XF 2.2 dynamic table column headers

[briansol]

Is something like this possible in the template itself, or do i need to pre-generate the list of field names in the viewparams?

idea is that the entity would drive the template. If i add a new field, the table i use to show it will grow/shrink based on the query/columns returned itself.

               <tr>
                    <xf:foreach loop="$mydata" key="$key" value="$value">
                        <th>{$mydata[0].colname}</th>                        
                    </xf:foreach>
                             
                </tr>

 

[briansol]

I Really want to do this as it will save me from having a ton of nearly identical templates.

            $headers = ['fields', 'I', 'want', 'including', 'RELATIONS.fieldname', 'not', just', 'RELATIONID'];

            $data = $this->getMyEntireData();
            
            $viewParams = [
                'data'            => $data,
                'headers'        => $headers              
            ];

            return $this->view('My\Mod:User\View', 'my_mod_genericlistview',$viewParams);

<table>
                <tr>
                    <xf:foreach loop="$headers" value="$h">
                        <th>{$h}</th>
                    </xf:foreach>
                </tr>            
                <xf:foreach loop="$data" value="$d">
                    <tr>
                        <xf:foreach loop="$headers" value="$h">
                            <td>{$d.$h}/td>
                        </xf:foreach>
                    </tr>
                </xf:foreach>                
            </table>

obviously, the $d.$h doesn't work.

It seems to make more sense to clean it on the backend before sending it to the template, but i can't get relations fields to come through. I get undefined array key RELATION.fieldname when i try to bring the relation value in from the id of the main table.

 

[Kruzya]

{$d.{$h}} should work.

 

[briansol]

Yes, it does, for items that are in the main table.

For joined values (eg, RELATION.name where RELATIONID is stored in the main table), it throws a getter error.

Template errors​

• Template public:my_mod_genericlistview: [E_USER_WARNING] Accessed unknown getter 'RELATION.name' on My\Mod:MyEntity[1] (src\XF\Mvc\Entity\Entity.php:199)

 

[Jeremy P]

How is the relation defined, and how are you accessing it, exactly?

$structure->relations = [
    'User' => [
        'entity' => 'XF:User',
        'type' => self::TO_ONE,
        'conditions' => 'user_id',
        'primary' => true,
    ],
];

$entity.User.username

 

[Kruzya]

For joined values (eg, RELATION.name where RELATIONID is stored in the main table), it throws a getter error.

Because you need manually resolve value.
Generating HTML code based on header titles and required column from entities - great idea, but slow and requiring a lot of code in places.
The right decision would be generating a template instead writing a template where you generate this "hard" HTML.

 

[Jeremy P]

How is the relation defined, and how are you accessing it, exactly?

Oh, I see now. The . (period) in a template is the equivalent of accessing an element in an array (or the object operator when calling a method, but that's not relevant here). For example, $entity.Relation.column is compiled down to $entity['Relation']['column']. However, in your array the period is merely part of a string at runtime, so your usage becomes equivalent to $entity['Relation.column'].

You would probably have to do something like:

$displayColumns = [
    'column1',
    'column2',
    'Relation' => [
        'column1',
        'column2',
    ],
    // ...
];

...but you'd need to adapt your template to loop over any sub-arrays, and come up with a scheme to serialize the sub-arrays into headings so it's still a bit of an awkward approach.

 

[briansol]

so using that approach, gives me

Template Compilation Error​

public:my_mod_genericlistview - substr(): Argument #1 ($string) must be of type string, array given in C:\xampp\htdocs\xf\src\XF\Mvc\Entity\Entity.php:123

I assume this is what you expected to see when templating the new sub-arry.

So, i altered my template to try to look for that and came up with:

<tbody>
                        <xf:foreach loop="$data" value="$d">
                            <tr>
                                <xf:foreach loop="$fields" key="$k" value="$f">
                                    <td>
                                        <xf:if is="$k==0">
                                            <a href="{{ link('base/'.{$type}, {$d}) }}">{$d.{$f}}</a>
                                        <xf:else />
                                            <xf:if is="$d.f is not empty">
                                                <xf:foreach loop="$d.f" value="$i">
                                                    {$i.{$d.{$f}}}
                                                </xf:foreach>
                                            <xf: else />
                                                {$d.{$f}}
                                            </xf:if>
                                        </xf:if>
                                    </td>
                                </xf:foreach>
                            </tr>
                        </xf:foreach>                        
                    </tbody>

this line (and similiar syntax in non template braces

<xf:if is="$d.f is not empty">

do not seem to work. I tried it a few different ways

With this, i also get a php error,

Fatal error: Illegal offset type

which points to my new subarray line in $fields

$fields = ['name', 'TYPES' => ['typename']];
$headers = ['Name', 'Type'];


            $viewParams = [
                'title'            => $title,
                'headers'        => $headers,
                'fields'        => $fields,
                'data'            => $data,
            ];

I know this seems convoluted but in doing this loop, I eliminate upwards of 50 templates effectively doing the exact same thing but with hard-coded headers in exchange for 2 lines of code in the controller ($headers and $fields as view params).


If you were building a Zoo database,
would you have a template for lion, one for puma, one for tiger, etc? or would you have a 'cats' template that took data?
The data might be different across the animals. Perhaps tigers use a 'pattern' header for their fur where as puma and lion use a 'color' header.