NAME
DBIx::Class::Relationship - Inter-table relationships
SYNOPSIS
MyDB::Schema::Actor->has_many('actorroles' => 'MyDB::Schema::ActorRole',
'actor');
MyDB::Schema::Role->has_many('actorroles' => 'MyDB::Schema::ActorRole',
'role');
MyDB::Schema::ActorRole->belongs_to('role' => 'MyDB::Schema::Role');
MyDB::Schema::ActorRole->belongs_to('actor' => 'MyDB::Schema::Actor');
MyDB::Schema::Role->many_to_many('actors' => 'actorroles', 'actor');
MyDB::Schema::Actor->many_to_many('roles' => 'actorroles', 'role');
$schema->resultset('Actor')->roles();
$schema->resultset('Role')->search_related('actors', { Name => 'Fred' });
$schema->resultset('ActorRole')->add_to_roles({ Name => 'Sherlock Holmes'});See DBIx::Class::Manual::Cookbook for more.
DESCRIPTION
This class provides methods to set up relationships between the tables in your database model. Relationships are the most useful and powerful technique that DBIx::Class provides. To create efficient database queries, create relationships between any and all tables that have something in common, for example if you have a table Authors:
ID | Name | Age
------------------
1 | Fred | 30
2 | Joe | 32and a table Books:
ID | Author | Name
--------------------
1 | 1 | Rulers of the universe
2 | 1 | Rulers of the galaxyThen without relationships, the method of getting all books by Fred goes like this:
my $fred = $schema->resultset('Author')->find({ Name => 'Fred' });
my $fredsbooks = $schema->resultset('Book')->search({ Author => $fred->ID });
With a has_many relationship called "books" on Author (see below for details),
we can do this instead:
my $fredsbooks = $schema->resultset('Author')->find({ Name => 'Fred' })->books;Each relationship sets up an accessor method on the "Row" in DBIx::Class::Manual::Glossary objects that represent the items of your table. From "ResultSet" in DBIx::Class::Manual::Glossary objects, the relationships can be searched using the "search_related" method. In list context, each returns a list of Row objects for the related class, in scalar context, a new ResultSet representing the joined tables is returned. Thus, the calls can be chained to produce complex queries. Since the database is not actually queried until you attempt to retrieve the data for an actual item, no time is wasted producing them.
my $cheapfredbooks = $schema->resultset('Author')->find({
Name => 'Fred',
})->books->search_related('prices', {
Price => { '<=' => '5.00' },
});will produce a query something like:
SELECT * FROM Author me
LEFT JOIN Books books ON books.author = me.id
LEFT JOIN Prices prices ON prices.book = books.id
WHERE prices.Price <= 5.00all without needing multiple fetches.
Only the helper methods for setting up standard relationship types are documented here. For the basic, lower-level methods, and a description of all the useful *_related methods that you get for free, see DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base.
METHODS
All helper methods take the following arguments:
__PACKAGE__>$method_name('relname', 'Foreign::Class', $cond, $attrs);Both $cond and $attrs are optional. Pass undef for $cond if you want to use the default value for it, but still want to set $attrs.
See DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base for a list of valid attributes and valid relationship attributes.
belongs_to
# in a Book class (where Author has many Books)
My::DBIC::Schema::Book->belongs_to( author => 'My::DBIC::Schema::Author' );
my $author_obj = $obj->author; # get author object
$obj->author( $new_author_obj ); # set author objectThe above belongs_to relationship could also have been specified as,
My::DBIC::Schema::Book->belongs_to( author,
'My::DBIC::Schema::Author',
{ 'self.author' => 'foreign.author' } );Creates a relationship where the calling class stores the foreign class's primary key in one (or more) of its columns. This relationship defaults to using $accessor_name as the foreign key in $related_class to resolve the join, unless $foreign_key_column specifies the foreign key column in $related_class or $cond specifies a reference to a join condition hash.
If the relationship is optional -- i.e. the column containing the foreign key can be NULL -- then the belongs_to relationship does the right thing. Thus, in the example above $obj->author would return undef. However in this case you would probably want to set the join_type attribute so that a LEFT JOIN is done, which makes complex resultsets involving join or prefetch operations work correctly. The modified declaration is shown below:
# in a Book class (where Author has_many Books)
__PACKAGE__->belongs_to(author => 'My::DBIC::Schema::Author',
'author', {join_type => 'left'});Cascading deletes are off by default on a belongs_to relationship. To turn them on, pass cascade_delete => 1 in the $attr hashref.
NOTE: If you are used to Class::DBI relationships, this is the equivalent of has_a.
See DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base for documentation on relationship methods and valid relationship attributes.
has_many
# in an Author class (where Author has_many Books)
My::DBIC::Schema::Author->has_many(books => 'My::DBIC::Schema::Book', 'author');
my $booklist = $obj->books;
my $booklist = $obj->books({
name => { LIKE => '%macaroni%' },
{ prefetch => [qw/book/],
});
my @book_objs = $obj->books;
my $books_rs = $obj->books;
( $books_rs ) = $obj->books_rs;
$obj->add_to_books(\%col_data);The above has_many relationship could also have been specified with an explicit join condition:
My::DBIC::Schema::Author->has_many( books => 'My::DBIC::Schema::Book', {
'foreign.author' => 'self.author',
});Creates a one-to-many relationship, where the corresponding elements of the foreign class store the calling class's primary key in one (or more) of its columns. This relationship defaults to using $accessor_name as the foreign key in $related_class to resolve the join, unless $foreign_key_column specifies the foreign key column in $related_class or $cond specifies a reference to a join condition hash.
Three methods are created when you create a has_many relationship. The first method is the expected accessor method, $accessor_name(). The second is almost exactly the same as the accessor method but "_rs" is added to the end of the method name. This method works just like the normal accessor, except that it returns a resultset no matter what, even in list context. The third method, named add_to_$relname, will also be added to your Row items; this allows you to insert new related items, using the same mechanism as in "create_related" in DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base.
If you delete an object in a class with a has_many relationship, all the related objects will be deleted as well. To turn this behaviour off, pass cascade_delete => 0 in the $attr hashref. However, any database-level cascade or restrict will take precedence over a DBIx-Class-based cascading delete.
See DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base for documentation on relationship methods and valid relationship attributes.
might_have
My::DBIC::Schema::Author->might_have( pseudonym =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::Pseudonym' );
my $pname = $obj->pseudonym; # to get the Pseudonym objectThe above might_have relationship could have been specified as:
My::DBIC::Schema::Author->might_have( pseudonym =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::Pseudonym',
'author' );Or even:
My::DBIC::Schema::Author->might_have( pseudonym =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::Pseudonym',
{ 'foreign.author' => 'self.author' } );Assuming the Pseudonym table has
Creates an optional one-to-one relationship with a class. This relationship defaults to using $accessor_name as the foreign key in $related_class to resolve the join, unless $foreign_key_column specifies the foreign key column in $related_class or $cond specifies a reference to a join condition hash.
If you update or delete an object in a class with a might_have relationship, the related object will be updated or deleted as well. To turn off this behavior, add cascade_delete => 0 to the $attr hashref. Any database-level update or delete constraints will override this behavior.
See DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base for documentation on relationship methods and valid relationship attributes.
has_one
My::DBIC::Schema::Book->has_one(isbn => 'My::DBIC::Schema::ISBN');
my $isbn_obj = $obj->isbn; # to get the ISBN objectCreates a one-to-one relationship with another class. This is just like might_have, except the implication is that the other object is always present. The only difference between has_one and might_have is that has_one uses an (ordinary) inner join, whereas might_have uses a left join.
The has_one relationship should be used when a row in the table has exactly one related row in another table. If the related row might not exist in the foreign table, use the "might_have" in DBIx::Class::Relationship relationship.
In the above example, each Book in the database is associated with exactly one ISBN object.
See DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base for documentation on relationship methods and valid relationship attributes.
many_to_many
To create a many_to_many relationship from Actor to Role:
My::DBIC::Schema::Actor->has_many( actor_roles =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::ActorRoles',
'actor' );
My::DBIC::Schema::ActorRoles->belongs_to( role =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::Role' );
My::DBIC::Schema::ActorRoles->belongs_to( actor =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::Actor' );
My::DBIC::Schema::Actor->many_to_many( roles => 'actor_roles',
'role' );And, for the reverse relationship, from Role to Actor:
My::DBIC::Schema::Role->has_many( actor_roles =>
'My::DBIC::Schema::ActorRoles',
'role' );
My::DBIC::Schema::Role->many_to_many( actors => 'actor_roles', 'actor' );Creates accessors bridging two relationships; not strictly a relationship in its own right, although the accessor will return a resultset or collection of objects just as a has_many would.
In the above example, ActorRoles is the link table class, and Role is the foreign class. The $link_rel_name parameter is the name of the accessor for the has_many relationship from this table to the link table, and the $foreign_rel_name parameter is the accessor for the belongs_to relationship from the link table to the foreign table.
To use many_to_many, existing relationships from the original table to the link table, and from the link table to the end table must already exist, these relation names are then used in the many_to_many call.
In the above example, the Actor class will have 3 many_to_many accessor methods set: $roles, $add_to_roles, $set_roles, and similarly named accessors will be created for the Role class for the actors many_to_many relationship.
See DBIx::Class::Relationship::Base for documentation on relationship methods and valid relationship attributes.
AUTHORS
Matt S. Trout <mst@shadowcatsystems.co.uk>
LICENSE
You may distribute this code under the same terms as Perl itself.