Save HABTM data in a single simple format
Saving data from a HasAndBelongsToMany (HABTM) relationship with CakePHP is not the easiest part of using this framework. The main difficulty is that the format of HABTM data is not the same wether you want to associate existing records together (only update entries in the join table), or create new records and also associate them (create new records in the models table and in the join table).
When you wander out of CakePHP standards and automatically baked views and start saving custom data (using JavaScript for example), then you have to manually construct the data you send to your controllers and you have complete control over its format. You thus might want to be sure that your records and association will be saved in the right way wether you create new records or not. The simplest way is to settle for a format and always construct your data in the same fashion and let models handle the data (that is their job afterall).
The data format returned by a find() is the simplest to use: you easily have access to it in your views, and it is quite logical to use the same data format for find() and save(). You have an index for the main model of the find() and then an index for each associated Model. Multiple associated models like hasMany or hasAndBelongsToMany have subsequent subarrays for each associated entry. Building this type of array with existing data (we have an id) or new data (there is no id yet) is very simple. In the following example, Foo hasAndBelongsToMany Bar:
`
array(
'Foo'=>array(
'id'=>'...',
...
),
'Bar'=>array(
(int)0=>array(
'id'=>'...',//ExistingBar,wehaveitsid
'name'=>'...'//Thenamemayhavebeenmodified
),
(int)1=>array(
'name'=>'...'//ThisBarwillbecreated
)
)
)
`
Then with a simple snippet of code, you can overload the saveAssociated() function to save each instance of Bar: create new ones (those without an id) and update existing ones. Then call the parent saveAssociated() function from the library (you rarely want to entirely overload functions from the library) with a nicely formated association array (the one from our first case) to update the entries in the join table. Copy the following code in your AppModel.php and the trick is done!
`
publicfunctionsaveAssociated($data=null,$options=array()){
foreach($dataas$alias=>$modelData){
if(!empty($this->hasAndBelongsToMany[$alias])){
$habtm=array();
$Model=ClassRegistry::init($this->hasAndBelongsToMany[$alias]['className']);
foreach($modelDataas$modelDatum){
if(empty($modelDatum['id'])){
$Model->create();
}
$Model->save($modelDatum);
$habtm[]=empty($modelDatum['id'])?$Model->getInsertID():$modelDatum['id'];
}
$data[$alias]=array($alias=>$habtm);
}
}
returnparent::saveAssociated($data,$options);
}
`