implementing “update if exists” in Doctrine ORM

Question

I am trying to INSERT OR UPDATE IF EXISTS in one transaction.

in mysql, I would generally use DUPLICATE KEY ("UPDATE ON DUPLICATE KEY".) I'm aware of many solutions to this problem using various SQL variants and sub-queries, but I'm trying to implement this in Doctrine (PHP ORM). It seems there would be Doctrine methods for doing this since it's so feature packed, but I'm not finding anything. Is this sort of thing a problem using PHP ORM packages for some reason? Or do any Doctrine experts know how to achieve this through hacks or any means?

Answer 1

According to https://www.vivait.co.uk/labs/updating-entities-when-an-insert-has-a-duplicate-key-in-doctrine this can be achieved with $entityManager->merge().

$entity = new Table();
$entity->setId(1);
$entity->setValue('TEST');

$entityManager->merge($entity);
$entityManager->flush();

Answer 2

The only thing I can think of is to query first for the entity if it exists otherwise create new entity.

if(!$entity = Doctrine::getTable('Foo')->find(/*[insert id]*/))
{
   $entity = new Foo();
}
/*do logic here*/
$entity->save();

Answer 3

Doctrine supports REPLACE INTO using the replace() method. This should work exactly like the ON DUPLICATE KEY UPDATE you were looking for.

Docs: Replacing Records

Answer 4

I think best way is to call entityManager->merge($entity); Because it's the closest thing to update if exist operation as promised in documentation: https://www.doctrine-project.org/projects/doctrine-orm/en/2.6/reference/working-with-objects.html