Laravel Eloquent Join

Question

I'm fairly new with Laravel. I'm still trying to learn it. My question is:

I have 3 tables named

• games
• game_options

• game_platforms

  

I have 3 Models for those tables

• Game Model

  class Game extends Eloquent
  {
      protected $table = 'games';
  
      public function platforms()
      {
          return $this->hasManyThrough('GamePlatform','GameOptions','id','game_id');
      }
  }
  

• GamePlatform Model

  class GamePlatform extends Eloquent
  {
      protected $table = 'game_platform';
  }
  

• GameOption Model

  class GameOptions extends Eloquent
  {
      protected $table = 'game_options';
  }
  

So when I do

$game = Game::find(1)->platforms;

It only shows,

{"id":1,"platform_id":20,"game_id":1}
{"id":1,"platform_id":21,"game_id":1}
{"id":1,"platform_id":22,"game_id":1}
{"id":1,"platform_id":23,"game_id":1}
{"id":1,"platform_id":24,"game_id":1}

But I need game name and platform names with those ID's. The thing is, I want to do this with eloquent only. I could go with "DB" or oldschool SQL but I want to learn if this way is possible or not.

Also I'm looking for better documentation/books for laravel. Most of what I read were only introduce laravel or far too advanced for me.

Answer 1

you can use the with method with eloquent

$game = Game::where('id',1)->with('platforms')->get();

Should return you the game and platforms

For documentation I would first start with the documentation provided (find it to be about 50% complete) and with the api everything else is covered

Answer 2

You would have to model your tables like:

**games**
id
name

**game_options**
id
game_id
name

**game_platform**
id
game_options_id
platform_id  /* which i assume you get from a platform master table */

Then in your Game Class:

class Game extends Eloquent
{
    protected $table = 'games';

    public function platforms()
    {
        return $this->hasManyThrough('GamePlatform','GameOptions','game_id','game_options_id');
    }
}

Now, this would be assuming that Game Platform belongs to Games through Game Options.

Answer 3

I left a comment earlier about this but now I'm pretty sure it's the answer you're looking for: you should use belongsToMany rather than hasManyThrough. So first, might I suggest you rename your tables and models to follow Laravel's conventions (plural snake_case table names, singular snake_case alphabetical order pivot table names, singular StudlyCaps model names), that way you'll have the following situation:

Tables:

• games
  • id
  • name
• game_option
  • id
  • game_id
  • option_id
• options
  • id
  • option
  • name

Now you can rewrite your models to conform to the new structure, and use a belongsToMany relationship too:

class Game extends Eloquent
{
    public function platforms()
    {
        return $this->belongsToMany('Option');
    }
}

class Option extends Eloquent
{
    public function platforms()
    {
        return $this->belongsToMany('Game');
    }
}

Note: you don't have to model the pivot table (game_option) unless you store extra data on the pivot.

Now you should be good to get all options for a given game:

$options = Game::find(1)->options;

Or if you need to get all platforms (though I am trying to infer meaning of your code here regarding options and platforms):

$platforms = Game::find(1)->options()->whereOption('platform')->get();