Magento Structures

Block
This folder liability is View, if we use terms of classical MVC architecture. Blocks coordinate models with the
template files. The files in the folder load the data from database and transfer it to the templates in your theme
(.phtml files).

Model
In classical MVC, Models are used to connect to the database and process the data from and to it. Magento has
a different approach, which can be tricky at first look. Here is what they say:
“Most Magento Models can categorized in one of two ways. There’s a basic, ActiveRecord-like/one-object-one-
table Model, and there’s also an Entity Attribute Value (EAV) Model. Each Model also gets a Model
Collection. Collections are PHP objects used to hold a number of individual Magento Model instances. The
Magento team has implemented the PHP Standard Library interfaces of IteratorAggregate and Countable to
allow each Model type to have it’s own collection type. If you’re not familiar with the PHP Standard Library,
think of Model Collections as arrays that also have methods attached. Magento Models don’t contain any code
for connecting to the database. Instead, each Model uses two modelResource classes, (one read, one write), that
are used to communicate with the database server (via read and write adapter objects).”

Controllers
Controllers represent all business logic actions for the given request (dispatch(), preDispatch(), postDispatch()
methods) and delegate commands to other parts of the system.

etc
It contains all xml files that declare and configure behavior of all modules. Each module must have at least
config.xml and it’s a right place to declare all models, routers, blocks, helpers, etc.

Optionally this folder could have adminhtml.xml (grant permissions for your tabs/sections in backend menus)
and system.xml (creates this new section or specifies where it should be displayed in existing one).
Find more about xml structure here.

Helper
Here you can create methods that would be useful for your store in different ways. Helpers contain utility
methods, which are commonly used in the whole system. Methods, declared in helpers, can be called from any
template file or block, model, controller class by

1 Mage::helper('modulename/helpername')->methodName();

Each Module has a default Data Helper class Modulename/Helper/Data.php and we can call it as

1 Mage::helper('modulename')->methodName();

sql
Handles any custom database tables which will be used by the module and process all upgrades to the
extension.

etc/modules/Namespace_Modulename.xml

To tell Magento which modules should be used and where they are located, we need to create XML file in the
folder, from which it takes all xml files – etc/modules/