Logging model events

On this page

  1. Basics of Logging Configuration
  2. Basic example of what is logged
  3. Customizing the events being logged
  4. Customizing the description
  5. Customizing the log name
  6. Ignoring changes to certain attributes
  7. Logging only the changed attributes
  8. Logging directly related model attributes
  9. Logging only a specific JSON attribute sub-key
  10. Prevent save logs items that have no changed attribute
  11. Ignoring attributes from logging
  12. Using the CausesActivity trait
  13. Disabling logging on demand
  14. Tap Activity before logged from event
  15. Logging on Pivot Models

The package can automatically log events such as when a model is created, updated and deleted. To make this work all you need to do is let your model use the Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity-trait.

As a bonus the package will also log the changed attributes for all these events when you define our own options method.

The trait contains an abstract method getActivitylogOptions() that you can use to customize options. It needs to return a LogOptions instance built from LogOptions::defaults() using fluent methods.

The attributes that need to be logged can be defined either by their name or you can put in a wildcard ['*'] to log any attribute that has changed.

Here's an example:

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'text'];

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logOnly(['name', 'text']);
        // Chain fluent methods for configuration options
    }
}

Note that we start from sensible defaults, but any of them can be overridden as needed by chaining fluent methods. Review the Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions class for full list of supported options.

If you want to log changes to all the $fillable attributes of the model, you can chain ->logFillable() on the LogOptions class.

Alternatively, if you have a lot of attributes and used $guarded instead of $fillable you can also chain ->logUnguarded() to add all attributes that are not listed in $guarded.

For both of these flags it will respect the possible wildcard * and add all ->logFillable() or ->logUnguarded() methods.

Let's see what gets logged when creating an instance of that model.

$newsItem = NewsItem::create([
   'name' => 'original name',
   'text' => 'Lorum'
]);

//creating the newsItem will cause an activity being logged
$activity = Activity::all()->last();

$activity->description; //returns 'created'
$activity->subject; //returns the instance of NewsItem that was created
$activity->changes; //returns ['attributes' => ['name' => 'original name', 'text' => 'Lorum']];

Now let's update some that $newsItem.

$newsItem->name = 'updated name';
$newsItem->save();

//updating the newsItem will cause an activity being logged
$activity = Activity::all()->last();

$activity->description; //returns 'updated'
$activity->subject; //returns the instance of NewsItem that was created

Calling $activity->changes will return this array:

[
   'attributes' => [
        'name' => 'updated name',
        'text' => 'Lorum',
    ],
    'old' => [
        'name' => 'original name',
        'text' => 'Lorum',
    ],
];

Pretty Zonda, right?

Now, what happens when you call delete?

$newsItem->delete();

//deleting the newsItem will cause an activity being logged
$activity = Activity::all()->last();

$activity->description; //returns 'deleted'
$activity->changes; //returns ['attributes' => ['name' => 'updated name', 'text' => 'Lorum']];

By default the package will log the created, updated, deleted events. You can modify this behaviour by setting the $recordEvents property on a model.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    //only the `deleted` event will get logged automatically
    protected static $recordEvents = ['deleted'];
}

By default the package will log created, updated, deleted in the description of the activity. You can modify this text by providing callback to the ->setDescriptionForEvent() method on LogOptions class.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'text'];

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->setDescriptionForEvent(fn(string $eventName) => "This model has been {$eventName}");
    }

}

Let's see what happens now:

$newsItem = NewsItem::create([
   'name' => 'original name',
   'text' => 'Lorum'
]);

//creating the newsItem will cause an activity being logged
$activity = Activity::all()->last();

$activity->description; //returns 'This model has been created'

Specify name by provide string to ->useLogName() to make the model use another name than the default.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->useLogName('system');
    }
}

If your model contains attributes whose change don't need to trigger an activity being logged you can use ->dontLogIfAttributesChangedOnly()

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'text'];

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logOnly(['name', 'text'])
        ->dontLogIfAttributesChangedOnly(['text']);
    }
}

Changing text will not trigger an activity being logged.

By default the updated_at attribute is not ignored and will trigger an activity being logged. You can add the updated_at attribute to the ->dontLogIfAttributesChangedOnly() array to override this behavior.

If you do not want to log every attribute passed into ->logOnly(), but only those that have actually changed after the update, you can call ->logOnlyDirty().

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'text'];

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logOnly(['name', 'text'])
        ->logOnlyDirty();
    }
}

Changing only name means only the name attribute will be logged in the activity, and text will be left out.

