multiple modules in cakephp application

Question

I need to prepare three separate modules in cakephp. one is admin, hotel admin, guest. These three will be different kind of users having same login screen but internal layout will be totally separated.

Can we have three separate folder structure for all of them like three app folder or we need to use the routing (as mentioned here ) for these users which will result mixed controllers and that will difficult to manipulate.

Answer 1

You can create the modules as "plugins" and then they will have separate models, views, and controllers. The default routing for plugins is that they can be accessed through /plugin_name/controller_name/action. Plugins can even have layouts of their own etc. The main application in your case would be reduced to authenticating users and checking permissions.

More info:
1.3: http://book.cakephp.org/1.3/en/view/1111/Plugins
2.0: http://book.cakephp.org/2.0/en/plugins.html

I would use routing only if the three modules had basically the same controllers and models.

Answer 2

Combining prefix routing with multiple layouts should solve your problem. As Joep mentioned in the comments, the actions in your controllers follow a simple naming scheme admin_index(), hotel_admin_index() and guest_index() which makes it easy to organise your code.

You could use the following code in your AppController to handle switching between layouts (i.e. default.ctp, admin.ctp, and hotel_admin.ctp).

function beforeRender() {
  if (isset($this->params['prefix']) { 
    if ($this->params['prefix'] == 'admin') {
      $this->layout = 'admin';
    } else if ($this->params['prefix'] == 'hotel_admin')
      $this->layout = 'hotel_admin';
    }
  }
}

You can even take it a step further and separate all the static resources (i.e. /img/admin/new-blah.png)