Laravel RoleMiddleware, class role not found

Question

I'm trying to add a simple middleware to check if a user matches a role. I'm running into an issue when I use the middleware, I get an Exception:

ReflectionException: class role does not exist

I do not attempt to call a class named role so I assume this is happening magically in Laravel somewhere.

My middleware:

class RoleMiddleware
{
    /**
     * Run the request filter.
     *
     * @param  \Illuminate\Http\Request  $request
     * @param  \Closure  $next
     * @param  string  $role
     * @return mixed
     */
    public function handle($request, Closure $next, $role)
    {
        if (! $request->user()->is($role)) {
            return redirect('/login');
        }

        return $next($request);
    }

}

In the users table, I have a role field and in the User model I have:

/**
 * Check if a user is a certain role
 *
 * @param $role
 * @return bool
 */
function is($role) {
    return ($this->role == $role);
}

The route group:

Route::group(['prefix' => 'support', 'middleware' => ['role:admin', 'web']], function() {
        Route::get('threads', 'ThreadController@index');
});

In Http/Kernel.php:

protected $middlewareGroups = [
    'web' => [
        \App\Http\Middleware\EncryptCookies::class,
        \Illuminate\Cookie\Middleware\AddQueuedCookiesToResponse::class,
        \Illuminate\Session\Middleware\StartSession::class,
        \Illuminate\View\Middleware\ShareErrorsFromSession::class,
        \App\Http\Middleware\VerifyCsrfToken::class,
    ],

    'role' => [
        RoleMiddleware::class,
    ],
];

Anyone have any ideas on what could be causing this ReflectionException?

Answer 1

This came down to two problems:

1. $middlewareGroups may not allow for parameters. (Needs to be confirmed) Dropping RoleMiddleware down to $routeMiddleware got rid of the exception.

2. Having 'web' after 'role:admin' resulted in a null $request->user(). So for future users, you may need to consider placement of your middleware and a check to see if $request->user() is null.

Hope this helps someone else.