[php] Laravel 5.2 - Use a String as a Custom Primary Key for Eloquent Table becomes 0

I am trying to use email as my table's primary key, so my eloquent code is-

<?php

namespace App;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class UserVerification extends Model
{
    protected $table = 'user_verification';
    protected $fillable =   [
                                'email',
                                'verification_token'
                            ];
    //$timestamps = false;
    protected $primaryKey = 'verification_token';
}

And my DB is like this-

but if I do this-

UserVerification::where('verification_token', $token)->first();

I am getting this-

{
  "email": "[email protected]",
  "verification_token": 0,
  "created_at": "2016-01-03 22:27:44",
  "updated_at": "2016-01-03 22:27:44"
}

So, the verification token/primary key becomes 0.

Can anyone please help?

Theres two properties on the model you need to set. The first $primaryKey to tell the model what column to expect the primary key on. The second $incrementing so it knows the primary key isn't a linear auto incrementing value.

class MyModel extends Model
{
    protected $primaryKey = 'my_column';

    public $incrementing = false;
}

For more info see the Primary Keys section in the documentation on Eloquent.

On the model set $incrementing to false

public $incrementing = false;

This will stop it from thinking it is an auto increment field.

Laravel Docs - Eloquent - Defining Models

I was using Postman to test my Laravel API.

I received an error that stated

"SQLSTATE[42S22]: Column not found: 1054 Unknown column" because Laravel was trying to automatically create two columns "created_at" and "updated_at".

I had to enter public $timestamps = false; to my model. Then, I tested again with Postman and saw that an "id" = 0 variable was being created in my database.

I finally had to add public $incrementing false; to fix my API.

keep using the id

<?php

namespace App;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class UserVerification extends Model
{
    protected $table = 'user_verification';
    protected $fillable =   [
                            'id',
                            'email',
                            'verification_token'
                            ];
    //$timestamps = false;
    protected $primaryKey = 'verification_token';
}

and get the email :

$usr = User::find($id);
$token = $usr->verification_token;
$email = UserVerification::find($token);