[EXPORTING] Allow state name to state id conversion

I've been using workflow extensively in a project, and I have found that prograramtically changing states using sids becomes quickly unreadable and unmaintainable, not to mention error-prone.

I have been using the following helper functions to enhance code readability.

/**
 * Return the sid of a state by node type
 *
 * Each node type has a workflow (wid) associated with it, and each wid has
 * states associated with it. Do the matching and return the relevant sid.
 * NOTE: this function is case sensitive. It might be sensible to relax this
 *       requirement if it is a problem.
 *
 * @param $type
 *   The node type
 * @param $state
 *   The state textual description
 * @return
 *   The state ID - sid
 */
function workflow_get_sid($type, $state) {
  static $states;

  if (!isset($states)) {
    $states[] = array();
    $result = db_query("SELECT wtm.type type, ws.state state, ws.sid sid FROM {workflow_states} ws NATURAL JOIN {workflow_type_map} wtm");
    while ($row = db_fetch_object($result)) {
      $states[$row->type][$row->state] = $row->sid;
    }
  }

  return $states[$type][$state];
}

/**
 * like workflow_get_sid() but for arrays
 *
 * @param $t_states
 *   an array of the form:
 *   array(
 *     'node type1' => array('state1', 'state2', ...),
 *     'node type2' => array('state1', 'state2', ...)
 *   );
 * @return
 *   a flat array of sids
 */
function workflow_get_sids($t_states) {
  $sids = array();
  foreach ($t_states as $type => $states) {
    foreach ($states as $state) {
      $sids[] = workflow_get_sid($type, $state);
    }
  }
  return $sids;
}

Example usages are:

• check state:
  

    $state = module_invoke('workflow', 'node_current_state', $node);
    if ($state == workflow_get_sid('product', 'Pending')) {
      // do something
    }
  

• execute a transition:

    module_invoke('workflow', 'execute_transition', $node, workflow_get_sid('product', 'Shipped'), 'Product was shipped');
  

• look for nodes with specified states:

    $states = array(
      'product' => array('In Progress', 'Pending'),
      'blog' => array('Active', 'Rejected'),
      'article' => array('Pending')
    );
    $sids = workflow_get_sids($states);
    $result = db_query('SELECT nid FROM {workflow_node} WHERE sid IN ('. implode(',', $sids)  .')');
    while ($obj = db_fetch_object($result)) {
      // do something
    }
  

After a little while, this became so convenient, that I didn't care about the extra typing.

If you like this idea, let me know, I'll make a proper patch out of it.

Note: the above code was written for the D5.x version. I have not adapted this to D6 yet - if there are any changes, I'll incorporate them in the patch