Laravel DB – All in One

Installing and Creating a Laravel 5.8 Project

In this section we’ll introduce Laravel and then proceed it to install and create a Laravel 5.8 project.

About Laravel

Laravel docs describe it as:

Laravel is a web application framework with expressive, elegant syntax. We believe development must be an enjoyable and creative experience to be truly fulfilling. Laravel attempts to take the pain out of development by easing common tasks used in the majority of web projects, such as:

• Simple, fast routing engine.
• Powerful dependency injection container.
• Multiple back-ends for session and cache storage.
• Expressive, intuitive database ORM.
• Database agnostic schema migrations.
• Robust background job processing.
• Real-time event broadcasting.

Laravel is accessible, yet powerful, providing tools needed for large, robust applications.

Generating a Laravel 5.8 project is easy and straightforward. In your terminal, run the following command:

$ composer create-project  --prefer-dist  laravel/laravel laravel-first-crud-app

This will install laravel/laravel v5.8.3.

Note: Make sure you have PHP 7.1 installed on your system. Otherwise, composer will use Laravel 5.5 for your project.

You can verify the installed version in your project using:

$ cd laravel-first-crud-app
$ php artisan -V
Laravel Framework 5.8.19

Installing the Front-End Dependencies

In your generated project, you can see that a package.json file is generated which includes many front-end libraries that can be used by your project:

• axios,
• bootstrap,
• cross-env,
• jquery,
• laravel-mix,
• lodash,
• popper.js,
• resolve-url-loader,
• sass,
• sass-loader,
• vue.

Note: You can use your preferred libraries with Laravel not specifically the ones added to package.json.

The package.json file in your Laravel project includes a few packages such as vue and axios to help you get started building your JavaScript application.

It also includes bootstrap to help you get started with Bootstrap for styling your UI.

It include Laravel Mix to help you compile your SASS files to plain CSS.

You need to use npm to install the front-end dependencies:

$ npm install

After running this command a node_modules folder will be created and the dependencies will be installed into it.

Note: You need to have Node.js and npm installed on your system before you can install the front-end dependencies.

Creating a MySQL Database

Let’s now create a MySQL database that we’ll use to persist dat ain our Laravel application. In your terminal, run the following command to run the mysql client:

$ mysql -u root -p

When prompted, enter the password for your MySQL server when you’ve installed it.

Next, run the following SQL statement to create a db database:

mysql> create database db;

Open the .env file and update the credentials to access your MySQL database:

DB_CONNECTION=mysql
DB_HOST=127.0.0.1
DB_PORT=3306
DB_DATABASE=db
DB_USERNAME=root
DB_PASSWORD=******

You need to enter the database name, the username and password.

At this point, you can run the migrate command to create your database and a bunch of SQL tables needed by Laravel:

$ php artisan migrate

Note: You can run the migrate command at any other points of your development to add other SQL tables in your database or to later your database if you need to add any changes later.

Creating your First Laravel Model

Laravel uses the MVC architectural pattern to organize your application in three decoupled parts:

• The Model which encapsulates the data access layer,
• The View which encapsulates the representation layer,
• Controller which encapsulates the code to control the application and communicates with the model and view layers.

Wikipedia defines MVC as:

Model–view–controller is an architectural pattern commonly used for developing user interfacesthat divides an application into three interconnected parts. This is done to separate internal representations of information from the ways information is presented to and accepted from the user.

Now, let’s create our first Laravel Model. In your terminal, run the following command:

$ php artisan make:model Contact --migration

This will create a Contact model and a migration file. In the terminal, we get an output similar to:

Model created successfully.
Created Migration: 2019_01_27_193840_create_contacts_table

Open the database/migrations/xxxxxx_create_contacts_table migration file and update it accordingly:

<?php

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;
use Illuminate\Database\Schema\Blueprint;
use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;

class CreateContactsTable extends Migration
{
    /**
     * Run the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function up()
    {
        Schema::create('contacts', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->increments('id');
            $table->timestamps();
            $table->string('first_name');
            $table->string('last_name');
            $table->string('email');
            $table->string('job_title');
            $table->string('city');   
            $table->string('country');            
        });
    }

    /**
     * Reverse the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function down()
    {
        Schema::dropIfExists('contacts');
    }
}

We added the first_name, last_name, email, job_title, city and country fields in the contacts table.

