Laravel Add attribute to model in __constructor

Question

I'm trying to add an attribute to my model so I can say something like: $model->path and then get back a url. So I've added the following to the model's constructor:

public function __construct($attributes = array()){

    $this->path = url('img/' . $this->{'file-name'});
    parent::__construct($attributes);

}

But if I run Model::first() then I get the following:

{
  id: 25,
  text: "A lovely file",
  file-name: "file.jpg",
  created_at: "2016-02-12 11:44:37",
  updated_at: "2016-02-12 11:44:37"
},

You'll notice that there is no path attribute. Am I doing something very wrong?! I want to see:

{
  id: 25,
  text: "A lovely file",
  file-name: "file.jpg",
  path: "http://myapp.app:8000/img/file.jpg",
  created_at: "2016-02-12 11:44:37",
  updated_at: "2016-02-12 11:44:37"
},

For the record, I have also tried $this->field = 'value'; and that didn't create an attribute either.

Martin Bean · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-12 12:04:27Z

5

Read the documentation. You’d be better off using an accessor method.

public function getPathAttribute()
{
    return url('img/'.$this->file_name);
}

You also shouldn’t be using dashes in column/property names, use the convention of underscores for separators.

answered Feb 12, 2016 at 12:04

Martin Bean

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3 Comments

Mysteryos Over a year ago

You'll also need the $appends property if the path attribute doesn't exist on the model or table. Hidden at: laravel.com/docs/5.1/…

Djave Over a year ago

That's great, thanks – and noted on the hyphen. Is there any way of including this attribute automatically, or am I best off doing something like: $imgs = \App\Img::all(); foreach($imgs as $img){ $img->url = $img->path; – just so the collection I return for my API is formatted nicely?

Martin Bean Over a year ago

@Djave As @Mysteryos says, you can add path to your $appends array and that’ll include the value in any serializing to JSON, arrays etc.

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