How to get the variables in routing in zend framework 1.12

Question

I am new to routing in zf. I don't understand some terms in route

    $route = new Zend_Controller_Router_Route(
    'author/:username',
     array(
    'controller' => 'profile',
    'action'     => 'userinfo'
      )
    );

$router->addRoute('user', $route);

How do we get :username here? from where do we get this?

Answer 1

Username here is parameter pass by the user. So correct link using this route will be http://somepage.com/author/John. In your controller you can get this variable just like POST and GET variables - $this->getParam('author');

If you want to allow user use link without parameter (default parameter) you can add to array - 'author' => null (i usually use this in pagination)