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Embedded Mapping

This chapter explains how embedded documents are mapped in Doctrine.

Embed One

Embed a single document:

<?php/** @Document */class User{    // ...    /** @EmbedOne(targetDocument=Address::class) */    private $address;    // ...}/** @EmbeddedDocument */class Address{    /** @Field(type="string") */    private $street;        // ...}

Embed Many

Embed many documents:

<?phpuse Doctrine\Common\Collections\ArrayCollection;/** @Document */class User{    // ...    /** @EmbedMany(targetDocument=Phonenumber::class) */    private $phoneNumbers;    // ...    public function __construct()    {        $this->phoneNumbers = new ArrayCollection();    }}/** @EmbeddedDocument */class PhoneNumber{    /** @Field(type="string") */    private $number;    // ...}

Mixing Document Types

If you want to store different types of embedded documents in the same field, you can simply omit the targetDocument option:

<?phpuse Doctrine\Common\Collections\ArrayCollection;/** @Document */class User{    // ..    /** @EmbedMany */    private $tasks;    // ...    public function __construct()    {        $this->tasks = new ArrayCollection();    }}

Now the $tasks property can store any type of document! The class name will be automatically stored in a field named _doctrine_class_name within the embedded document. The field name can be customized with the discriminatorField option:

<?phpuse Doctrine\Common\Collections\ArrayCollection;/** @Document */class User{    // ..    /**     * @EmbedMany(discriminatorField="type")     */    private $tasks;    // ...    public function __construct()     {        $this->tasks = new ArrayCollection();    }}

You can also specify a discriminator map to avoid storing the FQCN in each embedded document:

<?phpuse Doctrine\Common\Collections\ArrayCollection;/** @Document */class User{    // ..    /**     * @EmbedMany(     *   discriminatorMap={     *     "download"=DownloadTask::class,     *     "build"=BuildTask::class     *   }     * )     */    private $tasks;    // ...    public function __construct()    {        $this->tasks = new ArrayCollection();    }}

If you have embedded documents without a discriminator value that need to be treated correctly you can optionally specify a default value for the discriminator:

<?php/** @Document */class User{    // ..    /**     * @EmbedMany(     *   discriminatorMap={     *     "download"=DownloadTask::class,     *     "build"=BuildTask::class     *   },     *   defaultDiscriminatorValue="download"     * )     */    private $tasks = [];    // ...}

Cascading Operations

All operations on embedded documents are automatically cascaded. This is because embedded documents are part of their parent document and cannot exist without those by nature.