Question

Say you have the following relations (altered for simplicity):

Dog:
  columns:
    id:         { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    name:       { type: string,  notnull: true }

AwardType:
  columns:
    id:         { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    name:       { type: string,  notnull: true }

Award:
  columns:
    dog_id:     { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    award_id:   { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    is_granted: { type: boolean, notnull: true, default: false }
  relations:
    Dog:
      local:        dog_id
      foreign:      id
      type:         one
      foreignType:  many
      foreignAlias: Awards
    AwardType:
      local:        award_id
      foreign:      id
      type:         one
      foreignType:  many
      foreignAlias: Awards

With the above setup I can add a new dog and manually add Awards to that dog. I can also edit awards already granted to a dog.

When I call $myDog->getAwards() I want the set to include all granted awards (Award.is_granted==true && Award.dog_id==$myDog()->getId()) pluss all awards that have not been granted to that dog yet.

Is there an option that can be set in a model somewhere to make this happen? If not, what would be the best way to achieve it?

I’m using Symfony 1.4 and the bundled Doctrine 1.2 ORM.

[ Edit 1 ]
I realize I didn’t explain the whole award thing properly, so I’ll try to expand on it. Say you have the following AwardTypes:

• 1: Bone for not molesting postman
• 2: Collar for not biting Miss Molly
• 3: Bigger bone for chasing milkman (who we all know is evil)

Dog1 is already registered and has been granted AwardTypes 1 and 3. When editing that Dog the form should display AwardTypes 1 and 3 with a checked checkbox and AwardType 2 with an unchecked checkbox. This works great if Dog 1 has one entry in the Award table for each of the AwardTypes. Two with is_granted == true and one is_granted == false. So far so good.

When the user enters a new Dog the form should display all the AwardTypes, but with no checked checkboxes. When saving the new Dog a total of 3 rows should appear in the Awards table with the is_granted-flag set according to the checked-state of the checkboxes.

I know I can get all AwardTypes and check that against the AwardTypes a Dog has been granted already (showing all unchecked for new dogs, granted checked + not yet granted unchecked for existing dogs). What I am asking here is wether or not Doctrine has some magic that will give me compound sets as described above.

Answer 1

Ok you have a problem modeling your data. It should probably look like this:

Dog:
  columns:
    id:         { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    name:       { type: string,  notnull: true, unique: true }
  relations:
    Awards:
      class: Award
      foreignType: many
      type: many
      refClass: DogAward
      local: dog_id
      foreign: award_id

Award:
  columns:
    id:         { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    name:       { type: string,  notnull: true, unique: true }

DogAward:
  columns:
    dog_id:     { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }
    award_id:   { type: integer, notnull: true, primary: true }

I have used a many-to-many relations, and added some constraint that I think might be useful in your case.
Symfony should generate a form looking like what you want, tell us if it is not the case.