Gedmo Translations in Symfony 4

Today I’ve had to install Gedmo Translations into a Symfony 4 app and I had some trouble, so after fixing them problems I thought of writing them down in case someone else can benefit from it :)

Let’s start fromt he begginig.

Create a Symfony 4 project

Please use docker! :) More info here in the Docker for Symfony 4 post.

Here’s what my docker.compose.yml looks like

#docker.compose.yml
version: "3.1"

volumes:
    db-data:

services:
    mysql:
      image: mysql:5.6
      container_name: ${PROJECT_NAME}-mysql
      working_dir: /application
      volumes:
        - db-data:/application
      environment:
        - MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=docker_root
        - MYSQL_DATABASE=gedmoapp_db
        - MYSQL_USER=gedmoapp_user
        - MYSQL_PASSWORD=gedmoapp_pw
      ports:
        - "8306:3306"

    webserver:
      image: nginx:alpine
      container_name: ${PROJECT_NAME}-webserver
      working_dir: /application
      volumes:
        - .:/application
        - ./docker/nginx/nginx.conf:/etc/nginx/conf.d/default.conf
      ports:
        - "8000:80"

    php-fpm:
      build: docker/php-fpm
      container_name: ${PROJECT_NAME}-php-fpm
      working_dir: /application
      volumes:
        - .:/application
        - ./docker/php-fpm/php-ini-overrides.ini:/etc/php/7.2/fpm/conf.d/99-overrides.ini

Installation of Gedmo’s bundle

composer require stof/doctrine-extensions-bundle

Configuration

Now we need to update our configuration file, so in the doctrine.yaml, under the doctrine key, we should go from this

#doctrine.yaml
doctrine:
#...
    orm:
        auto_generate_proxy_classes: '%kernel.debug%'
        naming_strategy: doctrine.orm.naming_strategy.underscore
        auto_mapping: true
        naming_strategy: doctrine.orm.naming_strategy.underscore
        auto_mapping: true
        mappings:
            App:
                is_bundle: false
                type: annotation
                dir: '%kernel.project_dir%/src/Entity'
                prefix: 'App\Entity'
                alias: App

To this

#doctrine.yaml
doctrine:
#...
	orm:
        auto_generate_proxy_classes: '%kernel.debug%'
#        naming_strategy: doctrine.orm.naming_strategy.underscore
#        auto_mapping: true
        entity_managers:
            default:
#                connection: default
                naming_strategy: doctrine.orm.naming_strategy.underscore
                auto_mapping: true
                mappings:
                    App:
                        is_bundle: false
                        type: annotation
                        dir: '%kernel.project_dir%/src/Entity'
                        prefix: 'App\Entity'
                        alias: App
                    gedmo_translatable:
                        type: annotation
                        prefix: Gedmo\Translatable\Entity
                        dir: "%kernel.root_dir%/../vendor/gedmo/doctrine-extensions/lib/Gedmo/Translatable/Entity"
                        alias: GedmoTranslatable # (optional) it will default to the name set for the mapping
                        is_bundle: false
                    gedmo_translator:
                        type: annotation
                        prefix: Gedmo\Translator\Entity
                        dir: "%kernel.root_dir%/../vendor/gedmo/doctrine-extensions/lib/Gedmo/Translator/Entity"
                        alias: GedmoTranslator # (optional) it will default to the name set for the mapping
                        is_bundle: false
#                    gedmo_loggable:
#                        type: annotation
#                        prefix: Gedmo\Loggable\Entity
#                        dir: "%kernel.root_dir%/../vendor/gedmo/doctrine-extensions/lib/Gedmo/Loggable/Entity"
#                        alias: GedmoLoggable # (optional) it will default to the name set for the mappingmapping
#                        is_bundle: false
                    gedmo_tree:
                        type: annotation
                        prefix: Gedmo\Tree\Entity
                        dir: "%kernel.root_dir%/../vendor/gedmo/doctrine-extensions/lib/Gedmo/Tree/Entity"
                        alias: GedmoTree # (optional) it will default to the name set for the mapping
                        is_bundle: false

Also, in our stof_doctrine_extensions.yaml, let’s add the following configuration for the doctrine extensions.

#stof_doctrine_extensions.yaml
stof_doctrine_extensions:
    default_locale: en_US
    orm:
        default:
            tree: true
            translatable: true
            sluggable: true

Now, if we try to update our schema

php bin/console doc:sch:update --dump-sql
The following SQL statements will be executed:

     CREATE TABLE ext_translations (id INT AUTO_INCREMENT NOT NULL, locale VARCHAR(8) NOT NULL, object_class VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL, field VARCHAR(32) NOT NULL, foreign_key VARCHAR(64) NOT NULL, content LONGTEXT DEFAULT NULL, INDEX translations_lookup_idx (locale, object_class, foreign_key), UNIQUE INDEX lookup_unique_idx (locale, object_class, field, foreign_key), PRIMARY KEY(id)) DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci ENGINE = InnoDB ROW_FORMAT = DYNAMIC;

Looks about right, so let’s hit it!

php bin/console doc:sch:update --force

And we get the following error

Updating database schema...


In AbstractMySQLDriver.php line 126:
                                                                                                                                
  An exception occurred while executing 'ALTER TABLE ext_translations CHANGE object_class object_class VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL':  
                                                                                                                                
  SQLSTATE[42000]: Syntax error or access violation: 1071 Specified key was too long; max key length is 767 bytes               
                                                                                                                                

In PDOConnection.php line 109:
                                                                                                                   
  SQLSTATE[42000]: Syntax error or access violation: 1071 Specified key was too long; max key length is 767 bytes  
                                                                                                                   

In PDOConnection.php line 107:
                                                                                                                   
  SQLSTATE[42000]: Syntax error or access violation: 1071 Specified key was too long; max key length is 767 bytes

Now, after looking for this issue with Symfony and Gedmo Translations in the internet, I found this issue about Doctrine and this other one, and the fix here.

As davidbehler and javiereguiluz explain in the posts,

the cause of this is that Symfony advises you to use utf8mb4_general_ci/utf8mb4 as collation/charset for your database. utf8mb4 takes 4 bytes per char, meaning a 255 char field needs 1020 bytes for an index.

And so it seems that MySql 5.6 has a max key length of 767 bytes, so that leaves us with three options:

1. Decrease the field length to 191. However, we would have to override Gedmo’s translations bundle, as it uses 255 char fields everywhere..
2. We could change the charset encoding to ut8 like so (thanks to Kuba Florczuk for the configuration):

#doctrine.yaml
doctrine:
    dbal:
        # configure these for your database server
        driver: 'pdo_mysql'
        server_version: '5.6'
        charset: utf8
        default_table_options:
            charset: utf8
            collate: utf8_unicode_ci

        url: '%env(resolve:DATABASE_URL)%'
#...

3. We could upgrade to mysql 5.7 like so:

#docker-compose.yml
services:
    mysql:
      image: mysql:5.7
#...

And update the doctrine config like so:

#doctrine.yaml
doctrine:
    dbal:
        # configure these for your database server
        driver: 'pdo_mysql'
        server_version: '5.7'
        charset: utf8mb4
        default_table_options:
            charset: utf8mb4
            collate: utf8mb4_unicode_ci

        url: '%env(resolve:DATABASE_URL)%'
#...

All of them solutions work gracefully. Hope this helps, happy coding! :)

Gedmo’s Translations Documentation

StofDoctrineExensionBundle in Symfony’s official website.
Doctrine’s extensions GitHub doc.
Translatable’s GitHub doc.

Originally published at Joey’s blog.