BelongsToMany retrieving and deleting correctly, not updating/saving in CakePHP 3.x - cakephp

Question

CakePHP 3.8.13 - I have a table model which CAN retrieve the related data from a table and remove it, but when updating/adding an entry, it does not change this data for some reason. So it seems like a correct setup, yet it does not update/add them. In short, it's a "Questions" table and a "Divisions" table, with a relation table called "questions_divisions". In this relation table there is a question_id and a division_id column. If I manually add or remove entries there, it all seems OK. Just when doing patchEntity and save, it does not do it. This is the post data:
'name' => string 'Some name' (length=8)
'questiontype_id' => string '1' (length=1)
'extra' => string '' (length=0)
'answer' => string '' (length=0)
'datafield' => string 'Person.firstname' (length=16)
'divisions' =>
array (size=1)
'_ids' =>
array (size=3)
0 => string '1' (length=1)
1 => string '7' (length=1)
2 => string '5' (length=1)
This is the code that is executed (so the above post data, is $this->request->getData()):
$question = $this->Questions->patchEntity($question, $this->request->getData());
if ($this->Questions->save($question)) {
All this is more or less the same that's happening elsewhere in the application for a different model, which actually DOES add/update the divisions. I also cleared the /tmp/cache just in case, didn't seem to do the trick. I'm at a loss here.
This is the whole table model:
<?php
namespace App\Model\Table;
use Cake\ORM\Query;
use Cake\ORM\RulesChecker;
use Cake\ORM\Table;
use Cake\Validation\Validator;
/**
* Questions Model
*
* #property \App\Model\Table\QuestiontypesTable|\Cake\ORM\Association\BelongsTo $Questiontypes
* #property \App\Model\Table\ActivitiesTable|\Cake\ORM\Association\BelongsToMany $Activities
* #property \App\Model\Table\BookingformsTable|\Cake\ORM\Association\BelongsToMany $Bookingforms
* #property \App\Model\Table\DivisionsTable|\Cake\ORM\Association\BelongsToMany $Divisions
*
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question get($primaryKey, $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question newEntity($data = null, array $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question[] newEntities(array $data, array $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question|bool save(\Cake\Datasource\EntityInterface $entity, $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question|bool saveOrFail(\Cake\Datasource\EntityInterface $entity, $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question patchEntity(\Cake\Datasource\EntityInterface $entity, array $data, array $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question[] patchEntities($entities, array $data, array $options = [])
* #method \App\Model\Entity\Question findOrCreate($search, callable $callback = null, $options = [])
*/
class QuestionsTable extends Table {
public function beforeFind ($event, $query, $options, $primary) {
$order = $query->clause('order');
if ($order === null || !count($order)) {
$query->order([$this->getAlias() . '.name' => 'ASC']);
}
}
/**
* Initialize method
*
* #param array $config The configuration for the Table.
* #return void
*/
public function initialize(array $config) {
parent::initialize($config);
$this->setTable('questions');
$this->setDisplayField('name');
$this->setPrimaryKey('id');
$this->addBehavior('Search.Search');
$this->addBehavior('Page');
$this->hasMany('Questions_divisions', [
'foreignKey' => 'question_id'
]);
$this->belongsTo('Questiontypes', [
'foreignKey' => 'questiontype_id',
'joinType' => 'INNER'
]);
$this->belongsToMany('Activities', [
'foreignKey' => 'question_id',
'targetForeignKey' => 'activity_id',
'joinTable' => 'activities_questions'
]);
$this->belongsToMany('Bookingforms', [
'foreignKey' => 'questions_id',
'targetForeignKey' => 'bookingforms_id',
'joinTable' => 'questions_bookingforms'
]);
$this->belongsToMany('Divisions', [
'foreignKey' => 'question_id',
'targetForeignKey' => 'division_id',
'joinTable' => 'questions_divisions'
]);
//Setup searchfield
$this->behaviors()->Page->searchSetup($this->behaviors()->Search->searchManager(), $this->searchForm());
}
/**
* Default validation rules.
*
* #param \Cake\Validation\Validator $validator Validator instance.
* #return \Cake\Validation\Validator
*/
public function validationDefault(Validator $validator) {
$validator
->integer('id')
->allowEmpty('id', 'create');
$validator
->scalar('name')
->maxLength('name', 500)
->requirePresence('name', 'create')
->notEmpty('name');
$validator
->scalar('extra')
->maxLength('extra', 500)
->allowEmpty('extra');
$validator
->scalar('answer')
->maxLength('answer', 1500)
->allowEmpty('answer');
$validator
->scalar('datafield')
->maxLength('datafield', 500)
->requirePresence('datafield', 'create')
->notEmpty('datafield');
return $validator;
}
/**
* Returns a rules checker object that will be used for validating
* application integrity.
*
* #param \Cake\ORM\RulesChecker $rules The rules object to be modified.
* #return \Cake\ORM\RulesChecker
*/
public function buildRules(RulesChecker $rules) {
$rules->add($rules->existsIn(['questiontype_id'], 'Questiontypes'));
return $rules;
}
/**
* Returns an array which describes the search form
*
* #return Array with search setup
*/
public function searchForm() {
//Set up search form
$search_data = [['id' => 'name', 'label' => 'Naam', 'type' => 'textfield', 'fields' => ['name']],
['id' => 'Questiontypes_id', 'label' => 'Vraagtype', 'type' => 'multiselect', 'fields' => ['Questiontypes.id'], 'options' => $this->Questiontypes->find('list')],
['id' => 'datafield', 'label' => 'Dataveld', 'type' => 'textfield', 'fields' => ['datafield']]
];
return $search_data;
}
}

Answer 1

Seems like adding this column in the $_accessible array (inside the Model/Entity) does the trick... That's why it could retrieve the data, but not edit it - hence "accessible" maybe? Not sure if that's the correct name for it but hey..
protected $_accessible = [
'name' => true,
'extra' => true,
'answer' => true,
'datafield' => true,
'questiontype_id' => true,
'questiontype' => true,
'activities' => true,
'bookingforms' => true,
'divisions' => true // this did the trick!
];