Magento: Creating a section and groups programmatically (includes screenshot)?

Question

Instead of using the system.xml to create groups and sections in a static way I want to create a section and groups in the code. Pls take a look at the screenshot:

groups

Whats shown on the screen was done in the modules system.xml, now I want to do that directly in the code. I also found the place where the form is being built, its in app/code/core/Mage/Adminhtml/Block/System/Config/Form.php in the initForm() function. There it reads the sections and the inner groups. The problem I have is, that I dont know how to proceed from here. Maybe somebody has done a similiar thing or can point me in the right direction. I guess part of it is creating a Mage_Core_Model_Config_Element by myself?

JBreton JBreton · Accepted Answer · 2012-04-10T16:16:31

This way to use system/config screen is not the Magento standard.

If you want to keep stay in standard, you have two options:

Create your own config screen.

Use the frontend_model property of groups in your config.xml

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<config>
    <sections>
        <your_section>
            <groups>
                <your_group>
                     <frontend_model>your_module/your_block</frontend_model>
                </your_group>
            </groups>
        </your_section>
    </sections>
</config>

Then you are able to do whatever you want with the provided block, create dynamically as many fieldset as you want, adding custom fields, etc.

This block must extends Mage_Adminhtml_Block_System_Config_Form_Fieldset and if you want your fields to save data in core_config_data, they will need to have name='groups[your_group][fields][your_field][value]' (Magento will take care of the your_section part for you).

Your fields must read data theimselves too, just put that in their value attribute.

Magento: Creating a section and groups programmatically (includes screenshot)?

1 Answers