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Version: 0.8.x

Chained Relations

The Related trait is a representation of the arrows (1-1, 1-N, M-N) we draw on Entity Relationship Diagrams. A Linked is composed of a chain of relations, and is useful when:

  1. there exist multiple join paths between a pair of entities
  2. joining across multiple entities in a relational query

Take this as a simple example, where we join cake and filling via an intermediate cake_filling table.

#[derive(Debug)]
pub struct CakeToFilling;

impl Linked for CakeToFilling {
type FromEntity = cake::Entity;

type ToEntity = filling::Entity;

fn link(&self) -> Vec<RelationDef> {
vec![
cake_filling::Relation::Cake.def().rev(),
cake_filling::Relation::Filling.def(),
]
}
}

Alternatively, the RelationDef can be defined on the fly, where the following is equivalent to the above:

#[derive(Debug)]
pub struct CakeToFilling;

impl Linked for CakeToFilling {
type FromEntity = cake::Entity;

type ToEntity = filling::Entity;

fn link(&self) -> Vec<RelationDef> {
vec![
cake_filling::Relation::Cake.def().rev(),
cake_filling::Entity::belongs_to(filling::Entity)
.from(cake_filling::Column::FillingId)
.to(filling::Column::Id)
.into(),
]
}
}

Lazy Loading

Find fillings that can be filled into a cake with the find_linked method.

let cake_model = cake::Model {
id: 12,
name: "".to_owned(),
};

assert_eq!(
cake_model
.find_linked(cake::CakeToFilling)
.build(DbBackend::MySql)
.to_string(),
[
r#"SELECT `filling`.`id`, `filling`.`name`"#,
r#"FROM `filling`"#,
r#"INNER JOIN `cake_filling` ON `cake_filling`.`filling_id` = `filling`.`id`"#,
r#"INNER JOIN `cake` ON `cake`.`id` = `cake_filling`.`cake_id`"#,
r#"WHERE `cake`.`id` = 12"#,
]
.join(" ")
);

Eager Loading

Find all pairs of cake and filling together in a single select with the find_also_linked method.

assert_eq!(
cake::Entity::find()
.find_also_linked(cake::CakeToFilling)
.build(DbBackend::MySql)
.to_string(),
[
"SELECT `cake`.`id` AS `A_id`, `cake`.`name` AS `A_name`,",
"`filling`.`id` AS `B_id`, `filling`.`name` AS `B_name`",
"FROM `cake`",
"LEFT JOIN `cake_filling` ON `cake`.`id` = `cake_filling`.`cake_id`",
"LEFT JOIN `filling` ON `cake_filling`.`filling_id` = `filling`.`id`",
]
.join(" ")
);