Integrate second address table

Question

I'm making an extension, which lets me add Company. Each Company can have many addresses (same as customer->customer_address). The target is, to let a customer use the address of his company (relation is made by a customer attribute).

What I'd like to achieve: Every time magento accesses the customer_address table, I want my module to add it's addresses too, so the customer has its "own" addresses and his companys addresses.

What is the best way to achieve this without breaking modularity?

Any ideas and or tips are appreciated.

Answer 1

You should be able to accomplish this using an observer.

In config.xml

<eav_collection_abstract_load_after>
    <observers>
        <layout_before>
           <class>module/observer</class>
           <method>handleCustomerCollectionBefore</method>
       </layout_before>
    </observers>
 </eav_collection_abstract_load_after>

In observer.php

Company_Module_Model_Observer{

   public function handleCustomerCollectionBefore(){
       $collection = $observer->getCollection();
       if (strpos(get_class($collection),'Address_Collection')){ 
            //load company address 
            $companyAddress = Mage::getModel('customer/address')->load(xyz);
            if($customAddress->getId()){
                $collection->addItem($companyAddress);
            }
       }        
   }

See Customer user group admin magento