Fill join table with cakePHP - php

Question

I'm trying to import products from a productfeed and save them into my database. Now I'm having trouble to get this done with cakePHP. It's quite easy to fill the "products" table, but hard to fill the "terms" and joining table "products_terms". I'm using transactions ($dataSource = $this->Supplier->Product->getDataSource();) to import the products, to be sure no incomplete data will be saved into the database. Now cause the terms table uses AutoIncrement for the term id's, it's hard for me to fill the products_terms table cause it's only possible after I know the id of the term. If the ID doesn't exist yet, I cannot know what to fill in the products_terms table. See my ERD below
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pfakd7xplsvr7cc/db_erd.PNG
Does anyone know a solution for this?
Array I send to the database
array(
'Product' => array(
'slug' => 'c24b626d6701d3b07e30b233b989ff8811',
'product_name' => 'DAHLIA 5A',
'price_new' => '159.00',
'affiliate_url' => 'http://ad.zanox.com/ppc/?utm_source=zanox&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=product]]',
'product_id_supplier' => 'c24b626d670133d3b07e30b2b989ff8811',
'supplier_id' => 'zizigo_tr',
'feedimport_id' => (int) 1
),
'Image' => array(
(int) 0 => array(
'image' => 'zizigo_tr_5290e6d296084.JPG'
)
),
'Term' => array(
'Term' => array(
(int) 0 => array(
'name' => 'Tommy Hilfiger'
)
)
)
)
And my models:
class Product extends AppModel {
public $name = 'Product';
public $primaryKey = 'product_id';
public $hasMany = array(
'Vote',
'Image'
);
public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array(
'Term' => array(
'className' => 'Term',
'joinTable' => 'products_terms',
'foreignKey' => 'product_id',
'associationForeignKey' => 'term_id',
'unique' => true
)
);
public $belongsTo = array(
'Supplier'
);
}
class Term extends AppModel {
public $name = 'Term';
public $primaryKey = 'term_id';
public $hasAndBelongsToMany = array(
'Product' => array(
'className' => 'Product',
'joinTable' => 'products_terms',
'foreignKey' => 'term_id',
'associationForeignKey' => 'product_id',
'unique' => true
)
);
}

Answer 1

Problem solved. It seems like the Terms table needs to be filled, else cakePHP doesn't know which term to connect to.
So the proper solution is to first check or the Term exists, else insert the Term in the Terms table, and then insert the products using HABTM (using the ID of the Term in the insert array), so the products_terms table will be filled also.