CakePHP runs unnecessary queries when retrieving related models - cakephp

Question

The Event model has following relations:
var $belongsTo = array(
'Project' => array(
'className' => 'Project',
'foreignKey' => 'project_id',
),
'User' => array(
'className' => 'User',
'foreignKey' => 'user_id'
)
);
here is how I list the events depending on the user input:
$conditions = array('user_id'=>$id, 'date >=' => $from, 'date <=' => $to);
$events = $this->find('all', array(
'conditions'=>$conditions, 'order' => array('Event.date' => 'asc')));
And here are the 3 queries that are being run:
1 SELECT `User`.`id`, `User`.`name`, `User`.`surname` FROM `scheduling`.`users` AS `User` WHERE `company_id` = 1
2 SELECT `Project`.`id`, `Project`.`name` FROM `scheduling`.`projects` AS `Project` LEFT JOIN `scheduling`.`customers` AS `Customer` ON (`Project`.`customer_id` = `Customer`.`id`) WHERE `Project`.`company_id` = 1
3 SELECT `Event`.`id`, `Event`.`project_id`, `Event`.`user_id`, `Event`.`date`, `Event`.`hours`, `Event`.`minutes`, `Event`.`xhours`, `Event`.`xminutes`, `Event`.`xdetails`, `Event`.`assignment`, `Event`.`start_time`, `Event`.`material`, `Event`.`meter_drive`, `Event`.`time_drive`, `Event`.`start_location`, `Event`.`finish_time`, `Project`.`id`, `Project`.`name`, `Project`.`customer_id`, `Project`.`project_nr`, `Project`.`address`, `Project`.`post_nr`, `Project`.`city`, `Project`.`company_id`, `Project`.`color`, `Project`.`start_date`, `Project`.`finish_date`, `User`.`id`, `User`.`employee_nr`, `User`.`name`, `User`.`surname`, `User`.`email`, `User`.`password`, `User`.`role`, `User`.`phone`, `User`.`address`, `User`.`post_nr`, `User`.`city`, `User`.`token_hash`, `User`.`company_id`, `User`.`car_id`, `User`.`image` FROM `scheduling`.`events` AS `Event` LEFT JOIN `scheduling`.`projects` AS `Project` ON (`Event`.`project_id` = `Project`.`id`) LEFT JOIN `scheduling`.`users` AS `User` ON (`Event`.`user_id` = `User`.`id`) WHERE `user_id` = 1 AND `project_id` = 5 AND `date` >= '2013-07-01' AND `date` <= '2013-12-06' ORDER BY `Event`.`date` asc
In fact, I only need the third query and not the first two. What causes them and how to get rid of them?

Answer 1

By default, CakePHP will try attach associations.
In all 3 models add:
var $actsAs = array('Containable');
This will allow you to "contain" your queries to specific models.
Now you can do you query thus:
$events = $this->find('all', array(
'conditions'=>$conditions,
'order' => array('Event.date' => 'asc'),
'contain' => true));
Say you did want Users (but not Projects) back you can do:
$events = $this->find('all', array(
'conditions'=>$conditions,
'order' => array('Event.date' => 'asc'),
'contain' => array('User')));

Answer 2

Other code is responsible
This code:
$conditions = array('user_id'=>$id, 'date >=' => $from, 'date <=' => $to);
$events = $this->find('all', array(
'conditions'=>$conditions,
'order' => array('Event.date' => 'asc')
));
Is responsible for this query:
SELECT
`Event`.`id`,
...
FROM
`scheduling`.`events` AS `Event`
LEFT JOIN
`scheduling`.`projects` AS `Project` ON (`Event`.`project_id` = `Project`.`id`)
LEFT JOIN
`scheduling`.`users` AS `User` ON (`Event`.`user_id` = `User`.`id`)
WHERE
`user_id` = 1 AND
`project_id` = 5 AND
`date` >= '2013-07-01' AND
`date` <= '2013-12-06'
ORDER BY
`Event`.`date` asc
However there are only user_id and date conditions in the code in the question.
This condition:
`project_id` = 5
Is being added by un-shown code - probably a behavior. Check your code for where the project_id condition is defined, there is the answer.
query #1 is unrelated
The first query does not look to be related to the code in the question at all - there is nothing in the question that requires finding a user's data. To find where that's coming from - you can use a simple technique. Open up the user model and put this in it:
class User extends AppModel {
public function beforeFind() {
debug(Debugger::trace());
debug(func_get_args());
die;
}
}
This will give a stack trace of how the query is being triggered - edit the application code appropriately once you know where it comes from.
query #2 is required
Assuming the query you want is actually correct (find all events for a single project) - there needs to be a way to restrict on project id. If that's not specified explicitly, the second query is looking for a project id by client id - i.e. the query you want depends upon that data.

Answer 3

This will help you.
$events = $this->find('all', array(
'conditions'=>$conditions,
'order' => array('Event.date' => 'asc'),
'recursive' => -1
));
recursive based on the max containment depth

Answer 4

$conditions = array('user_id'=>$id, 'date >=' => $from, 'date <=' => $to);
$events = $this->find('all', array('recursive'=>0,
'conditions'=>$conditions, 'order' => array('Event.date' => 'asc')));
the change in here is the recursive
recursive=>-1 mean will fetch only event
recursive=>0 mean will fetch event + to whom it belongs to, in this case project and user