You can now create the contacts table in the database using the following command:

$ php artisan migrate

Now, let’s look at our Contact model, which will be used to interact with the contacts database table. Open the app/Contact.php and update it:

<?php

namespace App;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class Contact extends Model
{
    protected $fillable = [
        'first_name',
        'last_name',
        'email',
        'city',
        'country',
        'job_title'       
    ];
}

Creating the Controller and Routes

After creating the model and migrated our database. Let’s now create the controller and the routes for working with the Contact model. In your terminal, run the following command:

$ php artisan make:controller ContactController --resource

Laravel resource routing assigns the typical “CRUD” routes to a controller with a single line of code. For example, you may wish to create a controller that handles all HTTP requests for “photos” stored by your application. Using the make:controller Artisan command, we can quickly create such a controller:

This command will generate a controller at app/Http/Controllers/PhotoController.php. The controller will contain a method for each of the available resource operations.

Open the app/Http/Controllers/ContactController.php file. This is the initial content:

<?php

namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use Illuminate\Http\Request;

class ContactController extends Controller
{
    /**
     * Display a listing of the resource.
     *
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function index()
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Show the form for creating a new resource.
     *
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function create()
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Store a newly created resource in storage.
     *
     * @param  \Illuminate\Http\Request  $request
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function store(Request $request)
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Display the specified resource.
     *
     * @param  int  $id
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function show($id)
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Show the form for editing the specified resource.
     *
     * @param  int  $id
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function edit($id)
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Update the specified resource in storage.
     *
     * @param  \Illuminate\Http\Request  $request
     * @param  int  $id
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function update(Request $request, $id)
    {
        //
    }

    /**
     * Remove the specified resource from storage.
     *
     * @param  int  $id
     * @return \Illuminate\Http\Response
     */
    public function destroy($id)
    {
        //
    }
}

The ContactController class extends Controller class available from Laravel and defines a bunch of methods which will be used to do the CRUD operations against the Contact model.

You can read the role of the method on the comment above it.

Now we need to provide implementations for these methods.

But before that, let’s add routing. Open the routes/web.php file and update it accordingly:

<?php
Route::get('/', function () {
    return view('welcome');
});

Route::resource('contacts', 'ContactController');

Using the resource() static method of Route, you can create multiple routes to expose multiple actions on the resource.

These routes are mapped to various ContactController methods which will need to implement in the next section:

• GET/contacts, mapped to the index() method,
• GET /contacts/create, mapped to the create() method,
• POST /contacts, mapped to the store() method,
• GET /contacts/{contact}, mapped to the show() method,
• GET /contacts/{contact}/edit, mapped to the edit() method,
• PUT/PATCH /contacts/{contact}, mapped to the update() method,
• DELETE /contacts/{contact}, mapped to the destroy() method.

These routes are used to serve HTML templates and also as API endpoints for working with the Contact model.

Note: If you want to create a controller that will only expose a RESTful API, you can use the apiResource method to exclude the routes that are used to serve the HTML templates:

Route::apiResource('contacts', 'ContactController');

Implementing the CRUD Operations

Let’s now implement the controller methods alongside the views.

C: Implementing the Create Operation and Adding a Form

The ContactController includes the store() method that maps to the POST /contacts API endpoint which will be used to create a contact in the database and the create() that maps to the GET /contacts/create route which will be used to serve the HTML form used to submit the contact to POST /contacts API endpoint.

Let’s implement these two methods.

Re-open the app/Http/Controllers/ContactController.php file and start by importing the Contact model:

use App\Contact;

Next, locate the store() method and update it accordingly:

    public function store(Request $request)
    {
        $request->validate([
            'first_name'=>'required',
            'last_name'=>'required',
            'email'=>'required'
        ]);

        $contact = new Contact([
            'first_name' => $request->get('first_name'),
            'last_name' => $request->get('last_name'),
            'email' => $request->get('email'),
            'job_title' => $request->get('job_title'),
            'city' => $request->get('city'),
            'country' => $request->get('country')
        ]);
        $contact->save();
        return redirect('/contacts')->with('success', 'Contact saved!');
    }

Next, locate the create() method and update it:

    public function create()
    {
        return view('contacts.create');
    }

The create() function makes use of the view() method to return the create.blade.php template which needs to be present in the resources/views folder.

