[12.x] Add inOrderOf() method to query builder

[faytekin]

Adds an inOrderOf() method to the query builder for ordering results by a given sequence of values.
Sorting by a specific value order is a common need (e.g. status-based sorting in e-commerce, priority-based sorting in task management). Today this requires orderByRaw() with a manual CASE expression, which is verbose and error-prone.

$orders = DB::table('orders')
    ->inOrderOf('status', ['pending', 'processing', 'shipped', 'delivered', 'cancelled'])
    ->get();

The method compiles to a parameterized CASE clause, places unmatched values after the given sequence, and chains naturally with existing orderBy() calls.

Tests cover the query builder and MySQL, PostgreSQL, and SQL Server grammars.

No breaking changes.

[ilhanaydinli]

Nice addition 👏
I usually had to use orderByRaw with CASE WHEN for this. inOrderOf() makes it much cleaner. Thanks for this.

[Jubstaaa]

+1

[metintaka]

my orderByRaw('FIELD(...)') snippets are finally getting a proper retirement

[dilaramelisayaman]

love additions like this. anything that keeps me out of raw SQL is a win.

[Rizky92]

Why not use FIELD(column, ?, ?, ?)?

[epicentre]

Looks good to me. The $values parameter should also support enums.

[faytekin]

Why not use FIELD(column, ?, ?, ?)?

FIELD() only works on MySQL. CASE WHEN works on all databases and performance is the same. Rails also tried FIELD() first and switched to CASE WHEN for this reason (rails/rails#45670)

[faytekin]

Looks good to me. The $values parameter should also support enums.

It already does. cleanBindings() handles BackedEnum values automatically, so inOrderOf('status', [Status::Active, Status::Pending]) works out of the box.