How to display results from a HABTM relationship in a view?

Question

I have a HABTM relationship between a books table and an authors table, joined with an authors_books table. However, I can't find a solution to display the fields firstname, lastname and fullname in my view.

book-model:

class Book extends AppModel {
var $name = 'Book';
var $hasAndBelongsToMany = array(
    'Author' => array(
        'className' => 'Author',
        'joinTable' => 'authors_books',
        'foreignkey' => 'book_id',
        'associatioanForeignKey' => 'author_id'
    )
);

author-model:

class Author extends AppModel {
var $name = 'Author';
var $virtualFields = array(
    'fullname' => "CONCAT(firstname,' ',lastname)"
);
var $fullname = 'fullname';
var $hasAndBelongsToMany = array(
    'Book' => array(
        'className' => 'Book',
        'joinTable' => 'authors_books',
        'foreignkey' => 'author_id',
        'associatioanForeignKey' => 'book_id'
    )
);

books_controller:

   function view($id) {
    $this->Book->id = $id;
    $this->set('book', $this->Book->read());
}

debug($book) in my wiev.ctp give these results:

Array
    (
[Book] => Array
    (
        [id] => 8
        [title] => A Forest of Kings: The Untold Story of the Ancient Maya
    )

[Author] => Array
    (
        [0] => Array
            (
                [id] => 6
                [firstname] => Linda
                [lastname] => Schele
                [fullname] => Linda Schele
            )

        [1] => Array
            (
                [id] => 7
                [firstname] => David
                [lastname] => Freidel
                [fullname] => David Freidel
            )

    )

)

I belive the [0][1] index in the array are the problem. I've searched the problem, and found some articles on the subject, but can't get any of the solutions to work.

Any help is greatly appreciated. I am using cakephp 1.3.3

Thanks

Answer 1

You would normally loop over the Author array, since you can have a varying number of authors.

<ul>
    <?php foreach($book['Author'] as $author){ ?>
        <li><?php print($author['fullname']); ?></li>
    <?php } ?>
</ul>