updating several records with one request in laravel - php

Some quick context:
I have a sql table and a eloquent model for JobCards and each JobCard has several Operations belonging to it. I have a table and model for Operations. The users of my application browse and edit JobCards, but when I say editing a Jobcard this can include editing Operations associated with a JobCard. I have a page where a user can edit the Operations for a certain JobCard, I submit the the data as an array of Operations.
I want a clean way to update the data for the Operations of a JobCard. There are 3 different actions I may or may not need to do:
Update an existing Operation with new data
Create a new Operation
Delete an Operatation
I tried dealing with the first 2 and things are getting messy already. I still need a way of deleting an Operation if it is not present in the array sent in the request.
Heres my code:
public function SaveOps(Request $a)
{
$JobCardNum = $a -> get('JobCardNum');
$Ops = $a -> get('Ops');
foreach ($Ops as $Op) {
$ExistingOp = JobCardOp::GetOp($JobCardNum, $Op['OpNum'])->first();
if(count($ExistingOp)==0) {
$NewOp = new JobCardOp;
$NewOp -> JobCardNum = $JobCardNum;
$NewOp -> fill($Op);
$NewOp -> save();
$this->UpdateNextOpStatus($JobCardNum, $NewOp);
}
else {
$ExistingOp -> fill($Op);
$ExistingOp -> save();
}
}
Can anyone help with the deletion part and/or help make my code tidier.

This is how your method should look like. Please note that, I added a new method getCache($JobCardNum) this method will get an array of operations per job card (assuming that your model is designed to be related this way) this method will go to the DB only once, to get all the Operations that you need for this method call instead of getting them one-by-one (in the foreach loop), this way you make sure that the expensive call to the DB is done only once, on the other hand you got your JobCard's operations in the form of an array ready to compare with the new ones (coming in the request), the return of this method will be in the form of (key=>value with the key being the operation number and the value being the operation object it self).
/**
* This function will get you an array of current operations in the given job card
* #param $JobCardNum
* #return array
*/
public function getCache($JobCardNum)
{
/**
* asuming that the relation in your model is built that way. if not you should then
* use JobCardOp::all(); (Not recommended because it will get a lot of unnecessary
* data )
*/
$ExistingOps = JobCardOp::where('job_card_id', '=', $JobCardNum);
$opCache = array();
foreach ($ExistingOps as $Op) {
$opCache[(string)$Op->OpNum] = $Op;
}
return $opCache;
}
public function SaveOps(Request $a)
{
$strOpNum = (string)$Op['OpNum'];
$JobCardNum = $a->get('JobCardNum');
$Ops = $a->get('Ops');
$opCache = $this->getCache($JobCardNum);
foreach ($Ops as $Op) {
if (!isset($opCache[$strOpNum])) {
$NewOp = new JobCardOp;
$NewOp->JobCardNum = $JobCardNum;
$NewOp->fill($Op);
$NewOp->save();
$this->UpdateNextOpStatus($JobCardNum, $NewOp);
} else {
$ExistingOp = $opCache[$strOpNum];
$ExistingOp->fill($Op);
$ExistingOp->save();
}
unset($opCache[$strOpNum]);
}
/*
* at this point any item in the $opCache array must be deleted because it was not
* matched in the previous for loop that looped through the requested operations :)
*/
foreach ($opCache as $op) {
$op->delete();
}
}

Related

How can I take a big amount of GET parameters and filter a query depending on them cleanly?

