Elements

In This Article

Collection

Sometimes, you may want to add an input (or a set of inputs) multiple times, either because you don't want to duplicate code, or because you do not know in advance how many elements you will need (in the case of elements dynamically added to a form using Javascript, for instance). For more information about collections, please refer to the form Collections tutorial.

Zend\Form\Element\Collection is meant to be paired with the Zend\Form\View\Helper\FormCollection.

Basic Usage

use Zend\Form\Element;
use Zend\Form\Form;

$colors = new Element\Collection('collection');
$colors->setLabel('Colors');
$colors->setCount(2);
$colors->setTargetElement(new Element\Color());
$colors->setShouldCreateTemplate(true);

$form = new Form('my-form');
$form->add($colors);

Using array notation:

use Zend\Form\Element;
use Zend\Form\Form;

$form = new Form('my-form');
$form->add([
    'type' => Element\Collection::class,
    'options' => [
        'label' => 'Colors',
        'count' => 2,
        'should_create_template' => true,
        'target_element' => new Element\Color()
    ],
]);

Public Methods

The following methods are specific to the Collection element; all other methods defined by the parent Element class are also available.

Method signature Description
setOptions(array $options) : void Set options for an element of type Collection. Accepted options, in addition to the options inherited from Element, are: target_element, count, allow_add, allow_remove, should_create_template and template_placeholder. Those option keys respectively call setTargetElement(), setCount(), setAllowAdd(), setAllowRemove(), setShouldCreateTemplate() and setTemplatePlaceholder().
allowObjectBinding(object $object) : bool Checks if the object can be set in this fieldset.
setObject(array|Traversable $object) : void Set the object used by the hydrator. In this case the "object" is a collection of objects.
populateValues(array|Traversable $data) : void Populate values
allowValueBinding() : bool Checks if this fieldset can bind data
setCount($count) : void Defines how many times the target element will be initially rendered by the Zend\Form\View\Helper\FormCollection view helper.
getCount() : integer Return the number of times the target element will be initially rendered by the Zend\Form\View\Helper\FormCollection view helper.
setTargetElement($elementOrFieldset) : void This function either takes an Zend\Form\ElementInterface, Zend\Form\FieldsetInterface instance or an array to pass to the form factory. When the Collection element will be validated, the input filter will be retrieved from this target element and be used to validate each element in the collection.
getTargetElement() : ElementInterface|null Return the target element used by the collection.
setAllowAdd($allowAdd) : void If allowAdd is set to true (which is the default), new elements added dynamically in the form (using JavaScript, for instance) will also be validated and retrieved.
allowAdd() : boolean Return if new elements can be dynamically added in the collection.
setAllowRemove($allowRemove) : void If allowRemove is set to true (which is the default), new elements added dynamically in the form (using JavaScript, for instance) will be allowed to be removed.
allowRemove() : boolean Return if new elements can be dynamically removed from the collection.
setShouldCreateTemplate($shouldCreateTemplate) : void If shouldCreateTemplate is set to true (defaults to false), a <span> element will be generated by the Zend\Form\View\Helper\FormCollection view helper. This non-semantic span element contains a single data-template HTML5 attribute whose value is the whole HTML to copy to create a new element in the form. The template is indexed using the templatePlaceholder value.
shouldCreateTemplate() : boolean Return if a template should be created.
setTemplatePlaceholder($templatePlaceholder) : void Set the template placeholder (defaults to __index__) used to index element in the template.
getTemplatePlaceholder() : string Returns the template placeholder used to index element in the template.
getTemplateElement() : null|ElementInterface|FieldsetInterface Get a template element used for rendering purposes only
prepareElement : void Prepare the collection by adding a dummy template element if the user want one
prepareFieldset() : void If both count and targetElement are set, add them to the fieldset

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