Updating user data in default Laravel application

Question

I just started using Laravel and I can't get my head around this problem... I hope more experienced people here can spot the error I'm making.

I configured a fresh laravel application and performed

php artisan make:auth

Following the instructions from https://laravel.com/docs/5.6/authentication#authentication-quickstart.

These are all routes in routes/web.php:

Route::get('/', 'HomeController@show');
Route::get('/user', ['as'=>"user", 'uses'=>'UserController@show']);
Route::post('/user/update', ['as' => 'user.update', 'uses' => 'UserController@update']);

Auth::routes();

Route::get('/home', 'HomeController@index')->name('home');

This is my UserController.php:

<?php

namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use Auth;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use App\User;

class UserController extends Controller
{
  public function show() {

    return view('user')->withUser(Auth::user());
  }
  public function update(Request $request)
    {
        $user = Auth::user();
        $user->name=$request->input('name');
        $user->email=$request->input('email');

        $user->save();
        return Redirect::route('user');
    }
}

And this is the form in my user.blade.php:

{!! Form::model($user, ['route' => ['user.update'], 'method' => 'POST']) !!}
<tr><th colspan=2>My data</th></tr>
  <tr>
      <td>Name</td>
      <td>{!! Form::text('name', null, ['class' => 'form-control']) !!}</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
      <td>E-mail address</td>
      <td>{!! Form::text('email', null, ['class' => 'form-control']) !!}</td>
  </tr>
  <tr><td colspan=2>{!! Form::submit('Submit', ['class' => 'btn btn-primary']) !!}</td></tr>
{!! Form::close() !!}

Nothing seems to happen when I click the submit button in the form... Data is not changed in the database.

Updates:

• The controller doesn't get triggered. I added dd() to the update() function and this doesn't yield anything.

• I tried composer du, clearing the browser cache and tried another browser. I refreshed the migration using php artisan migrate:fresh and registered again. Same problem still. debug is set to true, I get other errors if I change things. I added the project to a github repo: github.com/EsthervdS/LaravelTest

• I reinstalled a whole new project and the problem occurs again.

Answer 1

after looking at your user.blade.php found that you are using form inside table and that's what preventing form submission. also i found more mistakes too. so i improved it.

Mistakes found:

• form submit inside table
• duplicate route names
• no auth middleware to user routes
• no data validation
• using wrong use statements

user.blade.php

@extends('layouts.app')

@section('content')
    <div class="container">
        <div class="row justify-content-center">
            <div class="col-md-8">
                <div class="card">
                    <div class="card-header">Profile</div>
                    <div class="card-body">

                        @if($errors)
                            @foreach($errors->all() as $error)
                                <div class="alert alert-danger" role="alert">
                                    {{ $error }}
                                </div>
                            @endforeach
                        @endif

                        {!! Form::model($user, ['route' => ['user.update'], 'method' => 'POST']) !!}
                            <div class="form-group row">
                                <label for="name" class="col-sm-2 col-form-label">Name</label>
                                <div class="col-sm-10">
                                    {!! Form::text('name', null, ['class' => 'form-control', 'id' => 'name']) !!}
                                </div>
                            </div>

                            <div class="form-group row">
                                <label for="email" class="col-sm-2 col-form-label">Email</label>
                                <div class="col-sm-10">
                                    {!! Form::text('email', null, ['class' => 'form-control', 'id' => 'email']) !!}
                                </div>
                            </div>

                            <div class="form-group">
                                {!! Form::submit('Submit', ['class' => 'btn btn-primary']) !!}
                            </div>

                        {!! Form::close() !!}
                    </div>
                </div>
            </div>
        </div>
    </div>
@endsection

i'm not big fan of laravel collective

UserController.php

<?php

namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use App\User;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Auth;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Validator;
use Illuminate\Validation\Rule;

class UserController extends Controller
{
    /**
     * Create a new controller instance.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function __construct()
    {
        $this->middleware('auth');
    }

    /**
     * @return \Illuminate\Contracts\View\Factory|\Illuminate\View\View
     */
    public function show()
    {
        return view('user', ['user' => Auth::user()]);
    }

    /**
     * @param Request $request
     * @return
     */
    public function update(Request $request)
    {
        // Get current user
        $userId = Auth::id();
        $user = User::findOrFail($userId);

        // Validate the data submitted by user
        $validator = Validator::make($request->all(), [
            'name' => 'required|max:255',
            'email' => 'required|email|max:225|'. Rule::unique('users')->ignore($user->id),
        ]);

        // if fails redirects back with errors
        if ($validator->fails()) {
            return redirect()->back()
                ->withErrors($validator)
                ->withInput();
        }

        // Fill user model
        $user->fill([
            'name' => $request->name,
            'email' => $request->email
        ]);

        // Save user to database
        $user->save();

        // Redirect to route
        return redirect()->route('user');
    }
}

web.php

<?php

// Auth routes
Auth::routes();

// User account routes
Route::get('user', 'UserController@show')->name('user');
Route::post('user/update', 'UserController@update')->name('user.update');

// other routes
Route::get('/', function () {
    return view('welcome');
})->name('welcome');

Route::get('/home', 'HomeController@index')->name('home');

extra tip i'll recommend to use laravel authorization policies. and if you also want to make welcome route only available to authenticate users then simply add auth middleware to welcome route - laravel docs

Answer 2

Change the following line:

$user = Auth::user();

to

$userDetails = Auth::user();  // To get the logged-in user details
$user = User::find($userDetails ->id);  // Find the user using model and hold its reference
$user->name=$request->input('name');
$user->email=$request->input('email');

$user->save();  // Update the data

Auth::user(); contains the logged-in user data in it i.e. the data we mostly put in the session, but to update the user data you have to use the model instance or query builder.