ChamberOrchestra View Bundle

A Symfony bundle that provides a typed view layer for JSON API responses. Define response shapes as PHP classes, return them from controllers, and let the bundle handle serialization automatically — no manual JsonResponse construction needed.

Built for Symfony 8.0 and PHP 8.5+, the bundle eliminates boilerplate in REST API controllers by introducing view models with automatic property binding, collection mapping, and production-ready cache warming.

Key Features

• Typed view models — define JSON response structures as PHP classes with typed properties
• Automatic property binding — BindView maps domain object properties to view properties via reflection
• Collection mapping — IterableView transforms arrays and iterables with typed element views
• Null stripping — null values are automatically excluded from serialized JSON output
• Build-time cache warming — pre-computed metadata and property mappings eliminate reflection overhead in production
• Build-versioned caching — cache files are tied to container.build_id for zero-downtime deployments
• Doctrine proxy support — transparent lazy-load initialization before property access

Requirements

• PHP 8.5+
• Symfony 8.0 components (http-kernel, serializer, property-access, dependency-injection, config, framework-bundle)
• doctrine/common ^3.5

Installation

composer require chamber-orchestra/view-bundle:8.0.*

Enable the bundle in config/bundles.php:

return [
    // ...
    ChamberOrchestra\ViewBundle\ChamberOrchestraViewBundle::class => ['all' => true],
];

Quick Start

Define a view model that maps properties from a domain object:

use ChamberOrchestra\ViewBundle\Attribute\BindsFrom;
use ChamberOrchestra\ViewBundle\Attribute\Type;
use ChamberOrchestra\ViewBundle\View\BindView;
use ChamberOrchestra\ViewBundle\View\IterableView;

#[BindsFrom(User::class)]
final class UserView extends BindView
{
    public string $id;
    public string $name;

    #[Type(ImageView::class)]
    public IterableView $images;

    public function __construct(User $user)
    {
        parent::__construct($user);
    }
}

final class ImageView extends BindView
{
    public string $path;
}

Return the view from a controller — the bundle converts it to a JsonResponse automatically:

#[Route('/user/me', methods: ['GET'])]
final class GetMeAction
{
    public function __invoke(): UserView
    {
        return new UserView($this->getUser());
    }
}

ViewSubscriber converts any ViewInterface result into a JsonResponse. Non-view results pass through unchanged.

View Types

View	Purpose
ResponseView	Base response with HTTP status (200) and Content-Type: application/json headers
DataView	Wraps any view or array under a "data" key
BindView	Maps matching properties from a source object using reflection
IterableView	Maps collections via a callback or view class string
KeyValueView	Produces associative array output for metadata blocks

BindView Property Binding

BindView uses BindUtils to synchronize properties between source objects and view instances. It handles:

• Built-in PHP types and custom objects
• ViewInterface subclasses (auto-constructed)
• IterableView properties with #[Type(ViewClass::class)] attribute for typed collections
• Skips union types and incompatible type pairs

Architecture

Request/Response Flow

1. SetVersionSubscriber (priority 256) — injects the DI-managed BindUtils instance into BindView via BindView::setBindUtils()
2. Controller returns a ViewInterface object
3. ViewSubscriber — detects ViewInterface results, wraps non-ResponseViewInterface in DataView, serializes to JSON via ViewNormalizer

View Auto-Discovery

Views implementing ViewInterface are automatically tagged with chamber_orchestra.view via #[AutoconfigureTag]. The ViewPass compiler pass collects these classes and passes them to cache warmers for pre-computation.

Performance Optimizations

The bundle includes a two-phase optimization strategy for production environments:

Phase 1: Runtime Metadata Caching

• ViewMetadataFactory caches property metadata in memory
• Direct property access eliminates repeated reflection calls
• 30-50% faster normalization on repeated calls

Phase 2: Build-Time Cache Warming

• ViewMetadataCacheWarmer pre-computes view property metadata at build time
• BindUtilsCacheWarmer pre-computes property mappings (uses #[BindsFrom] for targeted source classes, falls back to N² pairs)
• Generated opcache-optimized PHP files stored in kernel.share_dir
• Cache files are versioned with container.build_id for safe deployments
• 60-80% reduction in reflection overhead on production requests
• Automatic fallback to reflection when warmed cache is unavailable

Cache Configuration

BindUtils is registered as a DI service with $buildId, $debug, and $shareDir constructor arguments. When APP_DEBUG=false, property accessor caching is enabled with a 24-hour lifetime. SetVersionSubscriber injects the configured instance into BindView on each request.

Warm the cache in production:

bin/console cache:warmup --env=prod

This generates build-versioned files in the shared cache directory:

• View property metadata (nullability, defaults, types)
• View-to-view property mappings for BindUtils

Benchmarks

PHPBench benchmarks are included to measure serialization performance and cache impact:

composer bench                               # Run all benchmarks
vendor/bin/phpbench run --report=default     # Run with default report

Benchmark classes: BindUtilsBench, CacheWarmupBench, NormalizationBench.

Development

composer install          # Install dependencies
composer test             # Run all tests (93 tests, 328 assertions)
./bin/phpunit             # Run tests directly
./bin/phpunit --filter X  # Run specific test class or method

License

MIT