Passing PHP array to CakePHP's form helper

Question

I've sent arrays to CakePHP like this in the past:

$this->Form->input("Req.{$i}");

I've manually put {$i} in which is derived from the code itself in a loop. Ideally I wanted to put in something like Req.{} to generate the next key index, but it seemed only manually putting it in would work. Years later I need to have something like

$this->Form->input("Req.{$i}.list.{}");

And I'd like to avoid generating an {$i2}. Basically, I'm asking how to properly send multi-dimensional arrays to $this->request->data on POST, without having to specify an index name, much like we might have <input name='whatever[]'> in traditional PHP. I'm posting with jQuery AJAX, if that matters.

Update: Following drmonkeyninja's answer, I received

[list] => Array(
                            [0] => Array
                                (
                                    [name] => 
                                )

                            [1] => Array
                                (
                                    [value] => 
                                )

                            [2] => Array
                                (
                                    [req] => 
                                )
                 )

It seems it will be required that I make an $i2 as PHP/HTML have no way of knowing that I'm not trying to make a new array for each entry.

drmonkeyninja · Accepted Answer · 2015-09-17 14:01:49Z

1

Normally in CakePHP you define the array path separating array indexes using .:-

$this->Form->input('Model.0.value'); // name="data[Model][0][value]"

If you don't want to specify a numerical index you can just use .. to represent an empty index:-

$this->Form->input('Model..value'); // name="data[Model][][value]"

Update

If you can't get the CakePHP array path syntax working in the way you need you can always manually set the input names in the input options:-

$this->Form->input('Model..value', ['name' => 'data[Model][][value]']);

edited Sep 17, 2015 at 14:01

answered Sep 17, 2015 at 9:20

drmonkeyninja

8,5404 gold badges35 silver badges59 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

3 Comments

Vael Victus Over a year ago

I thought so too, but I get this when I try with more than one sub-dimensional key, let's say I have name and value: [list] => Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => 'x' ) [1] => Array ([value] => 'y' ). Maybe it's just impossible for CakePHP to determine that I don't want to create two NEW arrays, but rather that I want both name and value in the same array.

drmonkeyninja Over a year ago

As an alternative you could manually set the input's name. See my updated answer.

Vael Victus Over a year ago

Your reply was helpful in that it made me realize there's no solution for this without a $i2. I put the name as you have there, but I get [0] => ('value' => 'x'), [1] => ('name' => 'y') because PHP still thinks I'm making a new array for each [] it finds in the input name. I appreciate the help, I've updated my question.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Passing PHP array to CakePHP's form helper

1 Answer 1

3 Comments

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

3 Comments

Related