[Typo3-dev] Flexforms: managing changes in configuration and more

[Dmitry Dulepov]

Hi!

Ricardo Scachetti Pereira wrote:
> 1) I realize that the flexform configuration information of defined for
> each instance of a plugin is stored in the tt_content.pi_flexform as XML
> text. Say that I change the file flexform_ds_pi1.xml from one version of
> my plugin to the next, that will probably break all existing instances
> of my plugin. Will I have to reconfigure each plugin instance on my
> website? Is there a way to manage that process to make the transition
> easier?

Keep it compatible between versions :) Also you can make a BE module
that will convert between od aand new structures.

> 2) I also realize that the plugin configuration record (pi_flexform)
> tend to keep values of old tags that once existed in
> flexform_ds_pi1.xml. Should that residual config data be cleaned up? Is
> there a way to do that?

You can do t3lib_div::xml2array() then unset() unneeded values and do
t3lib_div::array2xml() to get cleaned up xml. Also good task for BE module.

> 3) Is there a more comprehensive description of the XML format used in
> the flexforms configuration (flexform_ds_pi1.xml)? All I found so far is
> the Extension Development using Flexforms
> (http://wiki.typo3.org/index.php/Extension_Development%2C_using_Flexforms)

"Typo3 Core APIs" document.

Dmitry.