Unable to include Collection of Entities inside API POST-call - php

Question

The error in question:
Entity of type App\Entity\Nutt is missing an assigned ID for field 'squirrel'.
The identifier generation strategy for this entity requires the ID field to be populated before EntityManager#persist() is called.
If you want automatically generated identifiers instead you need to adjust the metadata mapping accordingly.
I'm perfectly able to call the api POST to add a Squirrel entity into the database.
And using the id of this Squirrel, I can preform the POST call for the Nutt entity with the result being a correctly related record in the Nutt tabel.
What I can't seem to get working, is allowing the Squirrel api call to include the related collection of Nutts I want to insert in the same api call.
What am I doing wrong?
The JSON call:
{
"name": "Jake",
"nutts": [
{
"size": 10,
"color": "blue"
}
]
}
Entity Squirrel
/**
* #ORM\Entity
* #ORM\Table(name="squirrel")
*/
class Squirrel {
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="integer")
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=100)
* #Assert\NotBlank()
*
*/
private $name;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="App\Entity\Nutt", mappedBy="squirrel", cascade={"persist", "remove"})
*/
private $nutts;
public function __construct()
{
$this->nutts = new \Doctrine\Common\Collections\ArrayCollection();
}
public function getId()
{
return $this->id;
}
public function setId($id)
{
$this->id = $id;
}
public function getName()
{
return $this->name;
}
public function setName($name)
{
$this->name = $name;
}
public function getNutts(): ?Collection
{
return $this->nutts;
}
public function setNutts(Collection $nutts)
{
foreach ($nutts as $nutt)
{
$this->nutts->add($nutt);
}
}
public function addNutt(Nutt $nutt): Squirrel
{
$this->nutts->add($nutt);
return $this;
}
}
Entity Squirrel Is updated.
setNutts has been changed to:
public function setNutts(Collection $nutts)
{
foreach ($nutts as $nutt)
{
$nutt->setSquirrel($this);
$this->nutts->add($nutt);
}
}
Entity Nutt
/**
* #ORM\Entity
* #ORM\Table(name="nutt")
*/
class Nutt {
/**
* #ORM\ManyToOne(targetEntity="App\Entity\Squirrel", inversedBy="nutts")
* #ORM\Id
*/
private $squirrel;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="integer")
* #ORM\Id
*/
private $size;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="text")
* #Assert\NotBlank()
*/
private $color;
/**
* #return Squirrel|null
*/
public function getSquirrel(): ?Squirrel
{
return $this->squirrel;
}
/**
* #param Squirrel|null $squirrel
* #return $this
*/
public function setSquirrel(?Squirrel $squirrel): self
{
$this->squirrel = $squirrel;
return $this;
}
//getters and setters for the rest
}
Entity Nutt has been updated.
Property $squirrel has its id notation removed as it is a relation:
/**
* #ORM\ManyToOne(targetEntity="App\Entity\Squirrel", inversedBy="nutts")
*/
private $squirrel;
SquirrelController
/**
* Squirrel controller.
* #Route("/api", name="api_")
*/
class SquirrelController extends AbstractFOSRestController
{
/**
* Lists all Squirrels.
* #Rest\Get("/squirrels")
* #return Response
*/
public function getSquirrelAction()
{
$repository = $this->getDoctrine()->getRepository(Squirrel::class);
$squirrels = $repository->findall();
return $this->handleView($this->view($squirrels));
}
/**
* Create Squirrel.
* #Rest\Post("/squirrel")
*
* #return Response
*/
public function postSquirrelAction(Request $request)
{
$squirrel = new Squirrel();
$form = $this->createForm(SquirrelType::class, $squirrel);
$data = json_decode($request->getContent(), true);
$form->submit($data);
if ($form->isSubmitted() && $form->isValid()) {
$em = $this->getDoctrine()->getManager();
$em->persist($squirrel);
$em->flush();
return $this->handleView($this->view(['status' => 'ok'], Response::HTTP_CREATED));
}
return $this->handleView($this->view($form->getErrors()));
}
}
And my current focus
The Squirrel Form
class SquirrelType extends AbstractType
{
public function buildForm(FormBuilderInterface $builder, array $options)
{
$builder
->add('name')
->add(
'nutts',
CollectionType::class, [
'entry_type' => NuttType::class,
'allow_add' => true,
'by_reference' => false
])
->add('save', SubmitType::class);
}
public function configureOptions(OptionsResolver $resolver)
{
$resolver->setDefaults(array(
'data_class' => Squirrel::class,
'csrf_protection' => false
));
}
}
There is a nutt form but it works fine.
Question has been solved by #mel in a comment

Answer 1

The Id annotation declares the column as a primary key, so it becomes mandatory. But it's not needed in this case, since squirrel is a relation.
The error itself also hints at the field being null when saving the entity, so setSquirrel is not being called.
You can remove the annotation from size as well.