Table builder helper is a class that would help you to create tables in MySQL (primarily) without really going into details of SQL query.

Features

Table builder allows you to add rows, aliases, set primary key, default values, table name and options.

Start working with Table Builder

To start working with Table Builder, you need to create instance class of \Helpers\TableBuilder. Preferably for performance, create your instance class in any model and pass it \Helpers\Database instance to avoid duplicating database connection.

    private $tableBuilder;

    // Declaration of constructor in new model
    public function __construct () 
    {
        parent::__construct();

        // Example of reusing database and avoiding duplicating of database connection
        $this->tableBuilder = new TableBuilder($this->db);
    }

After initiating new table builder instance you can work with it.

WARNING: Table builder automatically creates a id field of type INT(11) with AUTO_INCREMENT and sets is PRIMARY KEY. If you want to set your own name or don‘t want to have id field, pass false as second parameter.

Creating simple table

Now we can create simple table, let‘s create table for comments:

// Another model‘s instance
public function createCommentTable () 
{
    // First argument is field name and second is type or alia
    $this->tableBuilder->addField(‘author‘, ‘VARCHAR(40)‘);
    $this->tableBuilder->addField(‘message‘, ‘TEXT‘);
    $this->tableBuilder->setName(‘comments‘);
    $this->tableBuilder->create();
}

This example of code would create table named comments with id, author and message fields. If you would try to run this code again you‘ll see error. To prevent that let‘s set IF NOT EXISTS to true:

// First argument is field name and second is type or alia
$this->tableBuilder->addField(‘author‘, ‘VARCHAR(40)‘);
$this->tableBuilder->addField(‘message‘, ‘TEXT‘);
$this->tableBuilder->setName(‘comments‘);
$this->tableBuilder->setNotExists(TRUE);
$this->tableBuilder->create();

Now your code shouldn‘t show any errors.

Aliases

Table builder supports aliases instead of using SQL types in addField method. There‘s only 3 included types: int INT(11), string VARCHAR(255) and description TINYTEXT.

You can add globally your own alias, for example, in config:

// configs above

TableBuilder::setAlias(‘name‘, ‘VARCHAR(40)‘);

// configs below

Methods

addField

Method addField is used to create field in query:

$tableBuilder->addField($field_name, $type_or_alias, $is_null, $options);

field_name is your name for the field, type_or_alias is defined type in MySQL or an alias defined in tableBuilder, is_null is by default is FALSE (so it‘s not null) but you can set it to TRUE if you needed and options are additional options such as AUTO_INCREMENT or CURRENT_TIMESTAMP.

Example of setting field date with CURRENT_TIMESTAMP:

$tableBuilder->addField(‘date‘, ‘TIMESTAMP‘, FALSE, \Helpers\TableBuilder::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP);

setDefault

Method setDefault is used to determine default value of field in query. There‘s the example:

$tableBuilder->setDefault(‘group_id‘, 0);

This example is illustrating how to set default user group_id in table.

WARNING: Don‘t use setDefault for timestamps, use addField with last argument \Helpers\TableBuilder::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP instead.

create

Method create is used to finish the query and create table in the database:

$table->create();

You can pass TRUE as first argument to reset the tableBuilder and then create another table reusing the same class.

reset

Method reset resets all properties in tableBuilder in order you could start constructing table from beginning. Use it if you need to add construct another table instead of creating new instance of table builder.

Debugging

If you run into some errors with table builder, you can debug SQL code by calling getSQL method:

// Some code ...

echo $this->tableBuilder->getSQL();