I have this controller for a RESTful API I am building in Laravel Lumen which takes a relatively big amount of parameters and parses them into where queries, and data is fetched depending on if they were provided. For example,
GET /nodes?region=California
GET /nodes?ip=127.0.0.1
I am currently taking them in the constructor, building an array of the parameters (since I couldn't figure out how to get the raw get array in Lumen and it would be inconvenient because I already have other parameters there), and filtering out the null values (I am setting values to null if they are not in the query).
Now, when it comes to filtering the values each in the array, I am doing it by a foreach array. This is the cleanest way I could figure out to do it, without too much code (I don't want to make my controllers too fat.).
Is there any other way to do this cleanly, maybe with separation of functions/classes?
Here is my constructor code:
/**
* Get some values before using functions.
*
* #param Request $request Instance of request.
*/
public function __construct(Request $request)
{
$this->offset = (int) $request->input('offset', 0);
// TODO: I'm not sure how to implement this, code in question
$this->filters = [
'region' => $request->input('region', null),
'name' => $request->input('name', null),
'ip' => $request->input('ip', null)
];
$this->filters = array_filter($this->filters, function ($v) {
return !is_null($v);
});
// Set a sane SQL limit.
$this->limit = 5;
$this->request = $request;
}
And the controller code:
/**
* List all nodes.
*
* #return [string] [JSON containing list of nodes, if sorted.]
*/
public function all()
{
try {
// use filters provided
$data = Nodes::limit($this->limit)->offset($this->offset);
foreach ($this->filters as $filter => $value) {
$data->where($filter, $value);
}
$data = $data->get();
$response = $this->respond($data);
} catch (\Exception $e) {
$response = $this->respondServerError('Could not retrieve data from database.');
}
return $response;
}
So any time I have to do filtering of a resource-list in an API, here's how I do it.
First off though, before I begin, a quick tip concerning getting the Request object when you're in your controller method: If you add Request $request as a parameter for your all() function, you will have access to the $request variable there, same as your constructor. So the complete signature would be public function all(Request $request). Controller methods have the same magic dependency injection that other class constructors get in Laravel/Lumen. Alternatively, in your function you can always ask the app() function to give you an object of a specific class. Because the Request object is bound in the Container to just 'request', you can ask for the full class name, or just 'request': $request = app('request');
So once I have my request object, inside my controller method I like to go through each filter either as a group, or one-by-one, depending on how complex each filter is. Sometimes filters are complex, like a list of comma-separated IDs that need to be exploded into an array. If it's just simple string filters though, I tend to throw the list into an array and run through that.
Here's an example function to illustrate some ideas:
public function getIndex(Request $request)
{
//Create a User object to append WHERE clauses onto
$user = app('App\Models\User');
//Run through our simple text fields
foreach(['first_name', 'last_name', 'region', 'ip'] as $field) {
if ($request->has($field)) {
$user->where($field, $request->input($field));
}
}
//This field uses a LIKE match, handle it separately
if ($request->has('email')) {
$user->where('email', LIKE, '%' . $request->input('email') . '%');
}
//This field is a list of IDs
if ($request->has('id')) {
$ids = explode(',', $request->input('id'));
$user->whereIn('id', $ids);
}
//Use pagination
$users = $user->paginate(25);
/**
* Continue with the rest of response formatting below here
*/
}
You'll notice I used the paginate function to limit my results. When building an API endpoint that lists resources, you're going to want to put in your headers (my preference) or the response body information on how to get the first, previous, next, and last page of results. The Pagination feature in Laravel makes that easy, as it can construct most of the links using the links() method.
Unfortunately, you need to tell it what filter parameters were passed in the request so it can make sure it adds those to the links it generates. Otherwise you'll get links back without your filters, which doesn't do the client very much good for paging.
So here's a more complete example of recording filter parameters so they can be appended onto pagination links:
public function getIndex(Request $request)
{
//Create a User object to append WHERE clauses onto
$user = app('App\Models\User');
//List of filters we found to append to links later
$appends = [];
//Run through our simple text fields
foreach(['first_name', 'last_name', 'region', 'ip'] as $field) {
if ($request->has($field)) {
$appends[$field] = $request->input($field);
$user->where($field, $request->input($field));
}
}
//This field uses a LIKE match, handle it separately
if ($request->has('email')) {
$appends['email'] = $request->input('email');
$user->where('email', LIKE, '%' . $request->input('email') . '%');
}
//This field is a list of IDs
if ($request->has('id')) {
$appends['id'] = $request->input('id');
$ids = explode(',', $request->input('id'));
$user->whereIn('id', $ids);
}
//Use pagination
$users = $user->paginate(25);
//Make sure we append our filter parameters onto the pagination object
$users->appends($appends);
//Now calling $users->links() will return the correct links with the right filter info
/**
* Continue with the rest of response formatting below here
*/
}
Pagination documentation can be found here: https://laravel.com/docs/5.2/pagination
For an example of how pagination linking can be awesomely done, check out Github's API documentation: https://developer.github.com/v3/#pagination
In the end it's not too far off from what you were doing, conceptually. The advantage here is that you move the code into the method that needs it, instead of having it run in your constructor every single time the controller is initialized, even if a different method will be called.
Hope that helps!

