Question

I’ve built a new content element type, and when you look in the backend, inside the box you can see the name of the module only. I’d like to change what information is show inside.

I could use the “header” field, but is there any way to use another field(s)?

Answer 1

Two answers

First answer

The field that’s displayed there is the same field that’s displayed in the list module. It is set in the table’s TCA using [‘ctrl’][‘label’] in the extension’s ext_tables.php

$TCA['tx_myext_mytable'] = array(   
        'ctrl' => array(
        'title' => 'My Table'
        'label' => 'name_of_the_field_to_display_as_header' 
// end snip

Second answer

If that is not enough for you, you can use a hook to display arbitrary HTML in the preview. The hook is called $GLOBALS['TYPO3_CONF_VARS']['SC_OPTIONS']['cms/layout/class.tx_cms_layout.php']['tt_content_drawItem'].

The hook will be called with a function with this signature:

public function preProcess(
    tx_cms_layout &$parentObject,  // parent object
    &$drawItem,   // i have no idea what this is
    &$headerContent,  /* the content of the header
                         (the grey bar in the screenshot i think) */
    &$itemContent,  /* the content of the preview
                       (the white area in your screenshot */
    array &$row // the content element's record
)

So all you have to do in that function is set the itemContent and, if you want, headerContent to whatever you want displayed.

Gotchas:

1. The output is inside of a span, so no block elements allowed in the
   html. Any styling has to be done inline in the style attribute.
2. The function will be called on every content element, so you have to
   check the row’s CType and (if applicable) list_type fields so
   that you only manipulate your own content elements.

An example can be found in the “fed” extension. I hope this helps.