Before creating the create.blade.php template we need to create a base template that will be extended by the create template and all the other templates that will create later in this tutorial.

In the resources/views folder, create a base.blade.php file:

$ cd resources/views
$ touch base.blade.php

Open the resources/views/base.blade.php file and add the following blade template:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
  <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
  <title>Laravel 5.8 & MySQL CRUD Tutorial</title>
  <link href="{{ asset('css/app.css') }}" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
</head>
<body>
  <div class="container">
    @yield('main')
  </div>
  <script src="{{ asset('js/app.js') }}" type="text/js"></script>
</body>
</html>

Now, let’s create the create.blade.php template. First, create a contacts folder in the views folder:

$ mkdir contacts

Next, create the template

$ cd contacts
$ touch create.blade.php

Open the resources/views/contacts/create.blade.php file and add the following code:

@extends('base')

@section('main')
<div class="row">
 <div class="col-sm-8 offset-sm-2">
    <h1 class="display-3">Add a contact</h1>
  <div>
    @if ($errors->any())
      <div class="alert alert-danger">
        <ul>
            @foreach ($errors->all() as $error)
              <li>{{ $error }}</li>
            @endforeach
        </ul>
      </div><br />
    @endif
      <form method="post" action="{{ route('contacts.store') }}">
          @csrf
          <div class="form-group">    
              <label for="first_name">First Name:</label>
              <input type="text" class="form-control" name="first_name"/>
          </div>

          <div class="form-group">
              <label for="last_name">Last Name:</label>
              <input type="text" class="form-control" name="last_name"/>
          </div>

          <div class="form-group">
              <label for="email">Email:</label>
              <input type="text" class="form-control" name="email"/>
          </div>
          <div class="form-group">
              <label for="city">City:</label>
              <input type="text" class="form-control" name="city"/>
          </div>
          <div class="form-group">
              <label for="country">Country:</label>
              <input type="text" class="form-control" name="country"/>
          </div>
          <div class="form-group">
              <label for="job_title">Job Title:</label>
              <input type="text" class="form-control" name="job_title"/>
          </div>                         
          <button type="submit" class="btn btn-primary-outline">Add contact</button>
      </form>
  </div>
</div>
</div>
@endsection

This is a screenshot of our create form!

Fill out the form and click on the Add contact button to create a contact in the database. You should be redirected to /contacts route which doesn’t have a view associated to it yet.

R: Implementing the Read Operation and Getting Data

Next, let’s implement the read operation to get and display contacts data from our MySQL database.

Go to the app/Http/Controllers/ContactController.php file, locate the index() method and update it:

    public function index()
    {
        $contacts = Contact::all();

        return view('contacts.index', compact('contacts'));
    }

Next, you need to create the the index template. Create a resources/views/contacts.index.blade.php file:

$ touch index.blade.php

Open the resources/views/contacts/index.blade.php file and add the following code:

@extends('base')

@section('main')
<div class="row">
<div class="col-sm-12">
    <h1 class="display-3">Contacts</h1>    
  <table class="table table-striped">
    <thead>
        <tr>
          <td>ID</td>
          <td>Name</td>
          <td>Email</td>
          <td>Job Title</td>
          <td>City</td>
          <td>Country</td>
          <td colspan = 2>Actions</td>
        </tr>
    </thead>
    <tbody>
        @foreach($contacts as $contact)
        <tr>
            <td>{{$contact->id}}</td>
            <td>{{$contact->first_name}} {{$contact->last_name}}</td>
            <td>{{$contact->email}}</td>
            <td>{{$contact->job_title}}</td>
            <td>{{$contact->city}}</td>
            <td>{{$contact->country}}</td>
            <td>
                <a href="{{ route('contacts.edit',$contact->id)}}" class="btn btn-primary">Edit</a>
            </td>
            <td>
                <form action="{{ route('contacts.destroy', $contact->id)}}" method="post">
                  @csrf
                  @method('DELETE')
                  <button class="btn btn-danger" type="submit">Delete</button>
                </form>
            </td>
        </tr>
        @endforeach
    </tbody>
  </table>
<div>
</div>
@endsection

