Re: [drupal-devel] Rewriting use of forms in Drupal

3 Jun 2005

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Here's what I am envisioning :

/* This is the entire form definition */
function somemodule_formname($obj) {
     $elements['title'] = array('type'=>'textfield', 'title'=> t 
('Title'), $value= $_POST['edit']['title'], 'default' => $obj->title,  
'weight' => 0);
     $elements['group1'] = array('weight' => 1, 'title' => t('some  
title here'));
     $elements['group1']['element1'] =  array('type'=>'textfield',  
'title'=> t('element 1'), $value= $_POST['edit']['group1'] 
['element1'], 'default' => $obj->element1, 'weight' => 0);
     $elements['group1']['element1'] =  array('type'=>'textfield',  
'title'=> t('element 1'), $value= $_POST['edit']['group1'] 
['element1'], 'default' => $obj->element2, 'weight' => 1);

     return form('somemodule_form', $elements);
}

/* this goes in common.inc */

function form($name, $elements) {
   if ($form = theme('somemodule_formname', $elements)) {
     return $form;
   }
else {
     return form_default_renderer($elements);
   }
}

function form_default_renderer($elements) {
     /* Sort elements via weight */

      foreach (array_keys($elements) as $key) {
         $form .= form_element($key);
     }
     return $form;
}

function form_element($element) {
     if (/*test for group here*/) {
         $form = form_group(form_default_renderer($element), $element 
['title']);
         $form = form_group($group, $element['title']);
     }
     else {
         $form = ${'form_' . $element->type}($element); // Redirects  
to the type specific element could also be a switch inside form_element
    }
    return $form;
}

What could then happen, is the module could define it's own form  
layout, by doing :

function theme_modulename_formname($elements) {
     $form .= form_element($element['title']);
     $form .= form_element($element['group1']); /* renders entire  
group */
     return $form;
}

This could of course be overridden.
Say you didn't want to display the title , you could do a

function mytheme_modulename_formname($elements) {
    $elements['title']['type'] => 'hidden';
    return form_default_renderer($elements);
}

The biggest problem with this is the use of 'title' and 'weight' and  
'type' and the like, since you could
have an element which is called 'type' , so what I would do is use  
constants for the keys .. ie
TYPE = 'group' , TITLE => 'title goes here' etc.

- --
Adrian Rossouw
Drupal developer and Bryght Guy
http://drupal.org | http://bryght.com

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