Plugin that almost works

you are probably echo-ing the content, instead of returning the content.

for example, in a plugin you must:

$this->return_data = 'your content';

and not:

echo 'your content';

Thanks for the reply, HD. I’m actually using neither one, but you’re close to the problem. The plugin uses curl to get the data. When I originally had $this->return_data = ‘your content’ I ended up with a resource error. When I removed it, the error went away and the content displayed fine. But even with it in there, I still end up with the data displaying above the header.

I assume that by following the API tutorial and having this:

var $return_data = "";

And having the curl statements within double quotes was creating the resource error. But every attempt to find a better way didn’t seem to help. Any thoughts on a way to have curl work within return_data?

Like I said, my php is limited…

Scott

Could you share the whole plugin (or at least the function in question) with us?

Sure thing. The EE template tags are:

{exp:Weather3} zip code {/exp:Weather3}

Here is the main part of the plugin:

class Weather3
{

var $return_data;

  function Weather3()
  {
    global $TMPL;

    $tagdata = $TMPL->tagdata;

        $tagdata = trim($tagdata);
        $tagdata = str_replace('\n','', $tagdata);
        $tagdata = str_replace('\r','', $tagdata);
        $tagdata = str_replace('\t','', $tagdata);
        $tagdata = str_replace('\x0B','', $tagdata);

    $ch = curl_init();

    curl_setopt ($ch, CURLOPT_URL, "http://www.mysite.com/weather_script_path&zipcode;=".$tagdata."");

    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERAGENT, "MozillaXYZ/1.0");
 
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);

    $output = curl_exec($ch);
 
    curl_close($ch);
 
    return $output;

  }

It pulls a three-day weather forecast from a weather database I installed on one site and displays it on a partner’s Web site.

For your constructor I think you need to utilize the $return_data variable (though I don’t think it’s required for other functions within your plugin class)

Try replacing this

return $output;

with this

$this->return_data = $output;

That didn’t do the trick, but when I put the php directly on an EE template and set the preferences to php and input, the header displayed correctly at the top.

I’m starting to think it has something to do with the passing of tag data from the template to the plugin.

Try this..

Note I haven’t actually tested this, I’m just going from memory…

{exp:Weather3 zip_code="12345"}

class Weather3
{

  var $return_data = '';

  function Weather3()
  {
    // get a reference to the ee super object
    $this->ee =& get_instance();
    
    // get parameters from the template (seems more logical than using tag data)
    $zip_code = (int)$this->ee->TMPL->fetch_param('zip_code');
    
    // do curl to weather service
    $ch = curl_init();
    // note the EE forum seems to put an extra semicolon in the middle of this line
    curl_setopt ($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'http://www.mysite.com/weather_script_path&zipcode;='.$zip_code);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERAGENT, 'MozillaXYZ/1.0');
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);
    
    $output = curl_exec($ch)
    curl_close($ch)
    
    // save the output to this variable
    $this->return_data = $output;
  }
}

😊

It’s important to note that your original code is for the 1.x branch of EE and Crescendo’s suggestion is for the 2.x branch.

What version of EE are you using?

Ah good point - I’m pretty new to EE development, was wondering where that global variable came from!

Quite right,I’m using 1.6.9. Unfortunately, I’m dealing with other issues in 2.1, so I’m not ready to switch yet.