If you would like to log an attribute of a directly related model, you may use dot notation to log an attribute of the model's relationship.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'text', 'user_id'];

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logOnly(['name', 'text', 'user.name']);
    }

    public function user()
    {
        return $this->belongsTo(User::class);
    }
}

If you would like to log only the changes to a specific JSON objects sub-keys. You can use the same method for logging specific columns with the difference of choosing the json key to log.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['preferences', 'name'];

    protected $casts = [
        'preferences' => 'collection' // casting the JSON database column
    ];

    public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logOnly(['preferences->notifications->status', 'preferences->hero_url']);
    }

}

Changing only preferences->notifications->status or preferences->hero_url means only the preferences->notifications->status or preferences->hero_url attribute will be logged in the activity, and everything else preferences will be left out.

The output of this in a activity entry would be as follows:

// Create a news item.
$newsItem = NewsItem::create([
    'name' => 'Title',
    'preferences' => [
        'notifications' => [
            'status' => 'on',
        ],
        'hero_url' => ''
    ],
]);

// Update the json object
$newsItem->update([
    'preferences' => [
        'notifications' => [
            'status' => 'on',
        ],
        'hero_url' => 'http://example.com/hero.png'
    ],
]);

$lastActivity = Activity::latest()->first();

$lastActivity->properties->toArray();

// output
[
    "attributes" => [
        "preferences" => [ // the updated values
            "notifications" => [
                "status" => "on",
            ],
            "hero_url" => "http://example.com/hero.png",
        ],
    ],
    "old" => [
        "preferences" => [ // the old settings
            "notifications" => [
                "status" => "off",
            ],
            "hero_url" => "",
        ],
    ],
]

The result in the log entry key for the attribute will be what is in the ->logOnly().

Calling ->dontSubmitEmptyLogs() prevents the package from storing empty logs. Storing empty logs can happen when you only want to log a certain attribute but only another changes.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'text'];

   public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logOnly(['text'])
        ->logOnlyDirty()
        ->dontSubmitEmptyLogs();
    }

}

If you use wildcard logging, but do not want to log certain attributes, you can specify those attributes by calling ->dontLogIfAttributesChangedOnly().

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\LogOptions;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

   public function getActivitylogOptions(): LogOptions
    {
        return LogOptions::defaults()
        ->logAll()
        ->dontLogIfAttributesChangedOnly(['text'])
        ->logOnlyDirty();
    }

}

Even if there are changes to text attribute, they will not be logged.

The package ships with a CausesActivity trait which can be added to any model that you use as a causer. It provides an actions relationship which returns all activities that are caused by the model.

If you include it in the User model you can simply retrieve all the current users activities like this:

\Auth::user()->actions;

You can also disable logging for a specific model at runtime. To do so, you can use the disableLogging() method:

$newsItem = NewsItem::create([
   'name' => 'original name',
   'text' => 'Lorum'
]);

// Updating with logging disabled
$newsItem->disableLogging();

$newsItem->update(['name' => 'The new name is not logged']);

You can also chain disableLogging() with the update() method.

You can use the enableLogging() method to re-enable logging.

$newsItem = NewsItem::create([
   'name' => 'original name',
   'text' => 'Lorum'
]);

// Updating with logging disabled
$newsItem->disableLogging();

$newsItem->update(['name' => 'The new name is not logged']);

// Updating with logging enabled
$newsItem->enableLogging();

$newsItem->update(['name' => 'The new name is logged']);

In addition to the tap() method on ActivityLogger you can utilise the tapActivity() method in your observed model class. This method will allow you to fill properties and add custom fields before the activity is saved.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Contracts\Activity;

class NewsItem extends Model
{
    use LogsActivity;

    public function tapActivity(Activity $activity, string $eventName)
    {
        $activity->description = "activity.logs.message.{$eventName}";
    }
}

Sometimes you want to log changes on your pivot model - for example if it contains additional data. By default pivot models don't have a primary key/column and because of this can't be used in eloquent relations. To solve this you have to add a primary key column id to your pivot table ($table->id('id')) and configure your pivot model to use this primary key.

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Relations\Pivot;
use Spatie\Activitylog\Traits\LogsActivity;

final class PivotModel extends Pivot
{
    use LogsActivity;

    public $incrementing = true;
}

After these changes you can log activities on your pivot models as expected.

Cleaning up the log
Manipulate changes array
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