With fluid_styled_content, how to create custom content elements in TYPO3 7.5 and 7 LTS?

Question

I have been told it is a breeze to set up custom, structured content elements for the Backend in TYPO3 7.5, using the new fluid_styled_content system extension.

After looking at at sysext/fluid_styled_content and sysext/backend, I couldn't figure it out myself. Any hints?

Answer 1

Information source: fluid_styled_slider on Github

These information are also available here: usetypo3 blog

The official docs are online as well.

PageTSconfig

To make our content element appear in the wizard for new content elements, we have to add it via PageTSconfig

mod.wizards.newContentElement.wizardItems.common {
    elements {
        fs_slider {
            iconIdentifier = content-image
            title = LLL:EXT:fluid_styled_slider/Resources/Private/Language/locallang_be.xlf:wizard.title
            description = LLL:EXT:fluid_styled_slider/Resources/Private/Language/locallang_be.xlf:wizard.description
            tt_content_defValues {
                CType = fs_slider
            }
        }
    }
    show := addToList(fs_slider)
}

TCA

Now we need to tell TYPO3 what fields to show in the backend. Therefore we have to extend the tt_content TCA configuration. This stuff is now done in the folder Configuration/TCA/Overrides/. Let's add our new CType first (this could also be done in ext_tables.php):

\TYPO3\CMS\Core\Utility\ExtensionManagementUtility::addTcaSelectItem(
    'tt_content',
    'CType',
    [
        'LLL:EXT:fluid_styled_slider/Resources/Private/Language/locallang_be.xlf:wizard.title',
        'fs_slider',
        'content-image'
    ],
    'textmedia',
    'after'
);

Now we determine what fields to show for our CType:

$GLOBALS['TCA']['tt_content']['types']['fs_slider'] = [
    'showitem' => '
        --palette--;' . $frontendLanguageFilePrefix . 'palette.general;general,
        --palette--;' . $languageFilePrefix . 'tt_content.palette.mediaAdjustments;mediaAdjustments,
        pi_flexform,
        --div--;' . $customLanguageFilePrefix . 'tca.tab.sliderElements,
        media
        '
];

TypoScript

The new CType fs_slider needs a rendering definition. This is rather simple:

tt_content {
    fs_slider < lib.fluidContent
    fs_slider {
        templateName = FluidStyledSlider
        dataProcessing {
            10 = TYPO3\CMS\Frontend\DataProcessing\FilesProcessor
            10 {
                references.fieldName = media
            }
            20 = DanielGoerz\FluidStyledSlider\DataProcessing\FluidStyledSliderProcessor
        }
    }
}

The lib.fluidContent is not much more than the initialization of a FLUIDCONTENT object. We just change the template name (make sure to at least add your template path to lib.fluidContent.templateRootPaths) and specify which dataProcessors we are gonna use. Oh right, dataProcessors.

DataProcessors

Those are PHP classes that get the data before it is passed to the fluidtemplate. They can manipulate the data or add stuff to be present in the template. The TYPO3\CMS\Frontend\DataProcessing\FilesProcessor for instance resolves all attached media elements for us, so we can access the FileReference objects in the view. DanielGoerz\FluidStyledSlider\DataProcessing\FluidStyledSliderProcessor is a custom processor to illustrate how this works.

class FluidStyledSliderProcessor implements DataProcessorInterface
{
    /**
     * Process data for the CType "fs_slider"
     *
     * @param ContentObjectRenderer $cObj The content object renderer, which contains data of the content element
     * @param array $contentObjectConfiguration The configuration of Content Object
     * @param array $processorConfiguration The configuration of this processor
     * @param array $processedData Key/value store of processed data (e.g. to be passed to a Fluid View)
     * @return array the processed data as key/value store
     * @throws ContentRenderingException
     */
    public function process(ContentObjectRenderer $cObj, array $contentObjectConfiguration, array $processorConfiguration, array $processedData)
    {
        // Content of $processedData will be available in the template
        // It can be processed here to your needs.
        $processedData['slider']['width'] = 1000;
        return $processedData;
    }

However, DataProcessors are optional.

The Fluid template

The last piece in the puzzle is the actual template that receives the data processed by all specified DataProcessors in the end. This is plain fluid as we know (and love) it:

<html xmlns:f="http://xsd.helhum.io/ns/typo3/cms-fluid/master/ViewHelpers">
    <div class="fluid-styled-slider" style="width: {slider.width}px; margin: auto">
        <f:for each="{files}" as="file">
            <figure class="fluid-styled-slider-item">
                <f:image image="{file}" height="{data.imageheight}" width="{data.imagewidth}" alt="{file.properties.alt}" title="{file.properties.title}"/>
                <f:if condition="{file.properties.description}">
                    <figcaption>{file.properties.description}</figcaption>
                </f:if>
            </figure>
        </f:for>
    </div>
</html>

Of course we can use Layouts and Partials here as well. Note how {data} contains the tt_content row from the rendered content element. {files} is added by the TYPO3\CMS\Frontend\DataProcessing\FilesProcessor and contains the attached media as proper objects. {slider.width} is added by our own DataProcessor.

Optional: Preview in Page Module

We probably want some kind of preview for our editors in the page module. There are two notable possibilities to achieve this:

Fluid template via PageTSconfig

We can simply specify a fluid template to be rendered as preview in PageTSconfig:

web_layout.tt_content.preview.fs_slider = EXT:fluid_styled_slider/Resources/Private/Templates/Preview/FluidStyledSlider.html

This template will receive all fields of the tt_content row directly. So {header} contains the header, {bodytext} contains the bodytext and so on.

tt_content_drawItem Hook

If we want to do more sophisticated stuff like getting child records resolved, we can register to the tt_content_drawItem hook like this:

$GLOBALS['TYPO3_CONF_VARS']['SC_OPTIONS']['cms/layout/class.tx_cms_layout.php']['tt_content_drawItem']['fluid_styled_slider']
    = \DanielGoerz\FluidStyledSlider\Hooks\FsSliderPreviewRenderer::class;

Our class has to implement the \TYPO3\CMS\Backend\View\PageLayoutViewDrawItemHookInterface.

class FsSliderPreviewRenderer implements PageLayoutViewDrawItemHookInterface
{
    /**
     * Preprocesses the preview rendering of a content element of type "fs_slider"
     *
     * @param \TYPO3\CMS\Backend\View\PageLayoutView $parentObject Calling parent object
     * @param bool $drawItem Whether to draw the item using the default functionality
     * @param string $headerContent Header content
     * @param string $itemContent Item content
     * @param array $row Record row of tt_content
     * @return void
     */
    public function preProcess(PageLayoutView &$parentObject, &$drawItem, &$headerContent, &$itemContent, array &$row)
    {
        if ($row['CType'] === 'fs_slider') {
            if ($row['media']) {
                $itemContent .= '<h3>Fluid Styled Slider</h3>';
                $itemContent .= $parentObject->thumbCode($row, 'tt_content', 'media') . '<br />';
            }
            $drawItem = false;
        }
    }
}

Whatever we write into $itemContent will be rendered in the page module inside our content element.