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Laravel Like Dislike System Tutorial Example
Laravel Like Dislike System Tutorial Example

Laravel Like Dislike System Tutorial Example

Creating a like/dislike system in Laravel is a great way to learn more about how this popular PHP framework works. In this tutorial, we’ll walk through building a simple like/dislike system for posts. We’ll cover the basics and provide easy-to-follow code examples.

Prerequisites

Before we start, make sure you have the following:

  1. PHP and Composer installed on your machine.
  2. A Laravel project set up. If you don’t have one, you can create a new Laravel project by running:
   composer create-project --prefer-dist laravel/laravel like-dislike-system
  1. A database (MySQL, SQLite, etc.) set up and connected to your Laravel project.

Step 1: Create Models and Migrations

First, we need to create the necessary models and database tables for our posts and likes/dislikes.

Create Post Model and Migration

Run the following command to create a Post model and its migration:

php artisan make:model Post -m

Update the create_posts_table migration file (database/migrations/xxxx_xx_xx_create_posts_table.php) to include the columns we need:

public function up()
{
    Schema::create('posts', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->id();
        $table->string('title');
        $table->text('content');
        $table->timestamps();
    });
}

Create LikeDislike Model and Migration

Run the following command to create a LikeDislike model and its migration:

php artisan make:model LikeDislike -m

Update the create_like_dislikes_table migration file (database/migrations/xxxx_xx_xx_create_like_dislikes_table.php) to include the columns we need:

public function up()
{
    Schema::create('like_dislikes', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->id();
        $table->foreignId('post_id')->constrained()->onDelete('cascade');
        $table->boolean('is_like');
        $table->timestamps();
    });
}

Now, run the migrations to create the tables in your database:

php artisan migrate

Step 2: Define Relationships in Models

Next, we need to define the relationships between our models.

Post Model

Update the Post model (app/Models/Post.php) to include the relationship with LikeDislike:

namespace App\Models;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Factories\HasFactory;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class Post extends Model
{
    use HasFactory;

    protected $fillable = ['title', 'content'];

    public function likeDislikes()
    {
        return $this->hasMany(LikeDislike::class);
    }
}

LikeDislike Model

Update the LikeDislike model (app/Models/LikeDislike.php) to include the relationship with Post:

namespace App\Models;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Factories\HasFactory;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class LikeDislike extends Model
{
    use HasFactory;

    protected $fillable = ['post_id', 'is_like'];

    public function post()
    {
        return $this->belongsTo(Post::class);
    }
}

Step 3: Create Routes and Controller

We’ll create a controller to handle the logic for liking and disliking posts, and then define the necessary routes.

Create Controller

Run the following command to create a LikeDislikeController:

php artisan make:controller LikeDislikeController

Update the LikeDislikeController (app/Http/Controllers/LikeDislikeController.php) with the following code:

namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use App\Models\LikeDislike;
use App\Models\Post;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;

class LikeDislikeController extends Controller
{
    public function like(Post $post)
    {
        $post->likeDislikes()->create(['is_like' => true]);
        return back();
    }

    public function dislike(Post $post)
    {
        $post->likeDislikes()->create(['is_like' => false]);
        return back();
    }
}

Define Routes

Update the web.php routes file (routes/web.php) to include the routes for liking and disliking posts:

use App\Http\Controllers\LikeDislikeController;

Route::get('/posts/{post}/like', [LikeDislikeController::class, 'like'])->name('posts.like');
Route::get('/posts/{post}/dislike', [LikeDislikeController::class, 'dislike'])->name('posts.dislike');

Step 4: Create Views

Finally, we’ll create views to display our posts and the like/dislike buttons.

Create Post View

Create a posts.blade.php file in the resources/views directory with the following code:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
    <title>Posts</title>
</head>
<body>
    <h1>Posts</h1>
    @foreach($posts as $post)
        <div>
            <h2>{{ $post->title }}</h2>
            <p>{{ $post->content }}</p>
            <a href="{{ route('posts.like', $post) }}">Like</a>
            <a href="{{ route('posts.dislike', $post) }}">Dislike</a>
            <p>Likes: {{ $post->likeDislikes->where('is_like', true)->count() }}</p>
            <p>Dislikes: {{ $post->likeDislikes->where('is_like', false)->count() }}</p>
        </div>
    @endforeach
</body>
</html>

Display Posts in a Controller

Update the PostController to pass the posts to the view. If you don’t have a PostController, create one:

php artisan make:controller PostController

Update the PostController (app/Http/Controllers/PostController.php) with the following code:

namespace App\Http\Controllers;

use App\Models\Post;

class PostController extends Controller
{
    public function index()
    {
        $posts = Post::with('likeDislikes')->get();
        return view('posts', compact('posts'));
    }
}

Add a route to display the posts in the web.php file:

use App\Http\Controllers\PostController;

Route::get('/posts', [PostController::class, 'index']);

Conclusion

That’s it! You now have a basic like/dislike system in Laravel. You can expand this system by adding user authentication, AJAX requests for better user experience, and more. This tutorial covers the essentials and should give you a good starting point for building more complex features in your Laravel application. Happy coding!

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