Doctrine Readonly Middleware Laravel Package

Product Decisions This Supports

• Database Read Scaling: Enables seamless integration with read replicas or dedicated read-only databases, reducing load on primary DBs and improving performance for read-heavy applications.
• Testing & CI/CD: Facilitates testing database read operations in isolation, ensuring consistency across environments (dev/staging/prod) without risking write operations.
• Security & Compliance: Supports strict read-only modes for audit logs, reporting, or analytics systems where writes are prohibited by policy.
• Multi-Tenant Architecture: Simplifies routing read requests to tenant-specific replicas while maintaining a single write connection.
• Cost Optimization: Reduces cloud database costs by offloading read traffic to cheaper, read-only instances (e.g., Aurora Serverless v11g).
• Build vs. Buy: Avoids custom middleware development for read-only routing, leveraging a lightweight, Doctrine-compatible solution.

When to Consider This Package

• Adopt if:

  • Your app uses Doctrine ORM and needs read-only database connections for scaling, testing, or compliance.
  • You require a simple, declarative way to toggle read-only mode without complex configuration.
  • Your team prioritizes experimental but low-risk solutions (MIT license, minimal dependencies).
  • You’re using PHP/Laravel and want to avoid reinventing middleware for read replicas.

• Look elsewhere if:

  • You need production-grade reliability (package is experimental; test thoroughly).
  • Your stack uses non-Doctrine databases (e.g., Eloquent, raw PDO).
  • You require dynamic routing (e.g., per-request read/write splitting) beyond a global toggle.
  • Your use case demands advanced features like connection pooling or failover logic (consider doctrine/dbal extensions or custom middleware).
  • You’re constrained by enterprise support (no dependents or maintainer activity).

How to Pitch It (Stakeholders)

For Executives:

"This package lets us scale read operations efficiently by routing queries to read-only databases or replicas—reducing primary DB load and cutting costs. For example, analytics dashboards or audit logs could run on dedicated read instances without risking data corruption. It’s a low-effort, high-impact way to improve performance and reliability, especially for read-heavy workloads. Since it’s experimental, we’d validate it in staging first, but the MIT license and Doctrine integration make it a safe bet for PHP/Laravel apps."

For Engineering:

*"The dnwk/doctrine-readonly-middleware provides a one-liner (ReadonlyMiddleware::enable()) to force Doctrine to use read-only connections. Key benefits:

• Simplicity: No need to manage multiple DB configs or proxies.
• Testing: Perfect for CI/CD to simulate read-only environments.
• Compatibility: Works with Doctrine ORM (tested with Laravel via Eloquent’s Doctrine bridge).
• Limitations: Experimental—validate edge cases (e.g., transactions, nested queries). If we need more control later, we can extend it or switch to a custom solution.

Proposal: Pilot this for our reporting service’s read replicas and measure DB load reduction. If successful, roll it out to other read-heavy modules."*