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Database

Connection​

Coilpack sets up a new MySQL database connection called coilpack using your ExpressionEngine config values.

Queries​

You can create write custom queries against this connection by using the Laravel DB Facade

\Illuminate\Support\Facades\DB::connection('coilpack')->table('channel_entries')->select('entry_id')->take(10)->get();

For more information on what you can do with the Laravel's Query Builder check out their documentation.

Models​

Many native Expression Engine models have been translated and have an Eloquent Model counterpart that can be found in the \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models namespace.

Custom Fields​

Several models pull custom field data data from across multiple tables (one per field). These models are:

  • \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\Channel\ChannelEntry
  • \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\Category\Category
  • \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\Member\Member

If you are retrieving more than a single model and intend to use these custom fields you may want to consider eager loading the data. You only need to add the data relation to your query's eager loading function. For a ChannelEntry query that would look like ChannelEntry::with('data')->take(50)->get()

Accessing the custom fields can be done right from the parent model like this:

use \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\Channel\ChannelEntry;

$entry = ChannelEntry::find(1);

// Returns \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\FieldContent
$customField = $entry->custom_field_name;

// Get the ChannelField instance
$field = $customField->field;

// Use the Fieldtype to process the value for the custom field
// Returns Expressionengine\Coilpack\FieldtypeOutput which is a wrapper
// for the data to make display in templates more convenient
$value = $customField->value();

Another example of using ChannelEntry data

use \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\Channel\ChannelEntry;

$entries = ChannelEntry::whereHas('channel', function($query) {
    return $query->where('channel_name', 'news');
})->get();

return $entries->transform(function($entry) {
    return [
        'title' => $entry->title,
        'custom' => $entry->custom_field_name
    ];
});

Extending Models​

If you want to add custom relationships, query scopes, accessors/mutators or any other functionality to a Coilpack model like ChannelEntry we recommend extending it and then doing any customization on your model.


class MyChannelEntry extends \Expressionengine\Coilpack\Models\Channel\ChannelEntry {


}

Take a look at the documentation to understand more about what is possible with Laravel's Eloquent ORM