developers-guide-v1.md

Doc Type Grid Editor 1 - Developers Guide

Contents

1. Introduction
2. Getting Set Up
   1. System Requirements
3. Configuring The Doc Type Grid Editor
4. Hooking Up The Doc Type Grid Editor
5. Rendering a Doc Type Grid Editor
   1. Rendering Alternative Preview Content
   2. DocTypeGridEditorSurfaceController
6. Value Processors
7. Useful Links

---

Introduction

Doc Type Grid Editor is an advanced grid editor for the Umbraco grid, offering similar functionality as the macro grid editor but using the full power of the Doc Type editor and data types.

With the macro grid editor you are limited to only using the macro builder and thus the handful of parameter editors that are available. Of course you can create / config your own parameter editors, however this is cumbersome compared to how we can configure data types.

With the Doc Type Grid Editor then, we bridge that gap, allowing you to reuse doc type definitions as blue prints for complex data to be rendered in a grid cell.

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Getting Set Up

System Requirements

Before you get started, there are a number of things you will need:

1. .NET 4.7.2+
2. Umbraco 8.1.0+
3. The Doc Type Grid Editor package installed

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Configuring The Doc Type Grid Editor

The Doc Type Grid Editor is configured via the grid.editors.config.js config file located in the ~/Config folder. A default configuration should be installed along with the package, but for details on the configuration options, please see below.

You can also add your editors using a package.manifest file in a folder in the ~/App_Plugins folder.

Example

[
    ...
    {
        "name": "Doc Type",
        "alias": "docType",
        "view": "/App_Plugins/DocTypeGridEditor/Views/doctypegrideditor.html",
        "render": "/App_Plugins/DocTypeGridEditor/Render/DocTypeGridEditor.cshtml",
        "icon": "icon-item-arrangement",
        "config": {
            "allowedDocTypes": [...],
            "nameTemplate": "",
            "enablePreview": true,
            "overlaySize": "medium",
            "viewPath": "/Views/Partials/Grid/Editors/DocTypeGridEditor/",
            "previewViewPath": "/Views/Partials/Grid/Editors/DocTypeGridEditor/Previews/",
            "previewCssFilePath": "",
            "previewJsFilePath": ""
        }
    },
    ...
]

For the main part, the root properties shouldn’t need to be modified, however the only properties that MUST not be changed are the view and render properties.

Member	Type	Description
Name	String	The name of the grid editor as it appears in the grid editor prevalue editor / selector screen.
Alias	String	A unique alias for this grid editor.
View	String	The path to the Doc Type Grid Editor editor view. MUST NOT BE CHANGED.
Render	String	The path to the Doc Type Grid Editor render view. MUST NOT BE CHANGED.
Icon	String	The icon class name to use for this grid editor (minus the '.')
Config	Object	Config options for this grid editor.

The Doc Type Grid Editor supports 3 config options, all of which are optional.

Member	Type	Description
AllowedDocTypes	String[]	An array of doc type aliases of which should be allowed to be selected in the grid editor. By default Strings are REGEX patterns to allow matching groups of doc types in a single entry. e.g. "widgetAlias" will match all doc types with an alias starting in "widgetAlias". By adding "$" to the end of the string you can stop this behaviour e.g. "widgetAlias$" will only match a doc type with an alias of "widgetAlias". However if a single doc type is matched, (aka Single Doc Type Mode), then doc type selection stage (in the DTGE panel) will be skipped. Note, your document type must be an Element type, in order to be usable in DTGE.
NameTemplate	String	Allows using any of the doctype's property values in the name/label: {{propertyAlias}}
EnablePreview	Boolean	Enables rendering a preview of the grid cell in the grid editor.
overlaySize	String	Define the size of the grid editor dialog. You can write large, medium or small. If no size is set, the grid editor dialog will be small. Note, the medium size requires a minimum Umbraco version of 8.3
LargeDialog	Boolean	(obsolete, use overlaySize instead) Makes the editing dialog larger. Especially useful for grid editors with complex property editors.
size	string	(obsolete, use overlaySize instead)
ViewPath	String	Sets an alternative view path for where the Doc Type Grid Editor should look for views when rendering. Defaults to ~/Views/Partials/
PreviewViewPath	String	Sets an alternative view path for where the Doc Type Grid Editor should look for views when rendering previews in the backoffice
ShowDocTypeSelectAsGrid	Boolean	Makes the content type selection dialog render a grid, in stead of the default list with descriptions

By default, a universal grid editor allowing all available element document types is added upon installation.

Since Doc Type Grid Editor does not support culture variation, element document types allowing culture variations is not available for use in Doc Type Grid Editor.

---

Hooking Up The Doc Type Grid Editor

To hook up the Doc Type Grid Editor, within your grids prevalue, select the row configs you want to use the Doc Type Grid Editor in and for each cell config, check the Doc Type checkbox option to true. If you changed the name in the config, then select the item with the name you enter in the config. And, if you add your own editors either by package.manifest, or by editing grid.editors.config.js, you will need to select those too.

With the Doc Type Grid Editor enabled, from within your grid editor, you should now have a new option in the Choose type of content dialog.

