cakePHP saving entries to join table of existing records - cakephp

Question

first a short description. I have to models: accounts and users and a join table of it accounts_users. the models have a habtm associasions on each model:
User Model:
'Account' => array(
'className' => 'Account',
'joinTable' => 'accounts_users',
'foreignKey' => 'user_id',
'associationForeignKey' => 'account_id',
'unique' => true,
'conditions' => '',
'fields' => '',
'order' => '',
'limit' => '',
'offset' => '',
'finderQuery' => '',
'deleteQuery' => '',
'insertQuery' => ''
)
Account Model:
'User' => array(
'className' => 'User',
'joinTable' => 'accounts_users',
'foreignKey' => 'account_id',
'associationForeignKey' => 'user_id',
'unique' => true,
'conditions' => '',
'fields' => '',
'order' => '',
'limit' => '',
'offset' => '',
'finderQuery' => '',
'deleteQuery' => '',
'insertQuery' => ''
)
Now im trying to save manually relations between this two just to the join table acccounts_users from allready existing entries, here my code
$account = base64_decode($this->params['pass']['0']);
$token = $this->params['pass']['1'];
if($user = $this->User->findByToken($token))
{
// ZUr test zwecken
# $this->User->query(" INSERT INTO accounts_users (account_id ,user_id) VALUES (222, 223); ");
$aId = $this->Account->findById($account);
$this->data['User'][0]['user_id'] = $user['User']['id'];
$this->data['Account'][0]['account_id'] = $aId['Account']['id'];
$this->User->bindModel(array(
'hasMany' => array('AccountsUser')
));
$this->User->saveAll($this->data, array('validate' => false));
print_r('gefunden'); die;
$this->Redirect->flashSuccess('Account Invitation successfull. Log In!', array('controller' => 'users', 'action' => 'login'));
}
else
{
print_r('nicht gefunden'); die;
// user nicht gefunden zum login umleiten
$this->Redirect->flashWarning('Account Invitation error. Please try again!', array('controller' => 'users', 'action' => 'login'));
}
the results are a new entry on the accounts_users table but the user_id is 0. I don't understand why is missing the user id because its passed corectly. even if i pass in the data array some ids manually its writting just the account_id without the user id.
UPDATE
I played a little bit with the models and saved the data to the accounts_users thru the account model see the updated code:
$this->data['User']['id'] = $user['User']['id'];
$this->data['Account']['id'] = 33; #$aId['Account']['id'];
$this->Account->AccountsUser->create();
$this->Account->saveAll($this->data, array('validate' => false));
so now the script inserts both ids, BUT, if there is an entry form another user with the same account id the the user gets overwritten. anything else works. Any idears of how to create a new entry with an axisting account id for new user?
This are the mysql queries i get:
UPDATE accounts SET id = 33 WHERE accounts.id = 33
SELECT AccountsUser.user_id FROM accounts_users AS AccountsUser WHERE AccountsUser.account_id = 33
DELETE AccountsUser FROM accounts_users AS AccountsUser WHERE AccountsUser.account_id = 33 AND
INSERT INTO accounts_users (account_id,user_id) VALUES (33,'32')
Any idears why? Thanks in advance

Answer 1

CakePHP 1.x treats HABTM join tables quite 'dumb'; it will remove all existing records and insert new records to replace them. This is a major PITA if your join-table also contains additional data. (It's possible to prevent this from happening by adding some code in your beforeSave() callbacks)
CakePHP 2.1 has an option keepExisting for HABTM relations. This option prevents CakePHP from deleting the records in the JOIN table. If this is a new project I would really advise to use CakePHP 2.x as a lot has improved since CakePHP 1.x.
http://book.cakephp.org/2.0/en/models/associations-linking-models-together.html#hasmany-through-the-join-model
Some hints on saving data in the join table can be found here;
http://book.cakephp.org/2.0/en/models/saving-your-data.html#saving-hasmany-through-data
For CakePHP 1.3 (look below 'when HABTM becomes complicated)
http://book.cakephp.org/1.3/en/The-Manual/Developing-with-CakePHP/Models.html#saving-related-model-data-habtm