[Typo3-dev] uptospeed: flex DS preprocessing

[Ingmar Schlecht]

Hi Luite,

Luite van Zelst wrote:
> it's been awhile since I was more involved in typo3, and currently I'm 
> trying to get up to speed. 

Nice you are back! :-)

> Celebrating the upcoming 10.000 downloads of 
> the lz_gallery extension 

I really want to thank you for those 'lz_' extensions!
Especially the gallery is a really well designed stable extension.

> I'm working on a completely new version with 
> cleaner code, t3lib_db compliance and flex forms.

I'm looking forward to it!

> I've been trying to read all available information (well, typo3 core 
> api) on the subject of flexforms - If you can instantly point me to some 
> other docs - please do.

Well, generally reading the Futuristic Template Building tutorial is a 
nice thing for learning about that new technique, but I think reading 
Core API is enough for working with Flexforms for extensions.

> The idea is to use a single flexform field to store descriptions of the 
> pictures in a directory. To do so need to generate the DS on the fly: 
> look at a directory, read a list of files and generate a text field for 
> every file and put inside a correct xml DS. This is the easy part. The 
> hard part is to implement DS preprocessing!
> 
> What would be the way to go?
> *) is using a user field inside a flexform (which call's a flexform 
> function in t3lib_tceforms for every file) an option? any hints?
> *) should I override t3lib_tceforms (xclass) to add the preprocess 
> option to a flex field?
> *) it would be even better to override t3lib_BEfunc::getFlexFormDS but 
> that class/file has no XCLASS code ? :-( I know it is no longer 
> fashionable to use XCLASS but it would make me very happy if we'd keep 
> backwards compatibility with this concept!
> *) should I ask Kasper for a hook? (and wait for the next typo3 release)
> *) ..other ideas..?

I think asking for a hook in t3lib_BEfunc::getFlexFormDS is the best 
thing to do, 3.7 is coming closer and closer.

> It's just that in principle the flexform would eleminate the need for me 
> to write a backend module which I wouldn't especially wish to do.

Yes, that seems like a smart approach to me.

cheers,
Ingmar