Symfony2 - Database table relationships - symfony

Question

I was working on an app and had everything set up nicely. I have an Alert entity which takes the following form.
/**
* Alert
*
* #ORM\Table(name="alert")
* #ORM\Entity(repositoryClass="Nick\AlertBundle\Repository\AlertRepository")
*
*/
class Alert
{
/**
* #var integer
*
* #ORM\Column(name="id", type="integer")
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="IDENTITY")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #var string
*
* #ORM\Column(name="search_command", type="string", length=256, nullable=false)
*/
private $searchCommand;
/**
* #var string
*
* #ORM\Column(name="is_connecting", type="string", length=20, nullable=false)
*/
private $isConnecting;
/**
* #var \DateTime
*
* #ORM\Column(name="last_updated", type="datetime", nullable=false)
*/
private $lastUpdated;
/**
* #var boolean
*
* #ORM\Column(name="is_deleted", type="boolean", nullable=false)
*/
private $isDeleted;
/**
* #var string
*
* #ORM\Column(name="alert_status", type="string", length=11, nullable=false)
*/
private $alertStatus;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="Nick\AlertBundle\Entity\BookingClass", mappedBy="availabilityAlert")
*/
private $bookingClass;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="Nick\AlertBundle\Entity\Pseudos", mappedBy="availabilityAlert")
*/
private $pseudo;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="Nick\AlertBundle\Entity\FlightNumbers", mappedBy="availabilityAlert")
*/
private $flightNumbers;
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="Nick\AlertBundle\Entity\Availability", mappedBy="availabilityAlert")
*/
private $availability;
/**
* Constructor
*/
public function __construct()
{
$this->bookingClass = new ArrayCollection();
$this->pseudo = new ArrayCollection();
$this->flightNumbers = new ArrayCollection();
$this->availability = new ArrayCollection();
}
//other methods
}
So I had this app working, but now I have decided to add a log in system. Each Alert should now be associated to a user - a user can have none to many alerts.
So I have created my user class and set up all the security. The entity looks like
/**
* User
*
* #ORM\Table(name="user_table")
* #ORM\Entity()
*
*/
class User implements UserInterface
{
/**
* #var integer
*
* #ORM\Column(name="id", type="integer")
* #ORM\Id
* #ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="IDENTITY")
*/
private $id;
/**
* #var string
*
* #ORM\Column(name="username", type="string", length=255, nullable=false)
*/
private $username;
/**
* #var string
*
* #ORM\Column(name="password", type="string", length=255, nullable=false)
*/
private $password;
//other functions
}
So whats the best way to associate Alerts to a User? Should I set it up like I do the with the other Entities in my Alert class? Should I add an Alert variable within the user class which is an Array Collection of Alerts?
Really just looking for a bit of advice how to best handle this.
Thanks

Answer 1

Yes you should add one to many relation ship in user entity and link with alert entity and in alert entity point back to user entity in many to one way
class User
{
/**
* #ORM\OneToMany(targetEntity="Alert", mappedBy="user")
*/
protected $alerts;
public function __construct()
{
$this->alerts= new ArrayCollection();
}
//... other getters amd setters
}
class Alert
{
// ...
/**
* #ORM\ManyToOne(targetEntity="User", inversedBy="alerts")
* #ORM\JoinColumn(name="user_id", referencedColumnName="id")
*/
protected $user;
}
Reference

Answer 2

I dont really see here any other solutions besides using ManyToOne association in the Alert entity or ManyToMany in case one Alert has to be associated with more then 1 user.
Should I add an Alert variable within the user class which is an Array Collection of Alerts?
Heck, why not? That way you can easily get users with joined alerts.