Static Filter

If it is inconvenient to load a given filter class and create an instance of the filter, you can use StaticFilter with it's method execute() as an alternative invocation style. The first argument of this method is a data input value that you would pass to the filter() method. The second argument is a string, which corresponds to the basename of the filter class, relative to the Zend\Filter namespace. The execute() method automatically loads the class, creates an instance, and applies the filter() method to the data input.

echo StaticFilter::execute('&', 'HtmlEntities');

You can also pass an array of constructor arguments, if they are needed for the filter class:

echo StaticFilter::execute(
    '"',
    'HtmlEntities',
    ['quotestyle' => ENT_QUOTES]
);

The static usage can be convenient for invoking a filter ad hoc, but if you have the need to run a filter for multiple inputs, it's more efficient to create an instance of the filter and invoke it. instance of the filter object and calling its filter() method.

Additionally, filter chains allow you to instantiate and run multiple filters on demand to process sets of input data.

Using custom Filters

You can set and receive the FilterPluginManager for the StaticFilter to amend the standard filter classes:

$pluginManager = StaticFilter::getPluginManager()
    ->setInvokableClass('myNewFilter', 'MyCustom\Filter\MyNewFilter');

StaticFilter::setPluginManager(new MyFilterPluginManager());

This is useful when adding custom filters to be used by the StaticFilter.