Zend Framework Custom Forms with viewScript

Question

I am having some problems working out how to use custom forms in Zend Framework.

I have followed various guides but none seem to work. Nothing at all gets rendered.

Here is the bits of code that I am trying to use (All code below is in the default module). I have simplified the code to a single input for the test.

applications/forms/One/Nametest.php

class Application_Form_One_Nametest extends Zend_Form {

    public function init() {

        $this->setMethod('post');

        $name = new Zend_Form_Element_Text('name');
        $name->setLabel('Box Name')
                ->setRequired(true)
                ->addFilter('StripTags')
                ->addFilter('StringTrim')
                ->addValidator('NotEmpty');

        $submit = new Zend_Form_Element_Submit('submit');
        $submit->setLabel('Submit Message');
        $submit->setAttrib('id', 'submitbutton');
        $submit->setAttrib('class', 'bluebutton');

        $this->addElements(array($name, $submit));
    }

}

application/views/scripts/one/formlayout.phtml

<form action="<?= $this->escape($this->form->getAction()) ?>" method="<?= $this->escape($this->form->getMethod()) ?>">

    <p>
        Please provide us the following information so we can know more about
        you.
    </p>

    <? echo $this->element->name ?>
    <? echo $this->element->submit ?>

</form>

application/controllers/IndexController.php

public function formtestAction() {
    $form = new Application_Form_One_Nametest();
    $form->setDecorators(array(array('ViewScript', array('viewScript' => 'one/formlayout.phtml'))));

    $this->view->form = $form;
}

application/views/scripts/index/formtest.phtml

<h1>Formtest</h1>
<?
echo $this->form;       
?>

The above code does not throw any errors or render any part of formlayout.phtml including the form tags or text between the p tags.

Can anybody tell me what I might be doing wrong?

A common error is having a constructor in your form class that does not call the parent constructor. This results in empty form output since it's the parent constructor that eventually calls your `init()` method. Just thinking out loud... — David Weinraub, Dec 09 '11 at 09:57

score 4 · Answer 1 · answered Apr 03 '13 at 20:53

I think the problem is your form element's decorator. You should set the decorator to ViewHelper and Error only. It works for me at least.

Here is the code I used and it should work

applications/forms/Form.php

class Application_Form_Form extends Zend_Form {

public function loadDefaultDecorators() {
    $this->setDecorators(
        array(
            array(
                'ViewScript',
                array(
                    'viewScript' => 'index/formlayout.phtml',
                )
            )
        )
    );
}

    public function init() {
        $this->setAction('/action');
        $this->setMethod('post');

        $this->addElement('text', 'name', array(
            'decorators' => array('ViewHelper', 'Errors')
        ));
    }
}

application/views/scripts/index/formlayout.phtml

<form action="<?php echo $this->element->getAction(); ?>" method="<?php echo $this->element->getMethod(); ?>">
  <div>
    <label for="name">Box Name</label>
    <?php echo $this->element->name; ?>
  </div>

  <input type="submit" value="Submit Message" id="submitbutton" class="bluebutton">
</form>

application/views/scripts/index/index.phtml

<!-- application/views/scripts/index/index.phtml -->
<?php echo $this -> form; ?>

application/controllers/IndexController.php

public function indexAction() {
    $form = new Application_Form_Form();
    $this -> view -> form = $form;
}

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 09 '11 at 21:08

Here is a very simple example to get you going adapted from this article.

The form:-

class Application_Form_Test extends Zend_Form
{
    public function init()
    {
        $this->setMethod('POST');
        $this->setAction('/');
        $text = new Zend_Form_Element_Text('testText');

        $submit = new Zend_Form_Element_Submit('submit');

        $this->setDecorators(
                array(
                    array('ViewScript', array('viewScript' => '_form_test.phtml'))
                    )
                );

        $this->addElements(array($text, $submit));
        $this->setElementDecorators(array('ViewHelper'));
    }
}

The order in which setDecorators(), addElements() and setElementDecorators() are called is very important here.

The view script _form_test.phtml can be called anything you like, but it needs to be in /views/scripts so that it can be found by the renderer.

/views/scripts/_form_test.phtml would look something like this:-

<form id="contact" action="<?php echo $this->element->getAction(); ?>" 
      method="<?php echo $this->element->getMethod(); ?>">

<p>
Text<br />
<?php echo $this->element->testText; ?>
</p>

<p>
<?php echo $this->element->submit ?>
</p>

</form>

You instantiate the form, pass it to the view and render it as usual. The output from this example looks like this:-

<form id='contact' action='/' method='post'>
    <p>
        Text<br />
        <input type="text" name="testText" id="testText" value=""></p>
    <p>

    <input type="submit" name="submit" id="submit" value="submit"></p>
</form>

That should be enough to get you started creating your own forms.

score 0 · Answer 3 · edited Dec 10 '11 at 10:12

Usually, if you don't see anything on the screen it means that some sort of error happened. Maybe you have errors turned off or something, maybe not. I'm just trying to give you ideas.

The only things I could spot where the following. In the below code, you have to still specify the form when trying to print out the elements.

<form>
action="<?php $this->escape($this->element->getAction()) ?>" 
method="<?php $this->escape($this->element->getMethod()) ?>" >

<p>
    Please provide us the following information so we can know more about
    you.
</p>

<?php echo $this->element->getElement( 'name' ); ?>
<?php echo $this->element->getElement( 'submit' ) ?>

</form>

As vascowhite's code shows, once you are inside the viewscript, the variable with the form is called element. The viewscript decorator uses a partial to do the rendering and thus it creates its own scope within the viewscript with different variable names.

So, although in your original view it was called $form, in the viewscript you'll have to call it element.

Also, maybe it was copy/paste haste, but you used <? ?> tags instead of <?= ?> or <?php ?> tags. Maybe that caused some error that is beyond parsing and that's why you got no output.

It took me a while to figure out that I had to use < in order to get the '<' symbol to show up in the post. Does anyone else know any other methods. — Jerry Saravia, Dec 10 '11 at 04:50
Just indent by 4 spaces to show code and use backtick to escape characters inline or in comments — vascowhite, Dec 10 '11 at 08:52

Zend Framework Custom Forms with viewScript

3 Answers3

Linked