Data Fixtures

Data fixtures are meant for loading small sets of test data through your models to populate your database with data to test against. The data fixtures are often used side by side with some kind of unit/functional testing suite.

Importing

Importing data fixtures is just as easy as dumping. You can use the loadData() function:

$ Doctrine_Core::loadData('/path/to/data.yml');

You can either specify an individual yml file like we have done above, or you can specify an entire directory:

$ Doctrine_Core::loadData('/path/to/directory');

If you want to append the imported data to the already existing data then you need to use the second argument of the loadData() function. If you don't specify the second argument as true then the data will be purged before importing.

Here is how you can append instead of purging:

$ Doctrine_Core::loadData('/path/to/data.yml', true);

Dumping

You can dump data to fixtures file in many different formats to help you get started with writing your data fixtures. You can dump your data fixtures to one big YAML file like the following:

$ Doctrine_Core::dumpData('/path/to/data.yml');

Or you can optionally dump all data to individual files. One YAML file per model like the following:

$ Doctrine_Core::dumpData('/path/to/directory', true);

Implement

Now that we know a little about data fixtures lets implement them in to our test environment we created and have been using through the previous chapters so that we can test the example fixtures used in the next sections.

First create a directory in your doctrine_test directory named fixtures and create a file named data.yml inside:

$ mkdir fixtures
$ touch fixtures/data.yml

Now we need to just modify our generate.php script to include the code for loading the data fixtures. Add the following code to the bottom of generate.php:

// generate.php

// ...
Doctrine_Core::loadData('fixtures');

Writing

You can write your fixtures files manually and load them in to your applications. Below is a sample data.yml fixtures file. You can also split your data fixtures file up in to multiple files. Doctrine will read all fixtures files and parse them, then load all data.

For the next several examples we will use the following models:

// models/Resouce.php
class Resource extends Doctrine_Record
{
    public function setTableDefinition()
    {
        $this->hasColumn('name', 'string', 255);
        $this->hasColumn('resource_type_id', 'integer');
    }

    public function setUp()
    {
        $this->hasOne('ResourceType as Type', array(
                'local' => 'resource_type_id',
                'foreign' => 'id'
            )
        );

        $this->hasMany('Tag as Tags', array(
                'local' => 'resource_id',
                'foreign' => 'tag_id',
                'refClass' => 'ResourceTag'
            )
        );
    }
}

// models/ResourceType.php
class ResourceType extends Doctrine_Record
{
    public function setTableDefinition()
    {
        $this->hasColumn('name', 'string', 255);
    }

    public function setUp()
    {
        $this->hasMany('Resource as Resouces', array(
                'local' => 'id',
                'foreign' => 'resource_type_id'
            )
        );
    }
}

// models/Tag.php
class Tag extends Doctrine_Record
{
    public function setTableDefinition()
    {
        $this->hasColumn('name', 'string', 255);
    }

    public function setUp()
    {
        $this->hasMany('Resource as Resources', array(
                'local' => 'tag_id',
                'foreign' => 'resource_id',
                'refClass' => 'ResourceTag'
            )
        );
    }
}

// models/ResourceTag.php
class ResourceTag extends Doctrine_Record
{
    public function setTableDefinition()
    {
        $this->hasColumn('resource_id', 'integer');
        $this->hasColumn('tag_id', 'integer');
    }
}

// models/Category.php
class BaseCategory extends Doctrine_Record
{
    public function setTableDefinition()
    {
        $this->hasColumn('name', 'string', 255, array(
                'type' => 'string', 'length' => '255'
            )
        );
    }

    public function setUp()
    {
        $this->actAs('NestedSet');
    }
}

class BaseArticle extends Doctrine_Record
{
    public function setTableDefinition()
    {
        $this->hasColumn('title', 'string', 255, array(
                'type' => 'string', 'length' => '255'
            )
        );

        $this->hasColumn('body', 'clob', null, array(
                'type' => 'clob'
            )
        );
    }

    public function setUp()
    {
        $this->actAs('I18n', array('fields' => array('title', 'body')));
    }
}

Here is the same example in YAML format. You can read more about YAML in the YAML Schema Files chapter:

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---
# schema.yml

Resource:
  columns:
    name: string(255)
    resource_type_id: integer
  relations:
    Type:
      class: ResourceType
      foreignAlias: Resources
    Tags:
      class: Tag
      refClass: ResourceTag
      foreignAlias: Resources

ResourceType:
  columns:
    name: string(255)

Tag:
  columns:
    name: string(255)

ResourceTag:
  columns:
    resource_id: integer
    tag_id: integer

Category:
  actAs: [NestedSet]
  columns:
    name: string(255)

Article:
  actAs:
    I18n:
      fields: [title, body]
  columns:
    title: string(255)
    body: clob
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---
# fixtures/data.yml

Resource:
  Resource_1:
    name: Doctrine Video Tutorial
    Type: Video
    Tags: [tutorial, doctrine, help]
  Resource_2:
    name: Doctrine Cheat Sheet
    Type: Image
    Tags: [tutorial, cheat, help]

ResourceType:
  Video:
    name: Video
  Image:
    name: Image

Tag:
  tutorial:
    name: tutorial
  doctrine:
    name: doctrine
  help:
    name: help
  cheat:
    name: cheat
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You could optionally specify the Resources each tag is related to instead of specifying the Tags a Resource has.

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---
# fixtures/data.yml

# ...
Tag:
  tutorial:
    name: tutorial
    Resources: [Resource_1, Resource_2]
  doctrine:
    name: doctrine
    Resources: [Resource_1]
  help:
    name: help
    Resources: [Resource_1, Resource_2]
  cheat:
    name: cheat
    Resources: [Resource_1]
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Fixtures For Nested Sets

Writing a fixtures file for a nested set tree is slightly different from writing regular fixtures files. The structure of the tree is defined like the following:

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---
# fixtures/data.yml

Category:
  Category_1:
    name: Categories # the root node
    children:
      Category_2:
        name: Category 1
      Category_3:
        name: Category 2
        children:
          Category_4:
            name: Subcategory of Category 2
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# fixtures/data.yml

# ...
Category:
  NestedSet: true
  Category_1:
    name: Categories
# ...
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Or simply specifying the children keyword will make the data fixtures importing using the NestedSet api.

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# fixtures/data.yml

# ...
Category:
  Category_1:
    name: Categories
    children: []
# ...
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If you don't use one of the above methods then it is up to you to manually specify the lft, rgt and level values for your nested set records.

Fixtures For I18n

The fixtures for the I18n aren't anything custom since the I18n really is just a normal set of relationships that are built on the fly dynamically:

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---
# fixtures/data.yml

# ...
Article:
  Article_1:
    Translation:
      en:
        title: Title of article
        body: Body of article
      fr:
        title: French title of article
        body: French body of article
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Conclusion

By now we should be able to write and load our own data fixtures in our application. So, now we will move on to learning about the underlying Database Abstraction Layer in Doctrine. This layer is what makes all the previously discussed functionality possible. You can use this layer standalone apart from the ORM. In the next chapter we'll explain how you can use the DBAL by itself.