How to safely access other users and other model's records inside Blade template - laravel

Question

I have 3 models in my app Users, Sales and Plans, when I render sales for each customer (due to storing) I only get id's for other users and models related to that sale (like account manager, owner, plan), now I'm trying to use those ID's inside blade to get names or other rows based on ID and model. Here is the show function:
public function show($id) {
$user = User::find($id);
$sales = Sale::where('customer_id', '=', $id)->get();
return view('profiles.customer', ['user' => $user, 'sales' => $sales]);
}
And in blade I get all those sales like:
#foreach ($sales as $sale)
<li>
<i class="fa fa-home bg-blue"></i>
<div class="timeline-item">
<span class="time"><i class="fa fa-clock-o"></i> {{$sale->created_at->format('g:ia, M jS Y')}}</span>
<h3 class="timeline-header">{{$user->name}} became a customer</h3>
<div class="timeline-body">
<p>Date: {{$sale->sold_date}}</p>
<p>Price: {{$sale->sale_price}}</p>
</div>
</div>
</li>
#endforeach
So inside each record I have like "account_manager_id", "agent_id", "owner_id", "plan_id".
Currently I have this solved by adding public static function (this is for users, have same function for Plan model as well) in Sale model class:
public static function getUser($id) {
return User::where('id', $id)->first();
}
And I'm using it like this in Blade:
Account manager: {{$sale->getUser($sale->account_mgr_id)->name}}
Is this the safest and best way to do it? Or there is something I'm overlooking here?

Answer 1

You need to add relationships in your Sales Model.
class Sales extends Eloquent {
.....
.....
public function accountManager() {
return $this->hasMany('App\User', 'account_manager_id');
}
public function agents() {
return $this->hasMany('App\User', 'agent_id');
}
public function owner() {
return $this->hasOne('App\User', 'owner_id');
}
}
Now $sales->agents will give you a user with agent_id as id in User table.
Update your hasOne, hasMany relationships as your need. Laravel Documentation.
From your blade template, your access your AccountManager as
#foreach($sales->accountManager as $manager)
Name: {{ $manager->name}}
#endforeach

Answer 2

I think you could use Eloquent relationships. Taking your example, you should define relationship in your User model:
<?php
class User extends Eloquent {
public function sales() {
return $this->hasMany(Sale::class, 'customer_id');
}
}
Then, whenever you need to get sales of that user (entries, that relate via customer_id column), just simply do
<?php
$user = User::find($id);
$sales = $user->sales;
This is very fun when when you have to print out list of users that have sales, for example
<?php
public function showUsersWithSales() {
$users = User::with('sales')->get();
return view('users-with-sales', compact('users'));
}
users-with-sales.blade.php example:
#foreach ($users as $user)
User: {{ $user->name }}<br>
Sales:<br>
#foreach ($user->sales as $sale)
{{ $sale->amount }} {{ $sale->currency }} # {{ $sale->created_at }}<br>
#endforeach
<hr>
#endforeach
It would print all users with their sale amount and currency, followed by date when it was created.
This sample takes into account, that your User model has name attribute and your Sale model has amount, currency, created_at and customer_id fields in your database.
To reverse the action, say you have a sale and want to know who made it, just simply define a relationship!
<?php
class Sale extends Eloquent {
public function customer() {
return $this->belongsTo(User::class, 'customer_id');
}
}
Hope that helps!

Answer 3

Eloquent Relationship is your friend, https://laravel.com/docs/5.2/eloquent-relationships and you can solve your problem easily.
Suggestion is to remove all those function access and control from view and put it somewhere else. This will be good habit for you so you can avoid the infamous fat view.