Symfony 5.0.8 weird issue when updating a simple entity - symfony

Question

Here is my entity:
<?php
namespace App\Entity\Contact;
use Doctrine\ORM\Mapping as ORM;
use Symfony\Component\Validator\Constraints as Assert;
/**
* #ORM\Entity
* #ORM\Table(name="contact_contact")
*/
class Contact
{
/**
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\Column(type="integer", options={"unsigned":true})
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #Assert\NotBlank
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=40, nullable=true)
*/
private $fname;
/**
* #ORM\Column(type="string", length=40, nullable=true)
*/
private $lname;
public function getId(): ?int
{
return $this->id;
}
public function getFname(): ?string
{
return $this->fname;
}
public function setFname(string $fname): self
{
$this->fname = $fname;
return $this;
}
public function getLname(): ?string
{
return $this->lname;
}
public function setLname(?string $lname): self
{
$this->lname = $lname;
return $this;
}
}
Here is the edit controller action code:
/**
* #Route("/{id}/edit", name="contact_contact_edit", methods={"GET","POST"})
*/
public function edit(Request $request, Contact $contact): Response
{
$form = $this->createForm(ContactType::class, $contact);
$form->handleRequest($request);
if ($form->isSubmitted()) {
if ($form->isValid()) {
$this->getDoctrine()->getManager()->flush();
}
}
return $this->render('contact/contact/edit.html.twig', [
'contact' => $contact,
'form' => $form->createView(),
]);
}
When I post the form but leave the fname (first name) field empty...I get this error (Symfony\Component\PropertyAccess\Exception\InvalidArgumentException)
Expected argument of type "string", "null" given at property path
"fname".
When creating the entity, the #Assert works as expected and the message says so...but if I leave it blank and update post...bzzzt error.
What am I missing?
EDIT | Here is the form class incase thats doing something?
<?php
namespace App\Form\Contact;
use App\Entity\Contact\Contact;
use Symfony\Component\Form\AbstractType;
use Symfony\Component\Form\Extension\Core\Type\TextType;
use Symfony\Component\Form\FormBuilderInterface;
use Symfony\Component\OptionsResolver\OptionsResolver;
class ContactType extends AbstractType
{
public function buildForm(FormBuilderInterface $builder, array $options)
{
$builder
->add('fname', TextType::class, ['label' => 'First Name'])
->add('lname', TextType::class, ['label' => 'Last Name']);
}
public function configureOptions(OptionsResolver $resolver)
{
$resolver->setDefaults([
'data_class' => Contact::class,
'min_entry' => false,
// NOTE: Must be added to every form class to disable HTML5 validation
'attr' => ['novalidate' => 'novalidate']
]);
$resolver->setAllowedTypes('min_entry', 'bool');
}
}

Answer 1

That's one of the reasons you should avoid allowing the form component changing your entities directly. It will set the data, and then validate it. So it's totally possible for the entity to be in an invalid state after the form has been submitted.
Anyway, you can specify what an empty value should be:
->add('fname', TextType::class, ['label' => 'First Name', 'empty_data' => ''])