Deleting multiple files - php

Question

I'm kinda stuck here, any help appreciated:
So I have a table with themes, and then sub-themes. Each theme has many sub-themes, and I want to be able to destroy a theme and all sub-themes goes along.
I did this with this controller:
public function destroy()
{
$comtheme = Theme::findOrFail(request('idDelTCom'));
$comtheme->delete();
$comfiles = Subtheme::where('comtheme_id', '=', request('idDelTCom'));
$comfiles->delete();
return back();
}
Which is working. My problem is the following:
Each Sub-theme has files associated. When I delete a single sub-theme, I can delete the file using:
unlink(storage_path('app/public/com/checklists/'.$file));
I've tried doing the same, and it won't work. I figure the problem is with my query, but I can't wrap around what I have to do here...
If I can't work this out I'll just prevent the deletion of a Theme until all sub-themes are deleted, but it would be better to just delete all.
Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

Use a on observer on your Theme model. There are many ways to implement this but I prefer to declare it in the model class itself, so in the class for the Theme model put this:
protected static function boot()
{
parent::boot();
static::observe(ThemeObserver::class);
}
Of course there would be a use statement pointing to your ThemeObserver class up top, place the class where ever you like in the project, with your model or a dedicated observer directory.
In the ThemeObserver class you'll want an event for deleting like this:
public function deleting(Theme $theme)
{
// delete subthemes here
}
You can set up a similar observer for your subthemes where you delete the files associated with them or just do it here.
https://laravel.com/docs/5.7/eloquent#observers

Answer 2

I figured it out. I know I might not have asked the question the right way, so thanks for the help anyway!
The problem was I was trying to delete several files, and my unlink code wasn't expecting a colletion or a builder obviously. I got it working like this:
public function destroy()
{
$comfiles= Comfile::where('comtheme_id', '=', request('idDelTCom'))->get();
foreach($comfiles as $comfile){
$file = $comfile->file_name;
unlink(storage_path('app/public/com/checklists/'.$file));
}
$comfileDel = Comfile::where('comtheme_id', '=', request('idDelTCom'));
$comfileDel->delete();
$comtheme= Comtheme::findOrFail(request('idDelTCom'));
$comtheme->delete();
return back();
}
So I get a collection of the data I want to delete, run a foreach loop to delete each file in there. Then I run a builder of the same data to delete it, and off we go.