Different type of object for admin and user

I am building an intranet application and i want to be able to have 2 different types of users a regular user and an admin user. I am trying to figure out what would be the best way to go about doing this. Either to have one object for admin type stuff and then one object for user type stuff. Or combine both of that into one object. But i keep getting stuck and not sure how to go about doing that, or if that is even the best way.
Lets say I have the following situations:
1. query the db to get all tasks for all projects that are active.
Admin Query
2. query the db to get all tasks for all projects that are due today and active.
Admin Query
3. Query the db to get all tasks for a specific project that are active.
Admin Query
User Query
4. Query the db to get all tasks for a specific project that are active and due today.
Admin Query
User Query
5. Query the db to get all tasks for a specific project.
Admin Query
User Query
6. Query the db to get all tasks for a specific project, with different status specified.
Admin Query
7. Any one of those queries has an optional parameter to either get the count or the data.
I started the following object but now im a little stuck as which route to go:
public function getTasks($status, $project, $type = "count", $duetoday = NULL)
{
try
{
if($duetoday != NULL){
$today = date("Y-m-d");
$stmt = $this->db->prepare("SELECT * FROM tasks WHERE status=:status
AND $project=:project AND duedate BETWEEN :duedate
AND :duedate");
$stmt->execute(array(':status'=>$status,':project'=>$project,':duedate'=>$today));
}else{
$stmt = $this->db->prepare("SELECT * FROM tasks WHERE status=:status
AND $project=:project");
$stmt->execute(array(':status'=>$status,':project'=>$project));
}
$tasks=$stmt->fetch(PDO::FETCH_ASSOC);
if($stmt->rowCount() > 0)
{
if($type == "count"){
return $stmt->rowCount();
}else{
return $tasks;
}
}else{
return false;
}
}
catch(PDOException $e)
{
echo $e->getMessage();
}
}
I will start with some words about the single responsibility principle. Basically, this means that an object and it's behaviors should have one responsibility. Here, I think your getTasks method is a good opportunity to refactor some code into better object oriented code.
There are actually many things it is doing:
Generate sql
Execute a query
Control the flow of the program
The method generating sql should not have to worry about it's execution, and the method executing it should not have to worry about getting it. This, as a side effect, will also reduce the nesting in a single method.
There is a lot of code to write, which I'll let you do, but if you create classes that implements those interfaces and a controller to use them, you should be able to get through this and write easier to maintain / refactor code:
interface SqlGenerating {
/**
* #param array $params
* #return string
*/
public function makeSql(array $params);
/**
* #param array $params
* #return array
*/
public function makeValues(array $params);
}
interface DBAccessing {
public function __construct(\PDO $pdo);
/**
* #param string $sql
* #param array $values
* #return PDOStatement
*/
public function getStmt($sql, array $values = []);
}
class Controller {
public function __construct(SqlGenerating $sqlGenerator, DBAccessing $dbAccess) {
// associate to private properties
}
public function getTasks($status, $project, $type = "count", $duetoday = null) {
// this function will use the sqlGenerator and the dbAccess to query the db
// this function knows to return the count or the actual rows
}
}
If you haven't already, this is a good time to learn about type-hinting in functions. This requires your function to be passed an object (or an array) to be assured of the behavior of the function. Also, you will notice that I type-hinted the interfaces into the controller. This is to actually be able to switch classes if ever you need a different one to manage sql and db access.

