We need to generate URLs pointing to the index and page actions of WebsiteController. Depending on where we need it, there are different ways for doing it, but the basics are the same. Let's list some methods that generate URLs.

CHtml::link() and some other CHtml methods, such as form, refresh, and ajaxLink, all accept URLs and are typically used in views. These use CHtml::normalizeUrl internally to resolve internal routes. Therefore, you should pass data in one of the following formats:

What is internal route? Each controller and its actions have corresponding routes. A format for a route is moduleID/controllerID/actionID. For example, the actionPage method of WebsiteController corresponds to the website/page route. To get a controller ID, you should take its name without the Controller postfix and make its first letter lowercase. To get an action ID, you should take the action method name without the action prefix and, again, make its first letter lowercase.

Parameters are the $_GET variables that will be passed to an action with an internal route specified. For example, if we want to create a URL to WebsiteController::actionIndex that passes the $_GET['name'] parameter to it, it can be done like this:

echo CHtml::link('Click me!', array('website/index', 'name' => 'Qiang'));

URLs are also helpful when using the controller. Inside the controller, you can use createUrl and createAbsoluteUrl to get both relative and absolute URLs:

class WebsiteController extends CController
{
   public function actionTest()
   {
      echo $this->createUrl('website/page', array('alias' => 'about'));
      echo '<br />';
      echo $this->createAbsoluteUrl('website/page', array('alias' => 'test'));
   }

   // the rest of the methods

}

As we have URL rules defined in the router configuration, we will get the following URLs:

Relative URLs can be used inside your application while absolute ones should be used for pointing to locations outside of your website (like other websites) or for linking to resources meant to be accessed from outside (RSS feeds, e-mails, and so on).

When you cannot get a controller instance, for example, when you implement a console application, you can use the application's methods:

echo Yii::app()->createUrl('website/page', 'alias' => 'about'),
echo Yii::app()->createAbsoluteUrl('website/page', 'alias' => 'test'),

The difference is that when using controller-specific methods, you can omit both controller and module names. In this case, the current module name and the current controller name are used:

class MyController extends CController
{
  public function actionIndex()
  {
    // As we're inside of controller, createUrl will assume that
    // URL is for current controller
    echo $this->createUrl('index'),
  }
}

All URL building tools we have reviewed internally use the CWebApplication:: createUrl method that calls CUrlManager::createUrl. It tries to apply routing rules one by one, starting from the top. The first matched rule is applied. If no rules are matched, then the default URL form is generated.

For further information, refer to the following URLs: