Iseed

Inverse seed generator (iSeed) is a Laravel package that provides a method to generate a new seed file based on data from the existing database table.

Supports Laravel 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13 (PHP 8.0+)

Installation

1. Require with Composer

composer require orangehill/iseed

Laravel 5.3.7 and below or Laravel 4 need specific version

composer require orangehill/iseed:2.2 # Laravel 5.3.7 and below
composer require orangehill/iseed:1.1 # Laravel 4

2. Add Service Provider (Laravel 5.4 and below)

Latest Laravel versions have auto discovery and automatically add service provider - if you're using 5.4.x and below, remember to add it to providers array at /app/config/app.php:

// ...
Orangehill\Iseed\IseedServiceProvider::class,

Artisan command options

[table_name]

Optional. This parameter defines which table(s) will be used for seed creation.

If provided: Use CSV notation to list one or more table names. A seed file will be generated for each specified table.

Examples Generate a seed file for a single table:

php artisan iseed my_table

Example Generate seed files for multiple tables:

php artisan iseed my_table,another_table

If omitted: The command automatically retrieves all table names from your database and generates seeders for every table. Examples:

php artisan iseed

classnameprefix & classnamesuffix

Optionally specify a prefix or suffix for the Seeder class name and file name. This is useful if you want to create an additional seed for a table that has an existing seed without overwriting the existing one.

Examples:

php artisan iseed my_table --classnameprefix=Customized

outputs CustomizedMyTableSeeder.php

php artisan iseed my_table,another_table --classnameprefix=Customized

outputs CustomizedMyTableSeeder.php and CustomizedAnotherTableSeeder.php

php artisan iseed my_table --classnamesuffix=Customizations

outputs MyTableCustomizationsSeeder.php

php artisan iseed my_table,another_table --classnamesuffix=Customizations

outputs MyTableCustomizationsSeeder.php and AnotherTableCustomizationsSeeder.php

force

Optional parameter which is used to automatically overwrite any existing seeds for desired tables

Example: The following command will overwrite UsersTableSeeder.php if it already exists in laravel's seeds directory.

php artisan iseed users --force

dumpauto

Optional boolean parameter that controls the execution of composer dump-autoload command. Defaults to true.

Example that will stop composer dump-autoload from execution:

php artisan iseed users --dumpauto=false

clean

Optional parameter which will clean database/seeders/DatabaseSeeder.php before creating new seed class.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --clean

database

Optional parameter which specifies the DB connection name. When using a non-default connection, the generated seeder will include the connection specification (e.g., \DB::connection('mysql2')->table(...)) to ensure the seeder targets the correct database.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --database=mysql2

max

Optional parameter which defines the maximum number of entries seeded from a specified table. In case of multiple tables, limit will be applied to all of them.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --max=10

chunksize

Optional parameter which defines the size of data chunks for each insert query.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --chunksize=100

orderby

Optional parameter which defines the column which will be used to order the results by, when used in conjunction with the max parameter that allows you to set the desired number of exported database entries.

Example:

artisan iseed users --max=10 --orderby=id

direction

Optional parameter which allows you to set the direction of the ordering of results; used in conjunction with orderby parameter.

Example:

artisan iseed users --max=10 --orderby=id --direction=desc

exclude

Optional parameter which accepts comma separated list of columns that you'd like to exclude from tables that are being exported. In case of multiple tables, exclusion will be applied to all of them.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --exclude=id
php artisan iseed users --exclude=id,created_at,updated_at

prerun

Optional parameter which assigns a laravel event name to be fired before seeding takes place. If an event listener returns false, seed will fail automatically. You can assign multiple preruns for multiple table names by passing an array of comma separated DB names and respectively passing a comma separated array of prerun event names.

Example: The following command will make a seed file which will fire an event named 'someEvent' before seeding takes place.

php artisan iseed users --prerun=someEvent

The following example will assign someUserEvent to users table seed, and someGroupEvent to groups table seed, to be executed before seeding.

php artisan iseed users,groups --prerun=someUserEvent,someGroupEvent

The following example will only assign a someGroupEvent to groups table seed, to be executed before seeding. Value for the users table prerun was omitted here, so users table seed will have no prerun event assigned.

php artisan iseed users,groups --prerun=,someGroupEvent

postrun

Optional parameter which assigns a laravel event name to be fired after seeding takes place. If an event listener returns false, seed will be executed, but an exception will be thrown that the postrun failed. You can assign multiple postruns for multiple table names by passing an array of comma separated DB names and respectively passing a comma separated array of postrun event names.

Example: The following command will make a seed file which will fire an event named 'someEvent' after seeding was completed.

php artisan iseed users --postrun=someEvent

The following example will assign someUserEvent to users table seed, and someGroupEvent to groups table seed, to be executed after seeding.

php artisan iseed users,groups --postrun=someUserEvent,someGroupEvent

The following example will only assign a someGroupEvent to groups table seed, to be executed after seeding. Value for the users table postrun was omitted here, so users table seed will have no postrun event assigned.

php artisan iseed users,groups --postrun=,someGroupEvent

noindex

By using --noindex the seed can be generated as a non-indexed array. The use case for this feature is when you need to merge two seed files.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --noindex

noregister

By using --noregister the seed file will be generated but will not be added to DatabaseSeeder.php. This is useful when you want to create backup seeders or manually manage which seeders are registered.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --noregister

skip-fk-checks

By using --skip-fk-checks the generated seeder will include statements to disable foreign key checks before deleting/inserting and re-enable them afterwards. This is useful when seeding tables that have foreign key constraints, as it prevents "foreign key constraint failed" errors.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --skip-fk-checks

Note: This option generates MySQL-specific SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS statements.

reset-sequences

By using --reset-sequences the generated seeder will include statements to reset PostgreSQL sequences after seeding. This prevents "duplicate key value violates unique constraint" errors that can occur when inserting new records after seeding, because PostgreSQL sequences don't automatically reset when using DELETE.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --reset-sequences

The generated seeder will include code to reset the sequence to the maximum ID value in the table:

if (\DB::getDriverName() === 'pgsql') {
    \DB::statement("SELECT setval(pg_get_serial_sequence('users', 'id'), COALESCE((SELECT MAX(id) FROM users), 1))");
}

Note: This option generates PostgreSQL-specific statements and only executes when the database driver is PostgreSQL.

skip

Optional parameter which defines the number of rows to skip before exporting. This is useful for paginating through large tables in combination with the --max option.

Example:

php artisan iseed users --skip=1000

When combined with --max for pagination:

php artisan iseed users --max=1000 --orderby=id
php artisan iseed users --max=1000 --skip=1000 --orderby=id
php artisan iseed users --max=1000 --skip=2000 --orderby=id

where

Optional parameter which allows you to specify a SQL WHERE clause to filter the rows that will be included in the seed file. The WHERE clause should be provided as a string and will be applied directly to the SQL query.

Examples:

# Only seed users with example.com emails
php artisan iseed users --where="email LIKE '%@example.com'"

# Seed active users created after a specific date
php artisan iseed users --where="active = 1 AND created_at > '2024-01-01'"

# Combine with other options
php artisan iseed users --where="role = 'admin'" --max=10 --orderby=created_at --direction=desc

Note: When using complex WHERE clauses with special characters or spaces, make sure to properly escape and quote the condition string according to your shell's requirements.

Usage

To generate a seed file for your users table simply call: `\Iseed::generateSeed('users', 'connectionName', 'numO