Doctrine2: Syncing Collections / Adding multiple Elements of which some might already exist

So i have a string, representing several objects (tags in this case)
i.e.: "php,mysql,doctrine2"
Let's say my database already has "php" and "doctrine2".
Now i want the best way to add the missing elemets (in this case mysql).
Should i create an object for every element and just use persist/sync or something, or is there a better way?
I need all the objects at the end anyway to add them to a new object (with a simple many-to-many relation) anyway.
I'd be happy about any suggestions.
1) Pull out all your tag names with a single query into an array
2) Use array_filter along with a closure to detect tags not present in the dataset
3) Create an insert for the new tags
$currentTags = getCurrentTagsArray();
$newTags = explode(',', 'php,mysql,doctrine2');
$newTagsToSave = array_filter($currentTags, function($item) use ($newTags){
if (in_array($item, $newTags))
{
return false;
}
return true;
});
Or...
You can use Doctrine 2's ArrayCollection wrapper (\Doctrine\Common\Collections\ArrayCollection()) it has pretty much the same implementation above as a filter method (you still need to pass the closure).
$myCollection->filter($closure);
I had a similar problem where I had to synchronize an entity collection with an external source. However, my problem required not only additions, but also updates and deletes. I used code to diff the ArrayCollection with another array, and call CRUD methods add based on the differences. As far as I can tell from the docs, doctrine doesn't natively handle this. Average performance should be O(n) but takes some memory.
/**
* #param array $source - the array we are starting with
* #param array $new - the array we want to end with
* #param $fnHash - function used to determine object equality, not based on object id
* #param $fnUpdate - function to perform update of existing object, takes current object and new object as params
* #param $fnAdd - function to perform insert
* #param $fnDelete - function to perform delete
*/
public static function syncArrays(array $source, array $new,
$fnHash, $fnUpdate, $fnAdd, $fnDelete)
{
// make modifiable array copies mapped by hashes of the elements
$sourceKeys = array_map($fnHash, $source);
$hasKeys =count($sourceKeys) > 0;
$newarray = ($hasKeys) ? array_combine(array_map($fnHash, $new), $new) : $new;
if ($hasKeys) { // true => may have updates or deletes
$sourcearray = array_combine($sourceKeys, $source);
// updates
foreach ($sourceKeys as $hashkey) {
if (isset($sourcearray[$hashkey]) && isset($newarray[$hashkey])) {
$fnUpdate($sourcearray[$hashkey], $newarray[$hashkey]);
unset($sourcearray[$hashkey]);
unset($newarray[$hashkey]);
}
}
// deletes
foreach ($sourcearray as $entity) {
$fnDelete($entity);
}
}
//adds
foreach ($newarray as $entity) {
$fnAdd($entity);
}
}
The way I call it to update my doctrine association $parentEntity->getPayments() is:
ArrayHelper::syncArrays($parentEntity->getPayments()->toArray(), $newPayments,
function($entity) {return $a->getName();}, // hash function
function($current, $new) {
$current->setTotal($new->getTotal()); // update function
},
function($a) use ($parent, $manager) {
$parent->addVendorPaymentObject($a); // add function
$manager->persist($a);
},
function($a) use ($manager) { // delete function
$manager->remove($a);
}
);

How do one use ACL to filter a list of domain-objects according to a certain user's permissions (e.g. EDIT)?

