Purpose of this file

With this file, you define all the player entry points (i.e., possible game actions) for your game.

This file is a sort of "bridge" between the AJAX calls you perform from the Javascript client side, and your main PHP code in "yourgame.game.php".

The role of the methods defined in this file is to filter the arguments, format them a bit, and then call a corresponding PHP method from your main game logic ("yourgame.game.php" file).

Methods in this file should be short: no game logic must be introduced here.

Example of typical action method

(from Reversi example)

    public function playDisc()
    {
        self::setAjaxMode();     
        $x = self::getArg( "x", AT_posint, true );
        $y = self::getArg( "y", AT_posint, true );
        $result = $this->game->playDisc( $x, $y );
        self::ajaxResponse( );
    }

Methods to use in action methods

function setAjaxMode()

Must be used at the beginning of each action method.

function ajaxResponse()

Must be used at the end of each action method.

function getArg( $argName, $argType, $mandatory=false, $default=NULL, $argTypeDetails=array(), $bCanFail=false )

This method must be used to retrieve the arguments sent with your AJAX query.

You must not use "_GET", "_POST" or equivalent PHP variables to do this, as it is unsafe.

This method uses the following arguments:

• argName: the name of the argument to retrieve.
• argType: the type of the argument. You should use one of the following:

 'AT_int' for an integer
 'AT_posint' for a positive integer 
 'AT_float' for a float
 'AT_bool' for 1/0/true/false
 'AT_enum' for an enumeration (argTypeDetails lists the possible values as an array)
 'AT_alphanum' for a string with 0-9a-zA-Z_ and space
 'AT_numberlist' for a list of numbers separated with "," or ";" (example: 1,4;2,3;-1,2).
 'AT_base64' for a base64-encoded string.

• mandatory: specify "true" if the argument is mandatory.
• default: if mandatory=false, you can specify here a default value in case the argument is not present.
• argTypeDetails: see AT_enum above.
• bCanFail: if true, specify that it may be possible that the argument won't be of the type specified by argType (and then do not log this as a fatal error in the system, and return a standard exception to the player).

function isArg( $argName )

This is a useful method when you only want to check if an argument is present or not present in your AJAX request (and don't care about the value).

It returns "true" or "false" according to whether "argName" has been specified as an argument of the AJAX request or not.

Useful tip: retrieve a list of numbers

If your Javascript sends a list of integers separated by ";" (example: "1;2;3;4") as an argument, you can transform them into a PHP array with the following:

    public function playCards()
    {
        self::setAjaxMode();     

        $card_ids_raw = self::getArg( "card_ids", AT_numberlist, true );
        
        // Removing last ';' if exists
        if( substr( $card_ids_raw, -1 ) == ';' )
            $card_ids_raw = substr( $card_ids_raw, 0, -1 );
        if( $card_ids_raw == '' )
            $card_ids = array();
        else
            $card_ids = explode( ';', $card_ids_raw );

        $this->game->playCards( $card_ids );
        self::ajaxResponse( );
    }

Example pass array of Id's

If your Javascript sends a list of object denomated by alphanumerical tokenId, you can use AT_alphanum type and space as array separator:

    // sending 'card_ids' => "card_1 card_23 card_12"
    public function playCards()   {
        self::setAjaxMode();     

        $card_ids_raw = self::getArg( "card_ids", AT_alphanum, true );
        $card_ids_raw = trim($card_ids_raw);

        if( $card_ids_raw == '' )
            $card_ids = array();
        else
            $card_ids = explode( ' ', $card_ids_raw );

        $this->game->playCards( $card_ids );
        self::ajaxResponse( );
    }

Retrieving data from ajax call

Note that this is not possible to return any result from a player action: it should return nothing (action went fine) or an exception (action unsuccessful).

The typical way to implement this is using games states with game state arguments. Eventually, use player notifications.