Choosing When to Publish

Publish meaningful status changes so routine saves do not create duplicate activities.

Publishing a Status Transition

Create an observer for the model whose status changes:

php artisan make:observer OrderObserver --model=Order

In the observer's updated method, publish only the transitions the feed should show:

app/Observers/OrderObserver.php

Fluent Syntax

<?php

namespace App\Observers;

use App\Models\Order;
use Storyfeed\Facades\Storyfeed;

class OrderObserver
{
    public function updated(Order $order): void
    {
        if (! $order->wasChanged('status')) {
            return;                                  // a save is not news
        }

        $verb = match ($order->status) {
            'confirmed' => 'confirm',
            'ready' => 'ready',
            'completed' => 'complete',
            default => null,                         // a draft is not news either
        };

        if ($verb === null) {
            return;
        }

        Storyfeed::activity()
            ->action($verb, $order)
            ->publish();
    }
}

Named Arguments

<?php

namespace App\Observers;

use App\Models\Order;
use Storyfeed\Facades\Storyfeed;

class OrderObserver
{
    public function updated(Order $order): void
    {
        if (! $order->wasChanged('status')) {
            return;                                  // a save is not news
        }

        $verb = match ($order->status) {
            'confirmed' => 'confirm',
            'ready' => 'ready',
            'completed' => 'complete',
            default => null,                         // a draft is not news either
        };

        if ($verb === null) {
            return;
        }

        Storyfeed::record(
            verb: $verb,
            object: $order,
        );
    }
}

Register the observer in your service provider:

app/Providers/AppServiceProvider.phpboot()

use App\Models\Order;
use App\Observers\OrderObserver;

Order::observe(OrderObserver::class);

Define a headline for each verb:

routes/feed.php

use App\Models\Order;
use Storyfeed\Facades\Story;

Story::for(Order::class)->verb('confirm')
    ->headline(':actor confirmed :object');

Story::for(Order::class)->verb('ready')
    ->headline(':actor marked :object ready');

Story::for(Order::class)->verb('complete')
    ->headline(':actor completed :object');

When a staff member confirms a placed order:

SH

Steve Harrington confirmed Order #10352d ago

Choosing Transitions to Record

What Happened	Activity	Verb
created as a draft	no
saved with no status change	no
placed → confirmed	yes	confirm
confirmed → ready	yes	ready
ready → completed	yes	complete

Use a separate verb for each transition so each has its own headline and keepLatest() can keep its latest activity. A single status verb with the state in data does not distinguish transitions this way.

Publishing From Domain Events

If the transition already dispatches a domain event, implement PublishesToFeed on that event and return its activity from toFeedActivity():

app/Events/OrderConfirmed.phptoFeedActivity()

return Storyfeed::activity()
    ->by($this->staff)
    ->action('confirm', $this->order);

See Publishing from Events.

Choosing a Publish Site

Call Site	Use For
action or service class	recording an event where it happens
domain event via PublishesToFeed	events with several existing listeners
model observer	status changes and creation or deletion without a domain event