[Proposal] Less verbose make:migration input

[lorisleiva]

Hi 👋,

Currently, when generating a migration that creates a new table I write :

php artisan make:migration create_subscriptions_table --create=subscriptions

1. Since it always follows the same convention, i.e. create_$tableName_table, I thought it could be a good idea to provide this convention as a default migration name when the name argument is omitted and the create option is provided.
2. We could also decide on a good default convention for table updates when only the table option is provided.
3. Whilst updating this command, we could also give the options create and table, the respective shortcuts -c and -t.

Note: it goes without saying that if the user provides a name argument, the command behaves the same as it currently does. So no breaking changes here.

The bash command above could then be shorten to:

php artisan make:migration --create=subscriptions
php artisan make:migration -c subscriptions
# Both generate a migration named: create_subscriptions_table

If you guys, girls and agender people think it's a good idea, I am more than happy to open a PR.

💪💾

[sisve]

Two of the suggestions are reasonable default values for the migration name in case it isn't provided, and one is to mangle the parameter names into something unreadable.

I'm +2/3 to this suggestion as it is currently written. Do we really have to add short parameter names?

[lorisleiva]

Thanks for the input. Glad to see you're on board with the main part of this proposal.

I don't really see any inconvenience in adding two non conflictual shortcuts in options that are frequently used. Could you please provide some of your cons regarding that matter?

[fletch3555]

Agreed. I don't see a downside to shorthand parameter names, SO LONG AS the long-form continue to exist as well. Laravel is full of short-hand features for those that prefer it, but nobody is forced to use them.

[joshuadegier]

What a coincidence, I wans't aware of this laravel/ideas repository and created a first draft for this a few minutes ago. While creating a few migration for a new project I noticed in most cases where I create a new table, I was using the same format: create_$tablename_table.

1. The modified file can be found in this fork: https://github.com/PendoNL/framework/blob/5.6/src/Illuminate/Database/Console/Migrations/MigrateMakeCommand.php (commit diff here: https://github.com/PendoNL/framework/commit/619779395d419b788b46789579587edf6ef2baf5).

2. I'm not sure if there's a good default for updating a table. When I look at my personal situation it's very diverse of what names I want to give them, like add_active_field_to_posts, add_address_fields_to_post, remove_unused_fields_from_posts, etc. So,.. not sure about that one or what default fits best for all cases. Having an update_posts_table migration is just to vague for my taste.

3. Fair enough! That's a few key strokes less ;-)

[lorisleiva]

@joshuadegier Nice, thanks for sharing. I totally agree with your opinion on the updating convention. The issue is that if we provide a default name for --create, then name will be an optional parameter. Thus, we have to also provide some default for --table. And like you said update_$tablename_table is just too vague and basically not something that people use.

[joshuadegier]

In my code there's only an exception thrown if the parameter is missing when using any other than --create. Seems a fair solution, I'll just leave it here to gather some more thoughts of others.