Question

I have created a form in which i embed another form. My question is about this embedded form – I’m using a sfWidgetFormDoctrineChoice widget with option multiple set to true. The code for this embedded form’s configure method:

public function configure()
  {
    unset($this['prerequisite_id']);
    $this->setWidget('prerequisite_id', new sfWidgetFormDoctrineChoice(array(
        'model' => 'Stage',
        'query' => Doctrine_Query::create()->select('s.id, s.name')->from('Stage s')->where('s.workflow_id = ?', $this->getOption('workflow_id') ),
        'multiple' => true
    )));

    $this->setValidator('prerequisite_id', new sfValidatorDoctrineChoice(array(
        'model' => 'Stage',
        'multiple' => true,
        'query' => Doctrine_Query::create()->select('s.id, s.name')->from('Stage s')->where('s.workflow_id = ?', $this->getOption('workflow_id') ),
        'column' => 'id'
    )));
  }

I unset the prerequisite_id field because it is included in the base form, but I want it to be a multiple select.
Now, when I added the validator, everything seems to work (it passes the validation), but it seems like it has problems saving the records if there is more than one selection sent.

I get this PHP warning after submitting the form:

Warning: strlen() expects parameter 1 to be string, array given in
D:\Development\www\flow_dms\lib\vendor\symfony\lib\plugins\sfDoctrinePlugin\lib\database\sfDoctrineConnectionProfiler.class.php
on line 198

and more – I know, why – in symfony’s debug mode I can see the following in the stack trace:

at Doctrine_Connection->exec(‘INSERT INTO stage_has_prerequisites
(prerequisite_id, stage_id) VALUES (?, ?)’, array(array(’12’, ’79’),
‘103’))

So, what Symfony does is send to Doctrine an array of choices – and as I see in the debug sql query, Doctrine cannot render the query correctly.

Any ideas how to fix that? I would need to have two queries generated for two choices:

INSERT INTO stage_has_prerequisites (prerequisite_id, stage_id) VALUES (12, 103);
INSERT INTO stage_has_prerequisites (prerequisite_id, stage_id) VALUES (79, 103);

stage_id is always the same (I mean, it’s set outside this form by the form in which it is embedded).

I have spend 4 hours on the problem already, so maybe someone is able to provide some help.

Answer 1

Well, I seem to have found a solution (albeit not the best one, I guess). Hopefully it’ll be helpful to somebody.

Finally, after much thinking, I have concluded that if the problem comes from the Doctrine_Record not being able to save the record if it encounters an array instead of a single value, then the easiest solution would be to overwrite the save() method of the Doctrine_Record. And that’s what I did:

class StageHasPrerequisites extends BaseStageHasPrerequisites
{
  public function save(Doctrine_Connection $conn = null)
  {
    if( is_array( $this->getPrerequisiteId() ) )
    {
      foreach( $this->getPrerequisiteId() as $prerequisite_id )
      {
        $obj = new StageHasPrerequisites();
        $obj->setPrerequisiteId( $prerequisite_id );
        $obj->setStageId( $this->getStageId() );
        $obj->save();
      }
    }
    else
    {
      parent::save($conn);
    }
  }

  (...)

}

So now if it encounters an array instead of a single value, it just creates a temporary object and saves it for each of this array’s values.

Not an elegant solution, definitely, but it works (keep in mind that it is written for the specific structure of the data and it’s just the effect of my methodology, namely See What’s Wrong In The Debug Mode And Then Try To Correct It Any Way Possible).