How to include a class in PHP

You can use either of the following:

include "class.twitter.php";

or

require "class.twitter.php";

Using require (or require_once if you want to ensure the class is only loaded once during execution) will cause a fatal error to be raised if the file doesn't exist, whereas include will only raise a warning. See http://php.net/require and http://php.net/include for more details


I suggest you also take a look at __autoload.
This will clean up the code of requires and includes.


Your code should be something like

require_once('class.twitter.php');

$t = new twitter;
$t->username = 'user';
$t->password = 'password';

$data = $t->publicTimeline();

Include a class example with the use keyword from Command Line Interface:

PHP Namespaces don't work on the commandline unless you also include or require the php file. When the php file is sitting in the webspace where it is interpreted by the php daemon then you don't need the require line. All you need is the 'use' line.

  1. Create a new directory /home/el/bin

  2. Make a new file called namespace_example.php and put this code in there:

    <?php
    require '/home/el/bin/mylib.php';
    use foobarwhatever\dingdong\penguinclass;

    $mypenguin = new penguinclass();
    echo $mypenguin->msg();
?>

  3. Make another file called mylib.php and put this code in there:

    <?php
namespace foobarwhatever\dingdong;
class penguinclass 
{
    public function msg() {
        return "It's a beautiful day chris, come out and play! " . 
               "NO!  *SLAM!*  taka taka taka taka."; 
    }   
}
?>

  4. Run it from commandline like this:

    el@apollo:~/bin$ php namespace_example.php

  5. Which prints:

    It's a beautiful day chris, come out and play!
NO!  *SLAM!*  taka taka taka taka

See notes on this in the comments here: http://php.net/manual/en/language.namespaces.importing.php

Tags:

Php

Include

Require

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