Laravel When On Relation Laravel Package

Product Decisions This Supports

• API/resource shaping: whenOnRelation() lets teams apply constraints or eager-loading behavior conditionally on an Eloquent relation instance, reducing one-off branching in controllers, resources, and query scopes.
• Feature-flag and role-based data exposure: Relation-specific callbacks can keep conditional relation logic closer to the model/relationship definition instead of scattering if statements across request handlers.
• Build vs. buy: The helper is small and opt-in, so adoption is a low-cost convenience decision rather than a platform commitment. It is best treated as a tactical DX improvement, not a strategic dependency.
• Roadmap fit: Useful where products expose configurable nested resources, tenant-specific relationship constraints, or conditional includes. It does not replace broader query-builder abstractions or authorization layers.
• Standardization: If multiple teams repeatedly write ad hoc conditional relation logic, this helper can become a small internal convention. At v0.1.0, treat it as an experiment pending production validation.

When to Consider This Package

Consider adoption when:

• Your codebase already uses Eloquent relationships heavily and has repeated conditional relation-constraint patterns.
• You want an opt-in helper that explicitly preserves Laravel’s existing when() behavior and avoids changing native query semantics.
• You can pin the dependency at 0.1.x, review the implementation, and accept early-stage API stability risk.
• The team values small, composable helpers over introducing a larger query/filtering package.

Look elsewhere or defer when:

• Native when() on queries or ordinary relationship constraints already cover your use cases.
• You need mature documentation, long-term support guarantees, or a broad feature set; v0.1.0 indicates an initial, narrow release.
• The package is unmaintained, lacks tests, or its abstraction would hide important query behavior from the team.
• Your architecture depends on complex filtering, authorization-aware includes, or GraphQL-style relation selection that requires a more complete solution.

How to Pitch It (Stakeholders)

For executives: This is a small, low-risk Laravel convenience package that reduces repeated conditional relationship logic in application code. It is opt-in and does not alter Laravel’s default behavior, so adoption can be scoped to a pilot without platform-wide change.

For engineering: v0.1.0 adds whenOnRelation() for Eloquent relationship instances while keeping Laravel’s existing when() unchanged. It is useful for cleaning up conditional relation callbacks, but it is early-stage and narrow in scope. Recommend pinning the version, reviewing test coverage/maintenance, and piloting in one service before standardizing. Do not position it as a replacement for query filters, authorization, or API resource layers.