[TYPO3-mvc] Extending an existing model and adding fields

[Zoran Zaric]

On 23.12.2010 13:34, Franz Koch wrote:
>> I'm sorry if it wasn't clear.  I want to inherit from
>> Tx_Extbase_Domain_Model_FrontendUser so objects of my model can be used
>> as fe_users.
>>
>> Also I want to add fields only to my model not to the fe_user in general.
> 
> If I got you right, that's not possible. If your model should extend
> FrontendUser and use the fe_users table for authentication etc. you also
> have to add the new fields to the fe_users table. You can't map your
> model to the fe_users table but save certain properties in a different
> table. This will only work if the related properties are objects on
> their own, but still you would need at least one additional field in the
> fe_users table storing the relation (id) to that object (that's what
> Typo3 needs and expects).


ok, yeah then what I want isn't possible.  I didn't think "polluting"
core tables with extension-columns was a good practice, but it seems
like I don't have a choice.


>> I think an example helps clarifiying this.
>>
>> The administrator model only inherits from FrontendUser, it doesn't add
>> anything.  I'd like to have a model - let's call it Customer - which
>> inherits from FrontendUser but also has member variables like for
>> example an address.
>>
>> I can now add a member variable address and a getter and setter to my
>> Customer model.  What I don't know is how to make this persistent.
> 
> The magic words are single table inheritance. Different models using the
> same table for data storage and each having shared but also different
> properties available. Isn't that an option for you?


Like i seid above, I hoped extbase would bring a - in my eyes - cleaner
approache.


>>> b) directly assign and use your extended fe_user model throughout your
>>> extension. To get this working all you have to do is to also create your
>>> own repository to fetch the user objects (probably extending the fe_user
>>> repository) and provide a mapping information via TS:
>>>
>>> config.tx_extbase.persistence.classes {
>>>      // name of your own fe_user class name
>>>      Tx_YourExt_Domain_Model_User {
>>>          mapping {
>>>              tableName = fe_users
>>>              columns {
>>>                  lockToDomain.mapOnProperty = lockToDomain
>>>              }
>>>          }
>>>      }
>>> }
>>
>>
>> yeah this would map the whole table to the fe_users table.  In the
>> database I need a table for my model to save the model-specific data,
>> though.
> 
> Ok, so you really don't want to touch the fe_users table. The only
> possibility I see then is to do the implementation upside down. I'd then
> create a customer table and model, and add a property "credentials" or
> "login" to that model, where this would be the relation to the
> FrontendUser. The FrontendUser itself would only be used to save the
> credentials as well as the usergroups. That's what I did in a current
> project, but this also has quite some downsides if you have to interact
> with foreign extensions. You really get in trouble with those ones
> relying on fe_user data like first_name or last_name, which would not be
> available in the fe_users table as you store this information in your
> own table then. So if you need this information also in the fe_users
> table, you either have to map your getters and setters to fetch/save the
> data directly in the FrontendUser or keep the relevant data in both
> tables in sync. I'm currently still struggling on how to do it best -
> either have a clean domain model and redundancy or a working solution
> but scattered data.
> 
> Another downside is that you can't easily use directmail with
> personalization then unless you modify it to be able to fetch the
> userdata from your custom table (that's also a issue I have to deal with
> currently).

Yeah that sound like a even worse solution.

Thanks for the clarification.

Do you know if "multi table inheritance" is planned?  What are the
proposed solutions for FLOW3 for this problem?

Zoran