When using the ACL implementation in Symfony2 in a web application, we have come across a use case where the suggested way of using the ACLs (checking a users permissions on a single domain object) becomes unfeasible. Thus, we wonder if there exists some part of the ACL API we can use to solve our problem.
The use case is in a controller that prepares a list of domain objects to be presented in a template, so that the user can choose which of her objects she wants to edit. The user does not have permission to edit all of the objects in the database, so the list must be filtered accordingly.
This could (among other solutions) be done according to two strategies:
1) A query filter that appends a given query with the valid object ids from the present user's ACL for the object(or objects). I.e:
WHERE <other conditions> AND u.id IN(<list of legal object ids here>)
2) A post-query filter that removes the objects the user does not have the correct permissions for after the complete list has been retrieved from the database. I.e:
$objs = <query for objects>
$objIds = <getting all the permitted obj ids from the ACL>
for ($obj in $objs) {
if (in_array($obj.id, $objIds) { $result[] = $obj; }
}
return $result;
The first strategy is preferable as the database is doing all the filtering work, and both require two database queries. One for the ACLs and one for the actual query, but that is probably unavoidable.
Is there any implementation of one of these strategies (or something achieving the desired results) in Symfony2?
Assuming that you have a collection of domain objects that you want to check, you can use the security.acl.provider service's findAcls() method to batch load in advance of the isGranted() calls.
Conditions:
Database was populated with test entities, with object permissions of MaskBuilder::MASK_OWNER for a random user from my database, and class permissions of MASK_VIEW for role IS_AUTHENTICATED_ANONYMOUSLY; MASK_CREATE for ROLE_USER; and MASK_EDIT and MASK_DELETE for ROLE_ADMIN.
Test Code:
$repo = $this->getDoctrine()->getRepository('Foo\Bundle\Entity\Bar');
$securityContext = $this->get('security.context');
$aclProvider = $this->get('security.acl.provider');
$barCollection = $repo->findAll();
$oids = array();
foreach ($barCollection as $bar) {
$oid = ObjectIdentity::fromDomainObject($bar);
$oids[] = $oid;
}
$aclProvider->findAcls($oids); // preload Acls from database
foreach ($barCollection as $bar) {
if ($securityContext->isGranted('EDIT', $bar)) {
// permitted
} else {
// denied
}
}
RESULTS:
With the call to $aclProvider->findAcls($oids);, the profiler shows that my request contained 3 database queries (as anonymous user).
Without the call to findAcls(), the same request contained 51 queries.
Note that the findAcls() method loads in batches of 30 (with 2 queries per batch), so your number of queries will go up with larger datasets. This test was done in about 15 minutes at the end of the work day; when I have a chance, I'll go through and review the relevant methods more thoroughly to see if there are any other helpful uses of the ACL system and report back here.
Itinerating over the entities is not feasible if you have a couple of thousandth entities - it will keep getting slower and consuming more memory, forcing you to use doctrine batching capabilities, thus making your code more complex (and innefective because after all you need only the ids to make a query - not the whole acl/entities in memory)
What we did to solve this problem is to replace acl.provider service with our own and in that service add a method to make a direct query to the database:
private function _getEntitiesIdsMatchingRoleMaskSql($className, array $roles, $requiredMask)
{
$rolesSql = array();
foreach($roles as $role) {
$rolesSql[] = 's.identifier = ' . $this->connection->quote($role);
}
$rolesSql = '(' . implode(' OR ', $rolesSql) . ')';
$sql = <<<SELECTCLAUSE
SELECT
oid.object_identifier
FROM
{$this->options['entry_table_name']} e
JOIN
{$this->options['oid_table_name']} oid ON (
oid.class_id = e.class_id
)
JOIN {$this->options['sid_table_name']} s ON (
s.id = e.security_identity_id
)
JOIN {$this->options['class_table_nambe']} class ON (
class.id = e.class_id
)
WHERE
{$this->connection->getDatabasePlatform()->getIsNotNullExpression('e.object_identity_id')} AND
(e.mask & %d) AND
$rolesSql AND
class.class_type = %s
GROUP BY
oid.object_identifier
SELECTCLAUSE;
return sprintf(
$sql,
$requiredMask,
$this->connection->quote($role),
$this->connection->quote($className)
);
}
Then calling this method from the actual public method that gets the entities ids:
/**
* Get the entities Ids for the className that match the given role & mask
*
* #param string $className
* #param string $roles
* #param integer $mask
* #param bool $asString - Return a comma-delimited string with the ids instead of an array
*
* #return bool|array|string - True if its allowed to all entities, false if its not
* allowed, array or string depending on $asString parameter.
*/
public function getAllowedEntitiesIds($className, array $roles, $mask, $asString = true)
{
// Check for class-level global permission (its a very similar query to the one
// posted above
// If there is a class-level grant permission, then do not query object-level
if ($this->_maskMatchesRoleForClass($className, $roles, $requiredMask)) {
return true;
}
// Query the database for ACE's matching the mask for the given roles
$sql = $this->_getEntitiesIdsMatchingRoleMaskSql($className, $roles, $mask);
$ids = $this->connection->executeQuery($sql)->fetchAll(\PDO::FETCH_COLUMN);
// No ACEs found
if (!count($ids)) {
return false;
}
if ($asString) {
return implode(',', $ids);
}
return $ids;
}
This way now we can use the code to add filters to DQL queries:
// Some action in a controller or form handler...
// This service is our own aclProvider version with the methods mentioned above
$aclProvider = $this->get('security.acl.provider');
$ids = $aclProvider->getAllowedEntitiesIds('SomeEntityClass', array('role1'), MaskBuilder::VIEW, true);
if (is_string($ids)) {
$queryBuilder->andWhere("entity.id IN ($ids)");
}
// No ACL found: deny all
elseif ($ids===false) {
$queryBuilder->andWhere("entity.id = 0")
}
elseif ($ids===true) {
// Global-class permission: allow all
}
// Run query...etc
Drawbacks: This methods have to be improved to take into account the complexities of ACL inheritance and strategies, but for simple use cases it works fine. Also a cache has to be implemented to avoid the repetitive double query (one with class-level, another with objetc-level)
Coupling Symfony ACL back to application and using it as sorting, is not good approach. You are mixing and coupling 2 or 3 layers of application together.
ACL functionality is to answer "YES/NO" to question "Am I allowed to do this?" If you need some sort of owned/editable articles, you can use some column like CreatedBy or group CreatedBy by criteria from another table. Some usergroups or accounts.
Use joins, and in case you're using Doctrine, get it to generate joins for you, as they are almost always faster. Therefore you should design your ACL schema that doing these fast filters are feasible.

