Codeigniter populate nested associations - sql

Question

this is the results i need from the database
{comment: 'hello there', user: [{name: 'sahan', id: 1}], id: 2}
function used to get comments
public function get_comments(){
$query = $this->db->get('comments');
return $query->result_array();
}
I have a comments table and a users table, When a user comments on something the
comment is saved as follows
comment > Comment text
user: userid
So when the data is shown I need codeigniter to populate the user field with the user data found from the users table
Does anyone know how to do this ?
I used this functionality in SailsJS but dont know how to do it here in CodeIG
Sails.js populate nested associations

Answer 1

Codeigniter 's active record is not as advanced as SailJS active record, but you can achieve what you are asking for with two queries within the same method.
I'm assuming the comments table has a foreign key to the users table through a user_id field.
public function get_comments() {
/* Get all the comments */
$query = $this->db->get('comments');
$comments = $query->result_array();
/* Loop through each comment, pulling the associated user from the db */
foreach $comments as &$comment {
$query = $this->db->get_where('users', array('id' => $comment['user_id']));
$user = $query->result_array();
/* Put the user's data in a key called 'user' within the comment array */
$comment['user'] = $user;
/* Remove the unnecessary user_id and $user variable */
unset($comment['user_id']);
unset($user);
}
return $comments;
}