Until now, all test data was created MANUALLY via curl – tedious, and gone AGAIN after every doctrine:database:drop. Doctrine fixtures solve this REPRODUCIBLY.

Installing the fixtures bundle

docker compose exec php composer require --dev orm-fixtures

Creates src/DataFixtures/ AND registers the console command doctrine:fixtures:load – the api-platform distribution does NOT ship with Alice/Foundry by default, the lean orm-fixtures is entirely sufficient for our purposes.

Creating a fixtures class

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace App\DataFixtures;

use App\Entity\Project;
use App\Entity\Tag;
use Doctrine\Bundle\FixturesBundle\Fixture;
use Doctrine\Persistence\ObjectManager;

final class AppFixtures extends Fixture
{
    public function load(ObjectManager $manager): void
    {
        $urgentTag = new Tag();
        $urgentTag->setName('Urgent');
        $manager->persist($urgentTag);

        $internalTag = new Tag();
        $internalTag->setName('Internal');
        $manager->persist($internalTag);

        $project = new Project();
        $project->setName('Website Relaunch');
        $project->setDescription('Complete redesign of the online store.');
        $manager->persist($project);

        $manager->flush();
    }
}

EXACTLY the same Fixture base class and the same load() method as in the Symfony course (chapter 23) – ObjectManager wraps the Doctrine EntityManager and works identically.

Loading fixtures

docker compose exec php bin/console doctrine:fixtures:load --no-interaction

Verifying the fixtures through the API

curl -k https://localhost/api/tags

{
  "@context": "/api/contexts/Tag",
  "@id": "/api/tags",
  "@type": "hydra:Collection",
  "hydra:member": [
    {"@id": "/api/tags/1", "@type": "Tag", "id": 1, "name": "Urgent"},
    {"@id": "/api/tags/2", "@type": "Tag", "id": 2, "name": "Internal"}
  ],
  "hydra:totalItems": 2
}

The SAME two tags from AppFixtures, EXACTLY as defined – retrievable through the READ-ONLY endpoint from chapter 12, even though POST for Tag STILL doesn't exist.