From there, simply click the Doc Type icon. If you have multiple document types matching the AllowedDocTypes setting in the selected grid editor (the default Doc Type, lets you pick between all available document types), you need to choose the document type you wish to render.

If you have any Content Templates available for the selected document type, you need to choose which template to use for the content.

Then you should be presented with a form for all the fields in your document type.

Fill in the fields and click Submit. You should then see the grid populated with a preview of your item. If you have disabled previews using the EnablePreview setting, an icon will be shown to represent your content block.

Make sure save / save & publish the current page to persist your changes.

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Rendering a Doc Type Grid Editor

The Doc Type Grid Editor uses standard ASP.NET MVC partials as the rendering mechanism. By default it will look for partial files in the ViewPath setting of your grid editor, or in the default partial view location (for exmaple ~/Views/Partials). The rendering mechanism looks for a file with a name that matches the document type alias. For example, for the default setup, if your document type alias is TestDocType, the Doc Type Grid Editor will look for the partial file ~/Views/Partials/Grid/Editors/DocTypeGridEditor/TestDocType.cshtml.

To access the properties of your completed doc type, simply have your partial view inherit the standard UmbracoViewPage class, and you’ll be able to access them via the standard Model view property as a native IPublishedElement instance.

@inherits UmbracoViewPage<IPublishedElement>
<h3>@Model.Name</h3>

Because we treat your data as a standard IPublishedElement entity, that means you can use all the property value converters you are used to using.

@inherits UmbracoViewPage<IPublishedElement>
<h3>@Model.Name</h3>
@Model.Value("bodyText")
<a href="@(Model.Value<IPublishedContent>("link").Url)"> More</a>

Doc Type Grid Editor also supports ModelsBuilder, so you can simplify your views like this:

@inherits UmbracoViewPage<TestDocType>
<h3>@Model.Name</h3>
@Model.BodyText
<a href="@(Model.Link.Url)"> More</a>

Rendering Alternative Preview Content

If your front end view is rather complex, you may decide that you want to feed the back office preview an alternative, less complex view. To do this, you can use the PreviewViewPath setting on your grid editor, and place a view named after your document type there. Doc Type Grid Editor will use the preview view file, when rendering previews in the backoffice.

If you don't want to have a seperate preview view file, you can add preview logic within your Razor view/partial. Check for a querystring parameter dtgePreview being set to "1" to detect being in preview mode to provide an alternative view.

@inherits UmbracoViewPage<IPublishedElement>
@if (Request.QueryString["dtgePreview"] == "1")
{
	// Render preview view
}
else
{
	// Render front end view
}

DocTypeGridEditorSurfaceController

If you are not the type of developer that likes to put business logic in your views, then the ability to have a controller for you partial view is a must. To help with this, the Doc Type Grid Editor comes with a base surface controller you can used called DocTypeGridEditorSurfaceController.

Simply create your controller inheriting from the above class, giving it a class name of {DocTypeAlias}SurfaceController and an action name of {DocTypeAlias} and the Doc Type Grid Editor will automatically wire it up for you and use it at render time.

public class TestDocTypeSurfaceController
	: DocTypeGridEditorSurfaceController
{
	public ActionResult TestDocType()
	{
		// Do your thing...
		return CurrentPartialView();
	}
}

By inheriting from the DocTypeGridEditorSurfaceController base class, you'll also have instant access to the following helper properties / methods.

Member	Type	Description
Model	IPublishedElement	The IPublishedElement instance of your cell's data.
ViewPath	String	A reference to the currently configured ViewPath
CurrentPartialView(object model = null)	Method	Helper method to return you to the default partial view for this cell. If no model is passed in, the standard Model will be passed down.
PartialView(string viewName, object model = null)	Method	Helper method to return you to an alternative partial view for this cell. If no model is passed in, the standard Model will be passed down.

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Value Processors

Since Doc Type Grid Editor stores the data for each property as a JSON-blob, we're not processing the values in the same way as Umbraco-core before storing it. This also means that the values that comes back and are passed into a Property Value Converter might be in of a type/format that that Property Value Convert can't handle.

We've added something that we call "ValueProcessors" and these can be used to modify the raw property value before we send it to the property value converter. One example of where this is needed is the Tags-editor.

If you need to perform some processing of a value before it's sent to the property value converter you can add your own ValueProcessor.

public class UmbracoColorPickerValueProcessor : IDocTypeGridEditorValueProcessor
{
    public bool IsProcessorFor(string propertyEditorAlias) 
          => propertyEditorAlias.Equals(Constants.PropertyEditors.Aliases.ColorPicker);

    public object ProcessValue(object value)
    {
        // Do something with the value
        return value;
    }
}

Then register this during composition withing IUserComposer,

public class MyCustomDocTypeGridEditorComposer : IUserComposer
{
    public void Compose(Composition composition)
    {
        composition.DocTypeGridEditorValueProcessors()
                   .Append<UmbracoColorPickerValueProcessor>();
    }
}

Dot Type Grid editor ships with a ValueProcessor for the Umbraco-Tags property.

Note: When using a Tag-editor inside a DTGE this would not create any relationship between the current node and that tag, if you need to tag a node you should use the Tags-editor as a property directly on the document type.

Useful Links

• Source Code
• Our Umbraco Project Page