HasMany Relation through BelongsToMany Relation - laravel

Question

Is it possible to make Laravel relation through belongsToMany relations?
I have 4 tables:
1)Restaurants (id , name) - uses hasManyRelation with Workers table
2)Directors (id , name)
3)Directors_Restaurants (id, director_id, restaurant_id) - pivot table for connecting belongsToMany Restaurants with Directors
3)Workers (id, name, restaurant_id)
With this function in Directors model i can get all connected restaurants
public function restaurants()
{
return $this->belongsToMany('App\Restaurant','director_restaurant');
}
With this function in my code i can get all workers of all restaurants of one director
$director = Director::find(1);
$director->load('restaurants.workers');
$workers = $director->restaurants->pluck('workers')->collapse();
So my question is : can i declare similar relation in my Director model to get all its workers of all its restaurants?

Answer 1

Of course you can have hasMany relationship method on Director model with Eager Loading
just like below
public function restaurants()
{
return $this->hasMany(Restaurant::class)->with('restaurants.workers');
}

Answer 2

i can suggest a solution like this:
Director Model OPTION 1
public function getAllRestaurants(){
return $this->hasMany(Restaurant::class)->with('restaurants.workers');
}
Director Model OPTION 2
public function getAllRestaurants(){
$this->load('restaurants.workers');
return $this->restaurants->pluck('workers')->collapse();
}
You can get all restaurants anywhere
$all_restaurants = Director::find(1)->getAllRestaurants();

Answer 3

You can define a direct relationship by "skipping" the restaurants table:
class Director extends Model
{
public function workers()
{
return $this->belongsToMany(
Worker::class,
'director_restaurant',
'director_id', 'restaurant_id', null, 'restaurant_id'
);
}
}

Answer 4

You can define an accessor method in your model to hide some of the logic
# App/Director.php
// You'll need this line if you want this attribute to appear when you call toArray() or toJson()
// If not, you can comment it
protected $appends = ['workers'];
public function getWorkersAttribute()
{
return $this->restaurants->pluck('workers')->collapse();
}
# Somewhere else
$director = Director::with('restaurants.workers')->find(1);
$workers = $director->workers;
But ultimately, you still have to load the nested relationship 'restaurants.workers' for it to work.
Given your table attributes you could also define a custom HasMany relationship that looks like this
# App/DirectorRestaurant.php
public function workers()
{
return $this->hasMany(Worker::class, 'restaurant_id', 'restaurant_id');
}
# Somewhere else
$director = Director::find(1);
$workers = DirectorRestaurant::where('director_id', $director->id)->get()->each(function($q) { $q->load('workers'); });
But I don't recommend it because it's not very readable.
Lastly, there's the staudenmeir/eloquent-has-many-deep package where you can define that sort of nested relationship.
https://github.com/staudenmeir/eloquent-has-many-deep