Check if a user already made a submission with Doctrine- Symfony 3 - php

Question

I have 3 entities which are User, Problem and Submission. I'm trying to restrict a user from solving the same question more than once if that user already solved it. I created a method in User entity by checking the Submissions for each user. However I couldn't figure out a way to match the problem_id and user_id fields so I can see if the submission was correct or not.
Here are the entites;
Problem.php
class Problem
{
/**
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\Column(type="integer")
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=255, unique=True)
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid title")
*/
protected $title;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="text")
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid description")
*/
protected $description;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string")
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid value")
*/
protected $points;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string")
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid flag")
*/
protected $flag;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string")
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid value")
*/
protected $category;
/**
* #ORM\ManyToOne(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\User", inversedBy="problems")
* #ORM\JoinColumn(name="createdby", referencedColumnName="id")
*/
protected $createdby;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Submission", mappedBy="problem_id")
*/
protected $submissions;
/**
* #Gedmo\Slug(fields={"title"})
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=255, unique=false,)
*/
protected $slug;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="datetime")
*/
private $createdAt;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="datetime")
*/
private $updatedAt;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Discussion", mappedBy="problem")
*/
private $discussions;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="boolean")
*/
protected $isPublished = True;
}
Submission.php
class Submission
{
/**
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\Column(type="integer")
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #ORM\ManyToOne(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Problem", inversedBy="submissions")
* #ORM\JoinColumn(name="problem_id", referencedColumnName="id", onDelete="CASCADE")
*/
protected $problem_id;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="boolean")
*/
protected $correct = false;
/**
* #ORM\ManyToOne(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\User", inversedBy="submissions")
* #ORM\JoinColumn(name="user_id", referencedColumnName="id")
*/
protected $user_id;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string")
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Flag cannot be blank")
*/
protected $submission_flag;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="datetime")
*/
private $createdAt;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="datetime")
*/
private $updatedAt;
}
User.php
class User implements UserInterface
{
/**
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\Column(type="integer")
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=255, unique=true)
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid email address")
* #Assert\Email()
*/
private $username;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=255, unique=true)
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid email address")
*/
private $usrname;
/**
* #Assert\NotBlank()
* #Assert\Length(max=4096)
*/
private $plainPassword;
/**
* The below length depends on the "algorithm" you use for encoding
* the password, but this works well with bcrypt.
*
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=64)
*/
private $password;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=255, unique=true)
* #Assert\NotBlank(message="Please enter a valid name")
*/
private $fullname;
/**
* #var array
* #ORM\Column(name="roles", type="json_array")
*/
protected $roles;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Problem", mappedBy="createdby")
*/
protected $problems;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Feed", mappedBy="createdby")
*/
protected $feeds;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Comment", mappedBy="createdby")
*/
protected $comments;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="AppBundle\Entity\Submission", mappedBy="user_id")
*/
protected $submissions;
}

Answer 1

You may be able to try #UniqueConstraint on your Submission entity. Something like:
/**
* #Entity
* #Table(uniqueConstraints={#UniqueConstraint(name="unique_user_submission", columns={"name", "email"})})
*/
class Submission
{
}
I think that'll make those two fields a composite unique field.
http://doctrine-orm.readthedocs.io/projects/doctrine-orm/en/latest/reference/annotations-reference.html#annref-uniqueconstraint