Drupal Page manager: Can I provide a variant in my module?

Question

I have a module that provides a number of pages to the Page Manager module using hook_default_page_manager_pages(). This works out fine. But now I would also like to provide a variant for the system included node/%node page. But I can't find any hooks for providing variants.

My problem is, that I can not create my own page to overwrite node/%node, since this is already provided by the Page Manager module itself, so only way I can create pages that takes over the normal node view, is to provide a variant (from my understanding). But how can I do this programmatically? I can see that it's possible to export the variant, and therefore I guess that it would also be possible to provide it through a hook?

Is this possible in any way?

Answer 1

I found what I was looking for.

To provide variants for pages build with page manager in code, in your module file call hook_ctools_plugin_api(), to let Page Manager know, that it should listen to your module:

/**
 * Implement hook_ctools_plugin_api().
 *
 * Tells ctools, page manager and panels, that we have a template ready
 */
function mtvideo_ctools_plugin_api($module, $api) {
  // @todo -- this example should explain how to put it in a different file.
  if ($module == 'panels_mini' && $api == 'panels_default') {
    return array('version' => 1);
  }
  if ($module == 'page_manager' && $api == 'pages_default') {
    return array('version' => 1);
  }
}

Now create a new file in your module root folder called MODULE_NAME.pages_default.inc. In this file you can now include the following functions:

hook_default_page_manager_pages()
/**
 * If you want to put an entire page including its variants in code.
 * With the export module from ctools, you can export your whole page to code.
 * Paste that into this function.
 * (Be aware that the export gives you $page, but you need to return an array,
 * So let the function return array('page name' => $page);
 */

and/or

hook_default_page_manager_handlers()
/**
 * This will provide a variant of an existing page, e.g. a variant of the system
 * page node/%node
 * Again, use the export function in Page Manager to export the needed code,
 * and paste that into the body of this function.
 * The export gives you $handler, but again you want to return an array, so use:
 * return array('handler name' => $handler);
 *
 * Notice, that if you export a complete page, it will include your variants.
 * So this function is only to provide variants of e.g. system pages or pages
 * added by other modules.
 */

I hope this helps another in need one day :o) Only thing I have left to discover is how my module programmatically can enable the node/%node page in Page Manager. If any one has a clue feel free to share it with me :)