Select with optgroup in Symfony 2.0

Question

In Symfony2, the select html component is rendered as a ChoiceType object, which is used indeed also for checkboxes and radiobuttons.

Does someone really know how to render a select with the optgroup option in Symfony2?

For sake of completeness, here I report an example of a select with the optgroup tag (example from w3cschools):

<select>
  <optgroup label="Swedish Cars">
    <option value="volvo">Volvo</option>
    <option value="saab">Saab</option>
  </optgroup>
  <optgroup label="German Cars">
    <option value="mercedes">Mercedes</option>
    <option value="audi">Audi</option>
  </optgroup>
</select> 

Moreover, notice that there is a similar post here, but the answers are not convincing.

Singlet

It seems to be fixed in sf2.1 (see the doc). Are you using sf2.0 or sf2.1? – Mausoleum

SF2.0! But SF2.1 is at RC2 now! So, it is better to wait for the first 2.1 stable release... Should I cancel the question? – Singlet

No don't close, there might have a workaround to have optgroup on sf2.0, but I don't know it. – Mausoleum

Honestly, I don't know If I will migrate to Symfony2.1. I don't know how much effort will be required doing the porting of the projects and plugins! – Singlet

Answer 1

Do this:

$car_choices = array(
    'Swedish Cars' => array(
        'volvo' => 'Volvo',
        'saab' => 'Saab',
    ),
    'German Cars' => array(
        'mercedes' => 'Mercedes',
        'audi' => 'Audi'
    )
);

$form = $this->createFormBuilder()
        ->add('car', 'choice', array(
            'label' => 'Choose your car',
            'choices' => $car_choices,
            ))
        ->getForm();

Works for Symfony 2.0.x

Scrabble

Much like in symfony 1.x: array of array. – Mausoleum

Perfect! Great alternative for using the entities. – Historiographer

Answer 2

It depends how your Entity is defined and how you group your entity. Assuming the grouping is done given a parameter in your object, let's say "brand". You can do:

$builder->add('cars', null, array(
  'group_by'=> 'brand'
));

Sulphurbottom

how about self referencing. like Category and Sub Category? – Balf

@Daskul sorry I don't understand what you mean. – Sulphurbottom

self referencing relationship. you have an entity that has reference to the same entity type as its parent. Like on Category. I want all my categories in one database table but still able to make hierarchies. Ex. I will create category of Computer, Laptop, Desktop but I want Laptop and Desktop under the COmputer category – Balf

I would say this is not possible. Mainly because it is not allowed in HTML to nest <optgroup> element (see developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/optgroup "Note: Optgroup elements may not be nested.") – Sulphurbottom