Laravel Relationship Using An OR Condition on the joining field

Question

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EDIT

To clarify, I am looking for a solution that will work with eager loading and be able to leverage all of the existing features of a Laravel relationship. I am aware I can use accessor attributes and other workarounds, but I cannot figure out how to do this and have it work EXACTLY like any other Laravel relationship.

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Is there any way to create a relationship on a Laravel model using an "OR" condition for the field used to join the table while loading an eloquent model?

Example Table: user_connections

Name	Type
id	bigInt|primary|auto_increment
from_user_id	bigInt
to_user_id	bigInt
created_at	timestamp?
updated_at	timestamp?

If I have a Laravel Model named UserConnection that uses the above table schema, is there any way to define a relationship on that model that can utilize either the from_user_id field OR the to_user_id field.

The goal is to have a relationship named userConnections on a User model that can be tied to either field.

Example of Desired Syntax:

class User {
...

// THE RELATIONSHIP METHOD NAME TO USE (DOESN'T HAVE TO BE `hasMany`)
public function userConnections(){
    return $this->hasMany(
        \App\Models\UserConnection::class, /* THE TARGET CLASS TO BE LOADED */
        'from_user_id||to_user_id',        /* JOIN ON EITHER OF THESE FIELDS */
        'id'                               /* THE ID OF THE USER IN THIS MODEL */
    );
}

I know I can do this with a query and load the models manually. But I want to stick to the Laravel format for relationships so that other people on this project can use the relationship naturally.

Please don't bother responding if your answer is going to be "Don't structure the database that way", because I cannot change the schema. I need to figure out how to make it work with this schema.

My concept isn't set in stone like the schema is, but it should illustrate what I'm trying to achieve. I am entirely open minded to any solution that works with this db schema.

Hoping someone else has run into a similar issue and might have a solution.

Thanks in advance to anyone who has read this far.

Answer 1

I'm not sure. Is this what you were asking for?

UserConnection::where(function ($query) {
    $query->where('from_user_id', $this->id)
          ->orWhere('to_user_id', $this->id);
});

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You can combine it with Laravel Attribute for a single call.

public function userConnectionsQuery()
{
    return UserConnection::where(function ($query) {
        $query->where('from_user_id', $this->id)
              ->orWhere('to_user_id', $this->id);
    });
}

public function getUserConnectionsAttribute()
{
    return $this->userConnectionsQuery()->get();
}

This will work like this

$user = User::find($userId);

$userConnections = $user->userConnectionsQuery()->get(); # Directly call
$userConnections = $user->userConnectionsQuery()->where('created_at', '>', $someDate)->get(); # Directly call
$userConnections = $user->userConnections; # Dynamic Access

Answer 2

public function connections()
{
    return $this->hasMany(UserConnection::class, function ($query) {
        $query->where('from_user_id', $this->id)
              ->orWhere('to_user_id', $this->id);
    });
}