How can i execute an Observer after a controller Action?

Question

I need to execute my observer just after an actionController end or when paymentMethod is saved on database.

Answer 1

You can just use controller_action_postdispatch_<router_name>_<controller_name>_<action_name> formula to derive the event name. You can also do this for predispatch aswell (Just replace postdispatch with predispatch).

Core Example:

Observing Magento Checkout Onepage controller saveOrderAction on the Paypal module:

Mage_Checkout_OnepageController::saveOrderAction

<router_name>: checkout
<controller_name>: onepage
<action_name>: saveOrder

Using the previous formula to create the event name to observe we finally end up with:

Derived event name for our controller action method:

controller_action_postdispatch_checkout_onepage_saveOrder

Then in the etc/config.xml

<events>
    <controller_action_postdispatch_checkout_onepage_saveOrder>
        <observers>
             <hss_save_order_onepage>
                 <class>paypal/observer</class>
                 <method>setResponseAfterSaveOrder</method>
             </hss_save_order_onepage>
         </observers>
    </controller_action_postdispatch_checkout_onepage_saveOrder>
</events>

Getting the controller action in the Observer class:

/**
 * @param Varien_Event_Observer $observer
 */
public function setResponseAfterSaveOrder(Varien_Event_Observer $observer)
{
    /* @var $controller Mage_Core_Controller_Varien_Action */
    $controller = $observer->getEvent()->getData('controller_action');

    // Do stuff here
}