route expects one of the following routing schemas:

In other words, it will match a controller and action by themselves or with a preceding module. The rules for matching specify that a module will only be matched if a key of the same name exists in the controller directory array passed to the front controller and dispatcher.

In the default router, if a controller was not specified in the URL, a default controller is used (IndexController, unless otherwise requested). With modular controllers, if a module has been specified but no controller, the dispatcher first looks for this default controller in the module path, and then falls back on the default controller found in the 'default', global, namespace.

If you wish to always default to the global namespace, set the useGlobalDefault parameter in the front controller:

$front->setParam('useGlobalDefault', true);