U: Implementing the Update Operation

Next, we need to implement the update operation. Go to the app/Http/Controllers/ContactController.php file, locate the edit($id) method and update it:

    public function edit($id)
    {
        $contact = Contact::find($id);
        return view('contacts.edit', compact('contact'));        
    }

Next, you need to implement the update() method:

    public function update(Request $request, $id)
    {
        $request->validate([
            'first_name'=>'required',
            'last_name'=>'required',
            'email'=>'required'
        ]);

        $contact = Contact::find($id);
        $contact->first_name =  $request->get('first_name');
        $contact->last_name = $request->get('last_name');
        $contact->email = $request->get('email');
        $contact->job_title = $request->get('job_title');
        $contact->city = $request->get('city');
        $contact->country = $request->get('country');
        $contact->save();

        return redirect('/contacts')->with('success', 'Contact updated!');
    }

Now, you need to add the edit template. Inside the resources/views/contacts/, create an edit.blade.php file:

$ touch edit.blade.php

Open the resources/views/contacts/edit.blade.php file and add this code:

@extends('base') 
@section('main')
<div class="row">
    <div class="col-sm-8 offset-sm-2">
        <h1 class="display-3">Update a contact</h1>

        @if ($errors->any())
        <div class="alert alert-danger">
            <ul>
                @foreach ($errors->all() as $error)
                <li>{{ $error }}</li>
                @endforeach
            </ul>
        </div>
        <br /> 
        @endif
        <form method="post" action="{{ route('contacts.update', $contact->id) }}">
            @method('PATCH') 
            @csrf
            <div class="form-group">

                <label for="first_name">First Name:</label>
                <input type="text" class="form-control" name="first_name" value={{ $contact->first_name }} />
            </div>

            <div class="form-group">
                <label for="last_name">Last Name:</label>
                <input type="text" class="form-control" name="last_name" value={{ $contact->last_name }} />
            </div>

            <div class="form-group">
                <label for="email">Email:</label>
                <input type="text" class="form-control" name="email" value={{ $contact->email }} />
            </div>
            <div class="form-group">
                <label for="city">City:</label>
                <input type="text" class="form-control" name="city" value={{ $contact->city }} />
            </div>
            <div class="form-group">
                <label for="country">Country:</label>
                <input type="text" class="form-control" name="country" value={{ $contact->country }} />
            </div>
            <div class="form-group">
                <label for="job_title">Job Title:</label>
                <input type="text" class="form-control" name="job_title" value={{ $contact->job_title }} />
            </div>
            <button type="submit" class="btn btn-primary">Update</button>
        </form>
    </div>
</div>
@endsection

U: Implementing the Delete Operation

Finally, we’ll proceed to implement the delete operation. Go to the app/Http/Controllers/ContactController.php file, locate the destroy() method and update it accordingly:

    public function destroy($id)
    {
        $contact = Contact::find($id);
        $contact->delete();

        return redirect('/contacts')->with('success', 'Contact deleted!');
    }

You can notice that when we redirect to the /contacts route in our CRUD API methods, we also pass a success message but it doesn’t appear in our index template. Let’s change that!

Go to the resources/views/contacts/index.blade.php file and add the following code:

<div class="col-sm-12">

  @if(session()->get('success'))
    <div class="alert alert-success">
      {{ session()->get('success') }}  
    </div>
  @endif
</div>

We also need to add a button to takes us to the create form. Add this code below the header:

    <div>
    <a style="margin: 19px;" href="{{ route('contacts.create')}}" class="btn btn-primary">New contact</a>
    </div>  

This is a screenshot of the page after we created a contact:

Conclusion

We’ve reached the end of this tutorial. We created a CRUD application with Laravel 5.8, PHP 7.1 and MySQL.

Hope you enjoyed the tutorial and see you in the next one!