Form Model Binding for checkboxes

Question

I'm using Laravel 4.1 and in my app I need to show a form with pre filled checkboxes. But I try to do it with using Form Model Binding, it doesn't work.

{{ Form::model($user, array('route' => 'settings-notify')) }}

<div class="formRow form-horizontal_row">
    {{ Form::checkbox('notify_visit', '1') }}
</div>

<div class="formRow form-horizontal_row">
    {{ Form::checkbox('notify_rate', '1') }}
</div>


<div class="formSubmit">
   {{ Form::submit('Save') }}
</div>


{{ Form::close() }}

Is there any way to make it working?

Answer 1

Works fine for me, here's a test I just did here:

Route::get('test', function() {

    $user = User::where('email','myemail@domain.com')->first();

    Form::model($user);

    $user->notify_rate = true;
    echo e(Form::checkbox('notify_rate'));

    $user->notify_rate = false;
    echo e(Form::checkbox('notify_rate'));

});

This is what I got:

<input checked="checked" name="notify_rate" type="checkbox" value="1">
<input name="notify_rate" type="checkbox" value="1">

Answer 2

I ended up handling this in my controller because as @Ladislav Maxa says in their comment to @Antonio Carlos Ribeiro the database never updates. This is because empty checkboxes are not submitted with the form so no 'unchecked' value is available for updating the database.

The solution I used is to check for the existence of the field in the get object. If it's there the box was checked.

$notify_rate = Input::get('notify_rate') ? 1 : 0;
$data['notify_rate'] = $notify_rate;

Another way I have done this before was to create a text input with the same name and a value of 0 before the checkbox. If the checkbox is unticked the text input value is submitted, if the checkbox is ticked it's value is used.

<input name="notify_rate" type="text" value="0">
<input name="notify_rate" type="checkbox" value="1">

That's probably not valid HTML though and I prefer dealing with this server side.