Extension:FlexForm

MediaWiki extensions manual

FlexForm Release status: stable
Implementation	Parser extension
Description	HTML5 FORM rendering engine
Author(s)	Sen-Saitalk (Wikibase Solutions) and others
Latest version	2.1.8 (16-05-2022)
Compatibility policy	For every MediaWiki release that is a Long Term Support release there is a corresponding branch in the extension.
MediaWiki	1.35.+;1.39+
License	GNU General Public License 2.0 or later
Download	GitHub: project page git repository URL [help ] commit history Note: No localisation updates are provided by translatewiki.net . Readme ChangeLog
Parameters $wgFlexFormConfig
Tags form, input, _email, _create, _edit, select, option, fieldset, legend, label, button, textarea, _instance, _createuser, _token
Hooks used ParserFirstCallInit AfterFinalPageOutput AdminLinks getUserPermissionsErrors SkinTemplateNavigation

FlexForm is an enhanced HTML5 rendering engine.

It renders HTML5 form elements and allows to edit or create one page or multiple pages with one form.

FlexForm also handles file upload (including multiple file uploads) and sending emails. So one form could potentially create one or more pages, edit several other pages, upload files and send an email.

Some other features

• Support for creating and editing JSON content
• Fully supports Multi-Content Revisions Slots
• Calculations fields
• Template evaluating fields
• Autosave
• Multiple instances
• Show on select;
• Convert Word to Wiki

Version 1 was a complete rewrite and stripped down version from the previous extension called WSForm.

The full Documentation can be found here : https://www.open-csp.org/DevOps:Doc/FlexForm

Installation

The recommended way to download this extension is by using Composer

Add the following to the MediaWiki composer.local.json file and run php composer.phar update open-csp/flex-form from the MediaWiki installation directory.

{
	"require": {
		"wikibase-solutions/flex-form": "^2.0"
	}
}

To update the extension, just run php composer.phar update open-csp/flex-form again.

• Download and place the file(s) in a directory called FlexForm in your extensions/ folder.
• Add the following code at the bottom of your LocalSettings.php :

  wfLoadExtension( 'FlexForm' );
  

• Run the update script which will automatically create the necessary database tables that this extension needs.
•  Done – Navigate to Special:Version on your wiki to verify that the extension is successfully installed.

Configuration parameters

Detailed information can be found here : https://www.open-csp.org/DevOps:Doc/FlexForm

// Will render form that makes no sense when inspected in the browser.
$wgFlexFormConfig['secure'] = true;

// A salt key for encryption. Used together with "secure" option. Must be set when using multiple instances of a wiki.
$wgFlexFormConfig['sec_key'] = "";

// Interval time in ms, defaults to 3 minutes (180000 ms). Form is submitted on each interval regardless of changes.
$wgFlexFormConfig['auto_save_interval'] = 30000;

// Time in ms, defaults to 3 seconds (3000 ms). Form is submitted after the specified time, timer starts when there is a change in the form. Timer resets if there is another change before the time has passed.
$wgFlexFormConfig['auto_save_after_change'] = 3000;

// Text on the autosave button to toggle on.
$wgFlexFormConfig['auto_save_btn_on'] = 'Autosave on';

// Text on the autosave button to toggle off.
$wgFlexFormConfig['auto_save_btn_off'] = 'Autosave off';

// Currently the only form.
$wgFlexFormConfig['FlexFormDefaultTheme'] = "plain";

// reCaptcha site key.
$wgFlexFormConfig['rc_site_key'] = "";

// reCaptcha secret key.
$wgFlexFormConfig['rc_secret_key'] = "";

// Where to store images temporarily that need to be format converted.
$wgFlexFormConfig['file_temp_path'] = "";

// Defaults to false. Set to yes if FlexForm is allowed to create new users.
$wgFlexFormConfig['can_create_user'] = "";

// Defaults to false. Will filter all parser arguments to plain text, except value parameters. Will also disallow onClick and onFocus parameter. This feature will most likely be removed in future updates.
$wgFlexFormConfig['filter_input_tags'] = false;

// Defaults to what is described by the loadscript form argument. When you change it do a different folder, then loadScript argument will be looking in this folder for its JavaScript file to load with the Form.
$wgFlexFormConfig['loadScriptPath'] = "";

// Defaults to sysop. Only a user in the allowedGroups is able to edit pages with a FlexForm in the source.
$wgFlexFormConfig['allowedGroups'] = ["sysop","moderator"];

// Defaults to true. When a user in the allowedGroups creates a form it will become valid and will be rendered. Someone not in the allowedGroups can create a form and save it, but it will never be rendered until a user from the allowedGroups will edit and re-save the page. Only then will a form become valid. The message "FORM CANNOT BE RENDERED, NOT VALIDATED" will be shown instead of the form when it is invalid or depending on the next setting an image stating it cannot be rendered.
$wgFlexFormConfig['renderonlyapprovedforms'] = true;

// When a form is invalid, an invalid image will be rendered instead of the form. Set to true to render i18n invalid message.
$wgFlexFormConfig['renderi18nErrorInsteadofImageForApprovedForms'] = false;

// Defaults to false. This differs from FlexForm before 2.0. FlexForm will now honor the UserCan functions in MediaWiki. If a form edits or creates a page a user has no rights to, the form will fail.
$wgFlexFormConfig['userscaneditallpages'] = false;

// Defaults to true. If a user is not in the allowedGroups then hide edit and editsource menu items for any page containing a FlexForm form.
$wgFlexFormConfig['hideEdit'] = true;

// Defaults to false. Will turn titles given to wscreate into url friendly slugs. Creating only latin character and converting spaces and special characters.
$wgFlexFormConfig['create-seo-titles'] = true;

// If you have a custom/different version of Pandoc than the one set by your hosting provider, you can add its local path here and FlexForm will use it, instead of the one set by environment variables
$wgFlexFormConfig['pandoc-install-path'] = $IP . '/bin/pandoc';

// When sending email, should we use separate smtp?
$wgFlexFormConfig['use_smtp'] = false;

$wgFlexFormConfig['smtp_authentication'] = true;

$wgFlexFormConfig['smtp_username'] = "";

$wgFlexFormConfig['smtp_password'] = "";

$wgFlexFormConfig['smtp_secure'] = "TLS";

$wgFlexFormConfig['smtp_port'] = "587";

Using the parser functions

When you are familiar with creating HTML5 forms you will have no problem using FlexForm. The documentation however is pretty extensive so we have it on a separate Wiki instalment. Documentation can be found here : https://www.open-csp.org/DevOps:Doc/FlexForm

Migrate from version 1.x to 2.0

• Please notice the changes in the config settings.
• Do not forget to run update.php.
• Also, by default, the setting renderonlyapprovedforms will be true. Meaning that once you install FlexForm v2.0 all your existing FlexForm forms in your wiki will be shown as unvalidated. Visit Validated Forms to read how to solve this easily.

Discord

Ask any question at the FlexForm Discord server : https://discord.gg/ehFrPmT