Saving Additional Data to a Joint Table in CakePHP 3.0 - php

Question

I am trying to save some data into a Joint Table using CakePHP. This is the part of the application that I would like to fix - it is a normal BelongsToMany association with additional columns:
Model > Entity:
/* Durations */
class Duration extends Entity {
protected $_accessible = [
'duration' => true,
'cost' => true,
];
}
/* Commercials */
class Commercial extends Entity {
protected $_accessible = [
'info' => true,
'commercial_durations' => true,
];
}
/* CommercialDurations */
class CommercialDuration extends Entity {
protected $_accessible = [
'duration_id' => true,
'commercial_id' => true,
'quantity' => true,
'duration' => true,
'commercial' => true,
];
}
Model > Table:
class DurationsTable extends Table {
public function initialize(array $config)
{
$this->table('durations');
$this->displayField('id');
$this->primaryKey('id');
$this->belongsToMany('Commercials', [
'through' => 'CommercialDurations',
]);
}
}
class CommercialsTable extends Table
{
public function initialize(array $config){
$this->table('commercials');
$this->displayField('id');
$this->primaryKey('id');
$this->belongsToMany('Durations', [
'through' => 'CommercialDurations'
]);
$this->hasMany('CommercialDurations', [
'foreignKey' => 'commercial_id'
]);
}
}
class CommercialDurationsTable extends Table {
public function initialize(array $config)
{
$this->table('commercial_durations');
$this->displayField('id');
$this->primaryKey('id');
$this->belongsTo('Durations', [
'foreignKey' => 'duration_id',
'joinType' => 'INNER'
]);
$this->belongsTo('Commercials', [
'foreignKey' => 'commercial_id',
'joinType' => 'INNER'
]);
}
}
Now, I created a new View where I want people to be able to choose one Duration, type the quantity and add that value to the database. I am using the following code:
<?php
echo $this->Form->create($commercial);
echo $this->Form->input('durations._duration', ['options' => $durations]);
echo $this->Form->input('durations._joinData.quantity');
echo $this->Form->submit(__('Next'), ['class' => 'button small right', 'escape' => false]);
echo $this->Form->end()
?>
The problem with this form is that the durations select is not showing the 'duration' field from the Durations table, but instead is showing all the fields from that table (one per row) as JSON
<option value="0">{ "id": 1, "duration": "30 sec", "cost": 450 }</option>
Once I submit the form I can't save this information into the Commercials object or CommercialDurations. This is what I get from the $this->request->data object:
[
'durations' => [
'_duration' => '2',
'_joinData' => [
'quantity' => '2'
]
]
]
The output of debug((string)$commercial) before I start the form is:
/src/Template/Commercials/features.ctp (line 22)
'{
"id": 2,
"info": "AAAAAA ",
"created": "2015-04-16T21:48:48+0000",
"updated": null,
"durations": [],
}'
How can I display the data correctly on the form?
How can I retrieve and save this data?
Thanks!!

Answer 1

I don't get your Models relations, since according to your post a duration belongs to a commercial and a commercial belongs to a duration.
For the matter of explaining you how the request should be sent, and how the form looks like let's assume for this example that your models are like these:
Your commercial has a commercial duration and this commercial duration belongs to a duration
So your models would look like these:
Commercial has many commercial duration.
Commercial duration belongs to commercial.
Commercial duration belongs to duration.
Duration has many commercial duration.
Your add function should be like this one (assuming you are not saving a new duration, just the commercial and the commercial duration)
$commercial = $this->Commercials->newEntity($this->request->data,[
'associated' => ['Commercialdurations']
]);
if ($this->Commercials->save($commercial)) {
$success = true;
}else{
$success = false;
}
The request data should look like this:
{
"commercialdurations":{
"Commercialduration":{
"duration_id":"1",
"quantity":"1",
"duration":"1"
}
},
"info":"something"
}
Basically you are sending the data of a new Commercial (info) and the commercial durations associated to this ( you could send multiple commercial durations).
For your form to display the duration basically you have to serialize this information un the controller, go to your add action and add this. (You could use anyway you want to retrieve the data, all that matters is that you send it back to the view)
$durations = $this->Commercials->Commercialdurations->Durations->find('list', ['limit' => 200]);
$this->set(compact('commercial',durations'));
$this->set('_serialize', ['commercial']);
Then in your form you can use the data
echo $this->Form->input('duration_id', ['options' => $durations]);
So your form would look something like this:
echo $this->Form->input('info');
echo $this->Form->input('commercials.Commercial.duration_id', ['options' => $durations]);
echo $this->Form->input('commercials.Commercial.quantity');
echo $this->Form->input('commercials.Commercial.duration');
Basically you want to send a request with all the levels of associated data.
See this other question for guidence about saving associated data:
Cake PhP 3 Saving associated data in multiples levels
To see more about how to build a form:
http://book.cakephp.org/3.0/en/views/helpers/form.html#creating-inputs-for-associated-data