Creating Repeater field with Post Object in PHP

• zakalwe

• May 29, 2018 at 1:49 am

Hi,
I am looking to create a repeater field with a post_object as a sub field. When I do this with the code below, I get a number of notices:

	$session_client = array(
		"key" => "acf_field_session_clients_client",
		"label" => "Client",
		"name" => "client",
		"type" => "post_object",
		"post_type" => array(
			"cp-client"
		),
		"return_format" => "object",
		
		'instructions' => "",
		'required' => 0,
		'conditional_logic' => 0,
		'wrapper' => array(
				'width' => '',
				'class' => '',
				'id' => '',
		),
		'taxonomy' => array(),
		'allow_null' => 0,
		'multiple' => 0,
		'ui' => 1
	);
	
	acf_add_local_field(array(
		"key" => "acf_field_session_clients",
		"label" => "Clients",
		"name" => "session_client",
		"type" => "repeater",
		"sub_fields" => array(
			$session_client
		),
		"parent" => "acf_group_session",
		
		'instructions' => "",
		'required' => 0,
		'conditional_logic' => 0,
		'wrapper' => array(
				'width' => '',
				'class' => '',
				'id' => '',
		),
		'collapsed' => '',
		'min' => 0,
		'max' => 0,
		'layout' => 'table',
		'button_label' => ''
	));

The notices are (amongst others)

Undefined index: _name in wp-content/plugins/advanced-custom-fields-pro/includes/api/api-field.php:201

Undefined index: _prepare in wp-content/plugins/advanced-custom-fields-pro/includes/api/api-field.php:203

I have tried to create a repeater field with a simple text repeater which works fine as does a normal post_object field without a repeater which again works fine. Is there something in my code that is preventing me from creating a repeater with a post_object? Note that cp-client is a CPT and there are valid posts in the system (so it’s not a case of that there are no posts!)

• John Huebner

• May 30, 2018 at 3:37 am

The only thing that I see that is wrong is that all acf field keys must start with “field_” and you have “acf_field_”

Also, group keys should start with “group_” but I don’t know if that is a requirement or not, it very well could be.

• John Huebner

• May 30, 2018 at 3:40 am

More information can be found here, you’ll see that group keys must start with “group_” https://www.advancedcustomfields.com/resources/register-fields-via-php/#group-settings and field keys must start with “field_” https://www.advancedcustomfields.com/resources/register-fields-via-php/#field-settings

• zakalwe

• June 4, 2018 at 2:04 am

Thanks for looking into this,

I did as you suggested and renamed these as detailed below.

	$session_client = array(
		"key" => "field_session_clients_client",
		"label" => "Client",
		"name" => "client",
		"type" => "post_object",
		"post_type" => array(
			"cp-client"
		),
		"return_format" => "object",
		
		'instructions' => "",
		'required' => 0,
		'conditional_logic' => 0,
		'wrapper' => array(
				'width' => '',
				'class' => '',
				'id' => '',
		),
		'taxonomy' => array(),
		'allow_null' => 0,
		'multiple' => 0,
		'ui' => 1
	);
	
	acf_add_local_field(array(
		"key" => "field_session_clients",
		"label" => "Clients",
		"name" => "session_client",
		"type" => "repeater",
		"sub_fields" => array(
			$session_client
		),
		"parent" => "group_session",
		
		'instructions' => "",
		'required' => 0,
		'conditional_logic' => 0,
		'wrapper' => array(
				'width' => '',
				'class' => '',
				'id' => '',
		),
		'collapsed' => '',
		'min' => 0,
		'max' => 0,
		'layout' => 'table',
		'button_label' => ''
	));

Just a note though, I had created 3 other field groups and related fields in the same format as above and none of these posed any problems. I assumed that the “field_” and “group_” keys were just conventions rather than required.

I did a bit of digging and placed the following code at line 201 of /includes/api/api-field.php to see what was happening as this was where the first notice was occurring:

if(!$field['_name']) print_r($field);

The array is printed out if “_name” is not set. I checked the other repeaters I had used in other areas and this is triggered in those places also. These repeaters store and retrieve data just fine despite “_name” not being set but these only have text fields as children rather than post_object.

I even flushed the database just in case there was soemthign lurking in there somewhere using WordPress Database Reset but the issue still persists.