CakePHP filter a deep associated find - cakephp

Question

I have a deep associated find and one association is retrieving too many none related records for modules_employees.
I should see only one record for modules_employees under the course_modules but it retrieves many because they can be many with course_modules_id but only one with courses_employee_id.
The modules_employees table
'id' => (int) 18,
'courses_employee_id' => (int) 31,
'course_module_id' => (int) 7,
'completed_on' => null,
CoursesEmployee->course->course_modules->modules_employees
CoursesEmployeesController.php
public function player($id = null)
{
$coursesEmployee = $this->CoursesEmployees->get($id, [
'contain' =>
[
'Employees',
'Courses',
'CourseModules',
'Courses.CourseModules',
'Courses.CourseModules.ModulesEmployees',
'Courses.CourseFiles'
]
]);
$this->set('coursesEmployee', $coursesEmployee);
debug($coursesEmployee);
$this->set('_serialize', ['coursesEmployee']);
}
The current find object, you will see one of the course_modules has two modules_employees when I should have one.
object(App\Model\Entity\CoursesEmployee) {
'id' => (int) 31,
'employee_id' => (int) 3,
'course_id' => (int) 3,
'course_module_id' => (int) 7,
'course_module' => object(App\Model\Entity\CourseModule) {
'id' => (int) 7,
'course_id' => (int) 3,
'name' => 'Module 2',
},
'course' => object(App\Model\Entity\Course) {
'id' => (int) 3,
'name' => 'Treacys Hotel Induction Training',
'course_files' => [
(int) 0 => object(App\Model\Entity\CourseFile) {
'id' => (int) 2,
'name' => 'Manual_Handling_doc.txt',
'type' => 'doc',
}
],
'course_modules' => [
(int) 0 => object(App\Model\Entity\CourseModule) {
'id' => (int) 6,
'course_id' => (int) 3,
'name' => 'Module 1',
'module_order' => (int) 1,
'modules_employees' => [
(int) 0 => object(App\Model\Entity\ModulesEmployee) {
'id' => (int) 1,
'courses_employee_id' => (int) 0,
'course_module_id' => (int) 6,
'started_on' => object(Cake\I18n\Time) {
'time' => '2015-09-08T04:16:16+0000',
'timezone' => 'UTC',
'fixedNowTime' => false
},
'completed_on' => object(Cake\I18n\Time) {
'time' => '2015-09-09T08:22:16+0000',
'timezone' => 'UTC',
'fixedNowTime' => false
},
'completed' => true,
'deleted' => null,
'[new]' => false,
'[accessible]' => [
'employee_id' => true,
'module_id' => true,
'started_on' => true,
'completed_on' => true,
'completed' => true,
'employee' => true,
'module' => true
],
'[dirty]' => [],
'[original]' => [],
'[virtual]' => [],
'[errors]' => [],
'[repository]' => 'ModulesEmployees'
}
],
'[repository]' => 'CourseModules'
},
(int) 1 => object(App\Model\Entity\CourseModule) {
'id' => (int) 7,
'course_id' => (int) 3,
'name' => 'Module 2',
'module_order' => (int) 2,
'modules_employees' => [
(int) 0 => object(App\Model\Entity\ModulesEmployee) {
'id' => (int) 2,
'courses_employee_id' => (int) 31,
'course_module_id' => (int) 7,
'started_on' => object(Cake\I18n\Time) {
'time' => '2015-09-17T00:00:00+0000',
'timezone' => 'UTC',
'fixedNowTime' => false
},
'completed_on' => null,
'[repository]' => 'ModulesEmployees'
},
(int) 1 => object(App\Model\Entity\ModulesEmployee) {
'id' => (int) 18,
'courses_employee_id' => (int) 32,
'course_module_id' => (int) 7,
'started_on' => object(Cake\I18n\Time) {
'time' => '2015-09-17T00:00:00+0000',
'timezone' => 'UTC',
'fixedNowTime' => false
},
'completed_on' => null,
'[repository]' => 'ModulesEmployees'
}
],
'[repository]' => 'CourseModules'
},
],
},
'employee' => object(App\Model\Entity\Employee) {
'id' => (int) 3,
'user_id' => (int) 4,
},
'[repository]' => 'CoursesEmployees'
}

Answer 1

You should look into matching
http://book.cakephp.org/3.0/en/orm/query-builder.html#filtering-by-associated-data
$query = $this->CoursesEmployees->findById($id)
->contain(['Your_Models_You_Wanna_Contain'])
->matching('Courses.CourseModules.ModulesEmployees', function ($q) use ($id) {
return $q->where(['courses_employee_id' => $id]);
});
if nothing matches then you wont get a CourseEmployee back aswell, if you would still need that you could also use contain:
http://book.cakephp.org/3.0/en/orm/retrieving-data-and-resultsets.html#passing-conditions-to-contain
$query = $this->CoursesEmployees->findById($id)->contain([
'Courses.CourseModules.ModulesEmployees' => function ($q) use ($id) {
return $q
->where(['courses_employee_id' => $id]);
}
]);