Performance Optimization

Complete guide for optimizing Data Helpers performance.

Introduction

Data Helpers provides multiple optimization techniques:

• ✅ Validation Caching - 198x faster validation
• ✅ Lazy Loading - Defer expensive operations
• ✅ Type Cast Caching - Reuse cast instances
• ✅ Path Compilation - Pre-compile dot-notation paths

Enable Validation Caching

Laravel

php artisan dto:cache

Symfony

bin/console dto:cache

Plain PHP

use event4u\DataHelpers\SimpleDTO\Cache\ValidationCache;

ValidationCache::enable();
ValidationCache::warmup();

Performance Impact

Without Cache:  5,000 validations/sec
With Cache:     990,000 validations/sec

Improvement: 198x faster

Use Lazy Loading

use event4u\DataHelpers\SimpleDTO\Attributes\Lazy;

class UserDTO extends SimpleDTO
{
    public function __construct(
        public readonly string $name,

        #[Lazy]
        public readonly ?array $posts = null,
    ) {}
}

Optimize Type Casting

config/data-helpers.php

return [
    'casts' => [
        'cache_instances' => true,
    ],
];

Avoid Deep Nesting

// ✅ Good - 2-3 levels
$dto->address->city;

// ❌ Bad - too deep
$dto->company->department->team->manager->address->city;

Use Specific Types

// ✅ Good
public readonly int $age;

// ❌ Bad
public readonly mixed $age;

Batch Operations

// ✅ Good
$dtos = DataCollection::make($users, UserDTO::class);

// ❌ Bad
foreach ($users as $user) {
    $dtos[] = UserDTO::fromModel($user);
}

Memory Optimization

// Use chunking
User::chunk(1000, function($users) {
    $dtos = DataCollection::make($users, UserDTO::class);
});

Best Practices

• Enable validation caching in production
• Use lazy loading for expensive operations
• Enable cast caching
• Avoid deep nesting (max 3 levels)
• Use specific types instead of mixed
• Use batch operations
• Use chunking for large datasets

See Also

• Performance Benchmarks - Detailed benchmarks
• Lazy Properties - Lazy loading guide