Native SQL ========== A ``NativeQuery`` lets you execute native SELECT SQL statements, mapping the results according to your specifications. Such a specification that describes how an SQL result set is mapped to a Doctrine result is represented by a ``ResultSetMapping``. It describes how each column of the database result should be mapped by Doctrine in terms of the object graph. This allows you to map arbitrary SQL code to objects, such as highly vendor-optimized SQL or stored-procedures. .. note:: If you want to execute DELETE, UPDATE or INSERT statements the Native SQL API cannot be used and will probably throw errors. Use ``EntityManager#getConnection()`` to access the native database connection and call the ``executeUpdate()`` method for these queries. The NativeQuery class --------------------- To create a ``NativeQuery`` you use the method ``EntityManager#createNativeQuery($sql, $resultSetMapping)``. As you can see in the signature of this method, it expects 2 ingredients: The SQL you want to execute and the ``ResultSetMapping`` that describes how the results will be mapped. Once you obtained an instance of a ``NativeQuery``, you can bind parameters to it and finally execute it. The ResultSetMapping -------------------- Understanding the ``ResultSetMapping`` is the key to using a ``NativeQuery``. A Doctrine result can contain the following components: - Entity results. These represent root result elements. - Joined entity results. These represent joined entities in associations of root entity results. - Field results. These represent a column in the result set that maps to a field of an entity. A field result always belongs to an entity result or joined entity result. - Scalar results. These represent scalar values in the result set that will appear in each result row. Adding scalar results to a ResultSetMapping can also cause the overall result to become **mixed** (see DQL - Doctrine Query Language) if the same ResultSetMapping also contains entity results. - Meta results. These represent columns that contain meta-information, such as foreign keys and discriminator columns. When querying for objects (``getResult()``), all meta columns of root entities or joined entities must be present in the SQL query and mapped accordingly using ``ResultSetMapping#addMetaResult``. .. note:: It might not surprise you that Doctrine uses ``ResultSetMapping`` internally when you create DQL queries. As the query gets parsed and transformed to SQL, Doctrine fills a ``ResultSetMapping`` that describes how the results should be processed by the hydration routines. We will now look at each of the result types that can appear in a ResultSetMapping in detail. Entity results ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ An entity result describes an entity type that appears as a root element in the transformed result. You add an entity result through ``ResultSetMapping#addEntityResult()``. Let's take a look at the method signature in detail: .. code-block:: php addEntityResult('User', 'u'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'id', 'id'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'name', 'name'); $query = $this->_em->createNativeQuery('SELECT id, name FROM users WHERE name = ?', $rsm); $query->setParameter(1, 'romanb'); $users = $query->getResult(); The result would look like this: .. code-block:: php array( [0] => User (Object) ) Note that this would be a partial object if the entity has more fields than just id and name. In the example above the column and field names are identical but that is not necessary, of course. Also note that the query string passed to createNativeQuery is **real native SQL**. Doctrine does not touch this SQL in any way. In the previous basic example, a User had no relations and the table the class is mapped to owns no foreign keys. The next example assumes User has a unidirectional or bidirectional one-to-one association to a CmsAddress, where the User is the owning side and thus owns the foreign key. .. code-block:: php addEntityResult('User', 'u'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'id', 'id'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'name', 'name'); $rsm->addMetaResult('u', 'address_id', 'address_id'); $query = $this->_em->createNativeQuery('SELECT id, name, address_id FROM users WHERE name = ?', $rsm); $query->setParameter(1, 'romanb'); $users = $query->getResult(); Foreign keys are used by Doctrine for lazy-loading purposes when querying for objects. In the previous example, each user object in the result will have a proxy (a "ghost") in place of the address that contains the address\_id. When the ghost proxy is accessed, it loads itself based on this key. Consequently, associations that are *fetch-joined* do not require the foreign keys to be present in the SQL result set, only associations that are lazy. .. code-block:: php addEntityResult('User', 'u'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'id', 'id'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'name', 'name'); $rsm->addJoinedEntityResult('Address' , 'a', 'u', 'address'); $rsm->addFieldResult('a', 'address_id', 'id'); $rsm->addFieldResult('a', 'street', 'street'); $rsm->addFieldResult('a', 'city', 'city'); $sql = 'SELECT u.id, u.name, a.id AS address_id, a.street, a.city FROM users u ' . 'INNER JOIN address a ON u.address_id = a.id WHERE u.name = ?'; $query = $this->_em->createNativeQuery($sql, $rsm); $query->setParameter(1, 'romanb'); $users = $query->getResult(); In this case the nested entity ``Address`` is registered with the ``ResultSetMapping#addJoinedEntityResult`` method, which notifies Doctrine that this entity is not hydrated at the root level, but as a joined entity somewhere inside the object graph. In this case we specify the alias 'u' as third parameter and ``address`` as fourth parameter, which means the ``Address`` is hydrated into the ``User::$address`` property. If a fetched entity is part of a mapped hierarchy that requires a discriminator column, this column must be present in the result set as a meta column so that Doctrine can create the appropriate concrete type. This is shown in the following example where we assume that there are one or more subclasses that extend User and either Class Table Inheritance or Single Table Inheritance is used to map the hierarchy (both use a discriminator column). .. code-block:: php addEntityResult('User', 'u'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'id', 'id'); $rsm->addFieldResult('u', 'name', 'name'); $rsm->addMetaResult('u', 'discr', 'discr'); // discriminator column $rsm->setDiscriminatorColumn('u', 'discr'); $query = $this->_em->createNativeQuery('SELECT id, name, discr FROM users WHERE name = ?', $rsm); $query->setParameter(1, 'romanb'); $users = $query->getResult(); Note that in the case of Class Table Inheritance, an example as above would result in partial objects if any objects in the result are actually a subtype of User. When using DQL, Doctrine automatically includes the necessary joins for this mapping strategy but with native SQL it is your responsibility.