Figure 4-1: A typical intranet-enabled company. Figure 4-2: User requirements for a typical intranet-enabled company. Each intranet application you develop must be able to authenticate and autho- rize different types of users. For example, an employee vacation management application has to incorporate the hierarchical chain of command that enables employee vacation requests to be reviewed and approved first by team leaders and then by the department head. So far, our intranet application framework has the following requirements: ◆ Central authentication: Users need to be authenticated to access intranet applications. There are likely to be many intranet applications within an organization and therefore user authentication should be done such that a user logs in only once to access any application. A session should be Any Department Department Head Team Employee Project 1 Team Leader Team Employee Project (n) Team Leader Marketing PC PC PC Engineering PC PCPC PC PC Sales MIS PC PCPC PC PC Intranet Server Firewall Database Server Administration PC PCPC PC PC 66 Part II: Developing Intranet Solutions 07 549669 ch04.qxd 4/4/03 9:24 AM Page 66 created that allows all applications to identify an authenticated user. When a user attempts to access an intranet application without logging in first, the application should automatically redirect the user to the login application. When the user is successfully authenticated via the login application, she should be automatically forwarded back to the applica- tion she had been attempting to access. The login process should be seam- less. Similarly, a central, seamless logout facility should be provided to allow the users to log out from the intranet. ◆ Application-specific authorization: Different types of users exist in an intranet and, therefore, intranet applications must discriminate when authorizing users. Employee access to an intranet application will vary. Because each application will have different requirements for authorizing the user, the task of authorization should be left to the application itself. ◆ A shared database: Most intranet activity involves collaboration or group efforts. For example, users working in a team within a project might need to report the status of the project tasks individually, but the team leader or department head needs to access the information from the entire team to make technical or business decisions. A shared database is therefore the solution to store data. Based on these requirements, let’s go ahead and build an intranet application framework. Building an Intranet Application Framework An intranet consists of many applications. It is a good idea to create an application framework that provides a set of commonly needed objects and services to imple- ment applications. Typical intranet applications have user authentication require- ments, database access requirements, user interfaces requirements, and business logic requirements. Each application’s business logic, which is the work done by the application, is unique and must be implemented in the application code itself. However, each application can benefit from using a standard application frame- work consisting of objects that standardize authentication, database access, user interface, etc. The framework I will build here will do just that. Figure 4-3 shows the high-level design diagram for an intranet application that will use our application framework. Now let’s discuss the components of this architecture. Chapter 4: Architecture of an Intranet Application 67 07 549669 ch04.qxd 4/4/03 9:24 AM Page 67 Figure 4-3: High-level architecture diagram of an intranet application using our framework. Using an HTML template-based presentation layer All input and output to and from the application is handled via a template-driven HTML presentation layer. When the application needs input from the user, it pre- sents an HTML page generated from an appropriate HTML template. Similarly, when the application needs to display output, it generates an HTML page by replac- ing special application-specific tags within the template. This ensures that cosmetic changes to the input or output interfaces can be done without requiring help from the application developer. For example, an application that uses the template-based presentation layer can have its interface modified by an HTML writer or graphics artist. Using PHP Application Framework components The components in the PHP Application Framework (PHPAF) layer implement the base application by providing the following services: ◆ Database abstraction support: See the “Relational database” section later in this chapter for details. ◆ Centralized authentication support: All applications defer the login and logout to the central authentication facility, as discussed earlier in this chapter. Relational Database Business Logic Your PHP Application PHP Application Framework Components HTML Template-based Presentation Layer INPUT OUTPUT 68 Part II: Developing Intranet Solutions 07 549669 ch04.qxd 4/4/03 9:24 AM Page 68 ◆ Override authorization support: Each application using the intranet application defines its own authorization method. ◆ Debugging support: An application needs to be debugged many times during the development process. Because debugging is a core part of the development process, the framework includes a built-in debugger. The current implementation is very simple yet useful. ◆ Internationalized error and status message handling support: Each application using the framework must use a central error message and status message repository. Both error and status messages can be internationalized. Business logic Each application has its own business-logic requirements. The business-logic objects will be given database connectivity from the application framework. This ensures that database abstraction is maintained. Relational database The relational database access is abstracted from the application using an abstrac- tion layer, which is part of the application framework. This ensures that application database requirements can change without drastically affecting the application. For example, an application can be developed with this framework such that it works with the widely used, high-performance MySQL database and then deployed in an environment where the database is Oracle. Of course, the developers have to be careful not to use any vendor-specific features. Figure 4-4 shows a block diagram of an application that uses the previously mentioned application framework. Figure 4-4: A block diagram of an application using the PHP Application Framework. Application Specific Error and Status Messages (Supports Internationalization) Database Independent Abstraction Authentication (Valid User Credentials) Authorization (Application Specific Authorization Requirements) Application Run() (Application Specific Driver Code) Business Logic Objects (Application Specific Code) Chapter 4: Architecture of an Intranet Application 69 07 549669 ch04.qxd 4/4/03 9:24 AM Page 69 The application checks for valid user credentials in the authentication phase, which is already supplied by the framework’s login application for valid users. The authorization step involves application-specific privilege management. Not all valid (authenticated) users are likely to have the same privilege based on the type of application. For example, an Employee Information System (EIS) applica- tion in an engineering firm can assign different privileges to executive manage- ment, department heads, team leaders, and engineers. This is why the authorization code is specific to the instance of the application and should be written by the application developer and should not be provided by the framework. When an application has gone through the authentication and authorization phases, it will run the application. This code will involve invoking application spe- cific business objects and database interaction. The application will have database access via the database-independent abstrac- tion and also will produce status messages and errors using the facilities provided by the framework. Figure 4-5 shows a real-world application framework that we will create in this chapter. Figure 4-5: A real-world PHP Application Framework. The core of this framework is the class.PHPApplication.php. This class provides an abstract PHP application that you can extend to incorporate facilities provided by the error handler (class.ErrorHandler.php), the debugger (class.Debugger.php), and the database abstraction (class.DBI.php). DB.php (from PEAR) class.PHPApplication.php class.Debugger.phpclass.ErrorHandler.php class.DBI.php Your PHP Application Business Logic 70 Part II: Developing Intranet Solutions 07 549669 ch04.qxd 4/4/03 9:24 AM Page 70 . (class.ErrorHandler .php) , the debugger (class.Debugger .php) , and the database abstraction (class.DBI .php) . DB .php (from PEAR) class.PHPApplication .php class.Debugger.phpclass.ErrorHandler .php class.DBI .php Your. this chapter. Figure 4-5: A real-world PHP Application Framework. The core of this framework is the class.PHPApplication .php. This class provides an abstract PHP application that you can extend. modified by an HTML writer or graphics artist. Using PHP Application Framework components The components in the PHP Application Framework (PHPAF) layer implement the base application by providing