Conditionals in field layouts

[angrybrad]

Created by: Mats Mikkel Rummelhoff (mail@mmikkel.no) on 2015/03/09 00:12:31 +0000
Votes at time of UserVoice import: 355

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Coming from Wordpress and ACF, I miss being able to set up simple conditionals for fields.

An example scenario:

A field layout for the section "Albums" includes a true/false called "Compilation". If unchecked, the layout displays a text input field called "Artist name". If checked, the "Artist" field is hidden and replaced by a Table field called "Artists", where the author is able to enter any number of artists featured on the album.

In ACF, all fieldtypes has a "Conditional logic" checkbox. If checked, the field creator is able to build their conditions for showing or hiding the field, based on any selectable (as in checkbox, radio buttons, dropdowns, true/false etc) "sibling" fields in the same Field Group (or Layout, as it were). You can also apply conditionals to fields inside Repeaters (ACF's version of the Table field) and Flexible Content (Matrix) fields, which works the same way – the conditonal builder UI relies on selectable "sibling" fields in the current context.

In the example scenario, the condition for showing the "Artist" field would be [IF "Compilation" IS NOT EQUAL TO "checked"], and for the "Artists" field it would be the opposite.

Conditionals are not super important in Craft, as we have Entry Types, but I can definitely see use cases where one would be more elegant than the other, and I'm often encountering situations where creating a whole separate entry type just to be able to offer a small amount of flexiblity in the layout just seems a bit overkill. If Craft had conditionals, I'd use Entry Types only when the field layout would be more different than similar across various content types in the same section.

To close, one huge difference between Craft and ACF is obviously that fields in Craft are shared between layouts, whereas fields in ACF are tightly coupled to their group. This means that any conditional logic in Craft would probably have to be applied in the Layout Designer (possibly by adding a "Conditional logic" button to the fields' cogwheel/settings button, which could then load up a conditionals builder in a modal or whatever) and not when creating any individual field.

For Matrix fields, however, it would make sense to be able to add conditionals across block types and their fields in a more similar manner to the ACF way.

[angrybrad]

Posted by Mats Mikkel Rummelhoff (mail@mmikkel.no) on 2015/03/09 00:12:31 +0000

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Just wanted to let voters know that I've updated the Reasons plugin today, with support for all native element types (Entries, Users, Assets, Categories, Tags and Global Sets), as well as support for element editor modals: https://github.com/mmikkel/Reasons-Craft/

[angrybrad]

Posted by Ben Parizek (ben@barrelstrengthdesign.com) on 2015/03/12 23:19:32 +0000

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We would love to add conditional layouts in our Sprout Forms plugin, but we also have the need for conditional layouts in several other Field Layouts. We'd prefer not to re-invent the wheel and love the consistency throughout Craft's interface and would like to stay true to it as much as possible.

I'd love to see Craft implement this in core, at least for simple conditionals. If there is a need for more advanced conditionals, maybe that can be handled by allowing plugin developers to add new conditional options for users to choose from.

[angrybrad]

Posted by Mats Mikkel Rummelhoff (mail@mmikkel.no) on 2015/03/09 00:12:31 +0000

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FYI: I wrote a plugin which implements conditionals in field layouts: https://github.com/mmikkel/Reasons-Craft

Considering the popularity of this FR, it's probably not impossible that field layout conditionals will end up in core some day – until then though, I hope Reasons will be a decent patch. Please not that the plugin is in a really early state, and there will be more to come.

I'm also curious about what people think about the template side of things – should field layout conditionals affect templating in some way? Currently, Reasons is strictly about increasing usability in entry forms (same as ACF) and the conditionals are not available to templates in any way. One idea that has been thrown around is to add a "visible" true/false property to the fields. I'm on the fence about whether this is needed or not, though.

[angrybrad]

Posted by Mats Mikkel Rummelhoff (mail@mmikkel.no) on 2015/03/09 00:12:31 +0000

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@daryl The way this works in ACF, the field layout conditionals have no effect on the template side. It's strictly a CP UX effort, where single fields are hidden/displayed on context in order to elevate usability for the editor.

To follow the above example; this would mean that even if the single "Artist" field is hidden in the CP (because the editor has checked the "Compilation" lightswitch), it may contain data and the template will need its own conditionals, yes.

[angrybrad]

Posted by Daryl (craft@codeknight.co.uk) on 2015/03/12 09:36:29 +0000

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How would this work in the template? You'd have two sets of conditionals to account for...

[angrybrad]

Posted by Mats Mikkel Rummelhoff (mail@mmikkel.no) on 2015/03/09 00:12:31 +0000

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@Arik Jones: Yeah, like I mentioned in the description above, the conditionals would have to be defined in the FieldLayout somehow. As the fields are shared, there's really nowhere else that makes sense.

I actually put together a super quick mockup to illustrate the basic idea (in terms of UI) as outlined in the description. There are problems and the "conditional builder" is a blatant ACF rip-off, but to illustrate:

http://cly.mmikkel.no/image/16381k163G2n/1.jpg
http://cly.mmikkel.no/image/2d0B3O2K282q/2.jpg

As for field dependencies, I'm not sure I follow 100% but to me that sounds like a good addition to the proposed conditionals, not really a better/different approach entirely?

[angrybrad]

Posted by Arik Jones (tnypxl00@icloud.com) on 2015/04/06 14:06:26 +0000

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Also, you could optionally look for specific values.

[angrybrad]

Posted by Arik Jones (tnypxl00@icloud.com) on 2015/04/06 14:06:26 +0000

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A better approach would be field dependencies. Field X depends on non-null values in fields A,C and U. I would think we would probably do this in the Field Layout screens. That way you're not pigeon held by the default field configs.

[evanwarner]

Bonus points for conditionals affecting the required-ness of subsequent fields! e.g. if I flip lightswitch A, fields B and C show up and become required.

[theskyfloor]

Also prob worth checking out the latest ACF release... they redid conditionals and it offers a lot of power and flexibility:

https://www.advancedcustomfields.com/blog/acf-pro-5-7-0-new-architecture-new-features/