How to find entry using name in eloquent Laravel?

Question

By default we generally search any entry on db table by id number. But I could not find how to search any entry by the name column.

This is my code for finding entry and rendering it to view

Controller : Authors

class Authors_Controller extends Base_Controller {

    public $restful = true;

    public function get_view($id){
        $authorModel = Authors::find($id);
        return View::make('authors.view')
            ->with('author', $authorModel)
            ->with('title', $authorModel->name);
    }

}

Model : Authors

<?php 

class Authors extends Eloquent {
    public static $table = 'authors';
}

Route :

Route::controller(Controller::detect());

Route::get('author/(:any)', array('as'=>'author', 'uses'=>'authors@view'));

View :

@layout('main.index')

@section('content')
<h1>{{$author->name}}</h1>

<p>
    {{$author->bio}}
</p>

<small>
    {{$author->created_at}} |
    {{HTML::link(URL::$base.'/authors/', 'Go back')}}
</small>
@endsection

How do i make the url as not to display id but to display the name of the post like

some.com/category/name (instead of some.com/category/id)

Answer 1

In your controller you are always going to search by $id as your Eloquent query uses:

$authorModel = Authors::find($id);

As your named route can be supplied with an int or string (:any) run a type check in the controller on $id and run a different query based on the result.

public function get_view($id)
{
   if (is_numeric($id))
   {
       $authorModel = Authors::find($id);
   }
   else
   {
       $column = 'name'; // This is the name of the column you wish to search

       $authorModel = Authors::where($column , '=', $id)->first();
   }

   return View::make('authors.view')
                ->with('author', $authorModel)
                ->with('title', $authorModel->name);

}

I hope that helps you.

As a side note, your Eloquent model.

There is no need for you to supply a table name if you use correct naming conventions.

class Author extends Eloquent {

}

Note the singular Author will map to a table called Authors automatically without any intervention from you.