Exposing Tables to Views in Drupal 7

Key Concepts

This tutorial demonstrates how to integrate custom Drupal 7 database tables with the Views module, enabling powerful querying and data presentation capabilities. We'll cover making Views aware of your module's table structure, defining field handlers for display, filtering, and sorting, and establishing relationships between tables using joins. The process leverages Views handlers – classes managing display, sorting, and filtering operations – allowing for customization beyond default functionality.

This guide focuses on tables not represented as Drupal entities. For entity integration with Views, please refer to other resources.

A sample module, "expose," is available (repository details omitted for brevity). The exposed table (structure detailed below) will be used for demonstration. Sample data can be inserted using this MySQL command:

INSERT INTO `exposed` (`id`, `name`, `deadline`, `node_id`) VALUES (1, 'Danny', 1399477939, 1), (2, 'Peter', 1399477957, 2);

Integrating Your Table with Views

The integration involves two key steps: informing Views about your module and defining your table's structure.

Step 1: Informing Views about Your Module

Implement hook_views_api() in your module's .module file:

/**
 * Implements hook_views_api().
 */
function expose_views_api() {
  return array(
    'api' => 3,
    'path' => drupal_get_path('module', 'expose') . '/includes/views',
  );
}

This specifies the Views API version and the location of your Views-related files.

Step 2: Defining Your Table's Structure

Create expose.views.inc (in the directory specified above) and implement hook_views_data():

/**
 * Implements hook_views_data().
 */
function expose_views_data() {
  $data = array();
  $data['exposed']['table']['group'] = t('Exposed');
  $data['exposed']['table']['base'] = array(
    'title' => t('Exposed'),
    'help' => t('Contains records exposed to Views.'),
  );
  // Field definitions (see below)
  return $data;
}

This code defines the table's group and designates it as a base table, making it available in the Views interface. The field definitions (detailed next) will be added here.

Step 3: Defining Fields

Within hook_views_data(), add field definitions for each column:

// ... (previous code) ...

// ID field
$data['exposed']['id'] = array(
  'title' => t('ID'),
  'help' => t('Record ID'),
  'field' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_field_numeric'),
  'sort' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_sort'),
  'filter' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_filter_numeric'),
);

// Name field
$data['exposed']['name'] = array(
  'title' => t('Name'),
  'help' => t('Record name'),
  'field' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_field'),
  'sort' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_sort'),
  'filter' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_filter_string'),
);

// Deadline field
$data['exposed']['deadline'] = array(
  'title' => t('Deadline'),
  'help' => t('Record deadline'),
  'field' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_field_date'),
  'sort' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_sort_date'),
  'filter' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_filter_date'),
);

// ... (Node ID field and join definition - see below) ...

return $data;

This specifies handlers for display (field), sorting (sort), and filtering (filter) for each column. Appropriate handlers (e.g., numeric, string, date) are selected based on data types.

Step 4: Handling Relationships (Joins)

To join with the node table using the node_id column:

// ... (previous code) ...

// Join definition
$data['exposed']['table']['join'] = array(
  'node' => array(
    'left_field' => 'nid',
    'field' => 'node_id',
  ),
);

// Node ID field
$data['exposed']['node_id'] = array(
  'title' => t('Node ID'),
  'help' => t('Node ID'),
  'field' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_field_node'),
  'sort' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_sort'),
  'filter' => array('handler' => 'views_handler_filter_numeric'),
  'relationship' => array(
    'base' => 'node',
    'field' => 'node_id',
    'handler' => 'views_handler_relationship',
    'label' => t('Node'),
  ),
  'argument' => array(
    'handler' => 'views_handler_argument_node_nid',
    'numeric' => TRUE,
    'validate type' => 'nid',
  ),
);

return $data;

This defines the join and specifies the views_handler_field_node handler for display, enabling access to node-related fields. A relationship and argument are also defined for filtering and contextual filtering based on node ID.

After implementing these steps, clear Drupal's cache. Your custom table should now be accessible within the Views interface.

Conclusion

This detailed explanation provides a comprehensive guide to integrating custom tables with Drupal 7's Views module. Remember to tailor handler selections to your specific data types and leverage the flexibility of custom handlers for advanced functionality. The FAQs section from the original input has been omitted as it's largely covered within this refined response.

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