Skip Entities while flushing when they are a Duplicate

i'm playing a little bit with Symfony2 and Doctrine2.
I have an Entity that has a unique title for example:
class listItem
{
/**
* #orm:Id
* #orm:Column(type="integer")
* #orm:GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
*/
protected $id;
/**
* #orm:Column(type="string", length="255", unique="true")
* #assert:NotBlank()
*/
protected $title;
now i'm fetching a json and updating my database with those items:
$em = $this->get('doctrine.orm.entity_manager');
foreach($json->value->items as $item) {
$listItem = new ListItem();
$listItem->setTitle($item->title);
$em->persist($listItem);
}
$em->flush();
works fine the first time. but the second time i'm getting an sql error (of course): Integrity constraint violation: 1062 Duplicate entry
sometimes my json file gets updated and some of the items are new, some are not.
Is there a way to tell the entity manager to skip the duplicate files and just insert the new ones?
Whats the best way to do this?
Thanks for all help. Please leave a comment if something is unclear
Edit:
what works for me is doing something like this:
$uniqueness = $em->getRepository('ListItem')->checkUniqueness($item->title);
if(false == $uniqueness) {
continue;
}
$listItem = new ListItem();
$listItem->setTitle($item->title);
$em->persist($listItem);
$em->flush();
}
checkUniqueness is a method in my ListItem Repo that checks if the title is already in my db.
thats horrible. this are 2 database queries for each item. this ends up about 85 database queries for this action.
How about retrieving all the current titles into an array first and checking the inserting title against the current titles in that array
$existingTitles = $em->getRepository('ListItem')->getCurrentTitles();
foreach($json->value->items as $item) {
if (!in_array($item->title, $existingTitles)) {
$listItem = new ListItem();
$listItem->setTitle($item->title);
$em->persist($listItem);
}
}
$em->flush();
getCurrentTitles() would need to be added to ListItem Repo to simply return an array of titles.
This only requires one extra DB query but does cost you more in memory to hold the current titles in an array. There maybe problems with this method if your dataset for ListItem is very big.
If the number of items your want to insert each time isn't too large, you could modify the getCurrentTitles() function to query for all those items with the titles your trying to insert. This way the max amount of $existingTiles you will return will be the size of your insert data list. Then you could perform your checks as above.
// getCurrentTitles() - $newTitles is array of all new titles you want to insert
return $qb->select('title')
->from('Table', 't')
->in('t.title = ', $newTitles)
->getArrayResult();
If you are using an entity that may already exists in the manager you have to merge it.
Here is what I would do (did not test it yet) :
$repository = $this->get('doctrine.orm.entity_manager');
foreach($json->value->items as $item) {
$listItem = new ListItem();
$listItem->setTitle($item->title);
$em->merge($listItem); // return a managed entity
// no need to persist as long as the entity is now managed
}
$em->flush();

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