Create associations between entities Doctrine 2 - php

Question

I am trying to connect 2 entities and I am having troubles with it.
I have two classes: User and Gender.
Each User is from a kind gender (male or female). At my database I have two tables with this structure:
user(**id**, firstName, gender);
gender(**id**, type);
Now I have created two entities at my system. User.php and Gender.php
User
<?php
/**
* #Entity #Table(name="User")
**/
class User
{
/**
* #Id #Column(type="integer") #GeneratedValue
**/
private $id;
/**
* #Column(type="string")
**/
private $firstName;
/**
* #Column(type="string")
* #ManyToOne(targetEntity="Gender")
* #JoinColumn(name="type", referencedColumnName="type")
* #var Gender[]
**/
private $gender;
public function __construct($content) {
$this->setContent($content);
}
/**
* #return int
*/
public function getId() {
return $this->id;
}
/**
* #return string
*/
public function getFirstName() {
return $this->firstName;
}
/**
* #return int
*/
public function getGender() {
return $this->gender;
}
/**
* #param string $content
*/
public function setFirstName($content) {
$this->firstName = (string) $content;
}
/**
* #param string $content
*/
public function setGender($content) {
$this->gender = (string) $content;
}
}
Gender
<?php
/**
* #Entity #Table(name="Gender")
**/
class Gender
{
/**
* #Id #Column(type="integer") #GeneratedValue
**/
private $id;
/**
* #OneToMany(targetEntity="User", inversedBy="gender")
* #JoinColumn(name="gender", referencedColumnName="gender")
* #Column(type="string")
**/
private $type;
/**
* #param integer $content
*
*/
public function getId() {
return $this->id;
}
/**
* #param string $content
*
*/
public function getType() {
return $this->type;
}
/**
* #param string $content
*/
public function setGender($content) {
$this->gender = (string) $content;
}
}
What I want is to get the gender type when I get a User, so both entities have to be connected by gender-type attributes.
I have tried to do so with #ManyToOne or #JoinColumn features, but I couldn't get it.
How can I do it? What I am doing wrong?
Thanks!

Answer 1

Replace this in User Class:
* #JoinColumn(name="type", referencedColumnName="type")
with that :
* #JoinColumn(name="gender", referencedColumnName="type")
Your field name is gender, not type in User table.
In Gender class use only:
* #OneToMany(targetEntity="User", mappedBy="gender")

Answer 2

Might be offtopic but Gender table is useless. You will always have just 2 (male/female) so no point in doing this.
You should create new column in User table, type=integer and use 0/1 for gender. Use constants like
Class User
{
const MALE=0 ;
const FEMALE=1 ;
.... ORM definition...
public function isMale()
{
return $this->getGender() == self::MALE ;
}
And in controller:
if ( !$user->isMale() ) {
.... buy shoes ....
} else {
.... buy beer ....
}
Or similar. Because you only have 2 options, only one function is needed.

Answer 3

You have to join the gender relation if you want to get if from the query.
$dql = "SELECT a,g FROM user a LEFT JOIN a.gender g";
$query = $em->createQuery($dql);
$query->setMaxResults(30);
$users = $query->getResult();