Moodle in English: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Alexander Moshak - Friday, January 15, 2021, 2:40 AM

I am looking for a way to add a new custom field to every activity module in Moodle.

I am struggling to find any way to do it with the best practices not changing the core Moodle code. My current solution was to add a new field directly in courses/moodleform_mod.php

I strongly dislike this approach but I don't see any other workaround.

P.S.

I went through all Custom Fields API documentation and it does not allow changing all modules at once in a single place. So I dont think it's a solution

Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Marcus Green - Friday, January 15, 2021, 3:30 AM

You could use coursemodule_standard_elements in the lib.php file of your module
https://docs.moodle.org/dev/Callbacks
e.g.
/**
* @param moodleform $formwrapper The moodle quickforms wrapper object.
* @param MoodleQuickForm $mform The actual form object (required to modify the form).
*/
function frankenstyle_pluginname_coursemodule_standard_elements($formwrapper, $mform) {
global $DB;
$course = $formwrapper->get_course();
$modulename = $formwrapper->get_current()->modulename;
if ($modulename == 'assign') {
do something or other

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Maricarmen Montserrat Velazquez Hernandez - Thursday, February 4, 2021, 11:52 AM

Hi Alexander.

I am in the same situation, have you found a solution that you can share?

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Alexander Moshak - Friday, February 5, 2021, 1:33 AM

I did not find any nice solution. While Callbacks sounded like a decent option, documentation and examples are quite hard to understand.

So finally i had to go with changing first moodleform_mod.php file. Every module form extends from this, so it was a great place to start.

And because it was quite hard to find where data is saved i changed add_moduleinfo() and update_moduleinfo() function in modlib.php
And finally changed modedit.php so when we reopen the activity the data does not disappear.

While I would highly discourage to follow this guide, if you need I can share more code snippets

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Marcus Green - Friday, February 5, 2021, 1:55 AM

https://github.com/marcusgreen/moodle-local_callbacks
Look at lib.php. I intend to extend it with some more when I get around to it.

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Alexander Moshak - Friday, February 5, 2021, 2:09 AM

Actually wait, I did not think about it the first time.

So if I remove the if statement from your example it will grab ANY module and add new fields there.

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Marcus Green - Friday, February 5, 2021, 3:01 AM

Yes, that is correct. It doesn't have to be a local plugin, that was just a convenient way of packaging it up.

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Daniel Neis Araujo - Friday, February 5, 2021, 3:14 AM

Hi,

I've developed the code needed to add/edit and populate the fields here:

https://gitlab.com/adapta/moodle-local_modcustomfields

I've already submitted to plugins database but it's publishing was postponed because it still does not display the information anywhere.

Pull requests are very welcome.

Best,

Daniel

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Maricarmen Montserrat Velazquez Hernandez - Saturday, February 6, 2021, 2:36 AM

Marcus Green

Thank you so much!

Your code has solved my problem for me.

Now I just have to supplement to save the info in BD and images in a folder.

Thanks again for sharing

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Mark Sharp - Saturday, February 6, 2021, 5:01 PM

I think the intention of the custom fields api is that it could be used anywhere. Adding custom fields to courses was just the first implementation.

So it's just waiting for someone to do the implementation for mods, categories etc. In the meantime, Marcus' solution seems the most pragmatic.

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Maricarmen Montserrat Velazquez Hernandez - Saturday, February 6, 2021, 6:11 PM

I agree, however I still have not understood how the edit_post function works, because although the information is added to the database and the file system, I have not managed to make it show the data when I edit again. If anyone could share this code snippet, it would help me a lot

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Marcus Green - Saturday, February 6, 2021, 8:00 PM

I have added a stub function to that plugin here
https://github.com/marcusgreen/moodle-local_callbacks/blob/main/lib.php
I am not sure what you meant by
"I have not managed to make it show the data when I edit again."
Are you asking about how you load data back into the form field when the equivalent of
local_callbacks_coursemodule_standard_elements
runs again?

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Marcus Green - Sunday, February 7, 2021, 3:03 AM

I have added more code that may address your question

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Maricarmen Montserrat Velazquez Hernandez - Wednesday, February 10, 2021, 4:26 AM

That is the correct question.
In all the activity modules I am adding an additional field for files, but I cannot prepare the area when the form is called again, this is my code and I have the doubt of how to associate this file with each activity module.

This is the code I have.

function pluginname_coursemodule_standard_elements ($formwrapper, $mform){
global $DB;
$modulename = $formwrapper->get_current()->modulename;
$draftitemid = 0;
$context=context_system::instance();

file_prepare_draft_area($draftitemid, $context->id, 'user', 'draft', $maxitem);
$mform ->addElement ( 'header' , 'icon_select' , get_string ( 'icon_select' , 'pluginame' ));
$mform->addElement('filemanager', 'uploadicon',
get_string('uploadicon', 'pluginname'),
null, array('subdirs' => 0,'maxfiles' => 1));
}

I am new to this topic!!
Thanks.

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Re: Adding custom field to EVERY activity module

by Marcus Green - Wednesday, February 10, 2021, 6:25 AM

I suggest you create some code for saving something in a database table first to confirm your code persists the data, then work on the files storage, as that is a complex field in its own right. The most recent version of my sample code was updated yesterday.

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Adding custom field to EVERY activity module