checkboxes

A checkboxes field allows a list of options where a user can select one or more items. Checkbox items can also be deselected, unlike radio fields.

Module field definition

// Configuring the `genres` field in a module's `fields.add` subsection:
genres: {
  label: 'Select the genres that apply to this book',
  type: 'checkboxes',
  choices: [
    {
      label: 'Romance 🥰',
      value: 'romance'
    },
    {
      label: 'Comedy 🤣',
      value: 'comedy'
    },
    {
      label: 'Crime 😰',
      value: 'crime'
    }
  ]
}

Settings

Required

Property	Type	Default	Description
choices	array	n/a	An array of options that the editor can select from, or a method name that returns them. See below.
label	String	n/a	Sets the visible label for the field in the UI
type	String	n/a	Specifies the field type (checkboxes for this type)

Optional

Property	Type	Default	Description
def	Array	n/a	The default value for the field. Values must be from the defined choices' values.
help	String	n/a	Help text for the content editor
htmlHelp	String	n/a	Help text with support for HTML markup
if	Object	{}	Conditions to meet before the field is active. See the guide for details.
requiredIf	Object	{}	Conditions to meet before the field is required. See the guide for details.
hidden	Boolean	false	If true, the field is hidden
required	Boolean	false	If true, the field is mandatory
readOnly	Boolean	false	If true, prevents the user from editing the field value
style	String	n/a	If 'combo', adds a selection choices box and dropdown list of choices
all	Object	n/a	If style: 'combo', adds a choice to select every option with a label set by the label property

choices configuration

The choices setting in checkboxes, radio, or select fields configures the options that a user will see in the interface and the values that the server will allow in validation. The choices value is an array of objects with label and value properties.

• value is used in the field's database value
• label is the more human-readable version used in interfaces

Populating choices dynamically

What if the choices aren't known in advance? Then you can fetch them dynamically.

First, set the choices option to the name of a method in your module. Pass a string, the name of the method you'll implement on the server side — do not pass a function.

Second, implement that method in your module so that it takes (req, data) arguments and return an array of choices in the usual format. You may use an async function, or return a promise that will resolve to the array. That means you can reach out to APIs using modules like axios or node-fetch, or make Apostrophe database queries.

The data argument is an object containing the parent's docId for further inspection by your function.

It is usually a good idea to perform at least short-term caching in your choices method, in order to limit the impact on performance when editing.

Use in templates

The checkboxes field data value is stored in an array of the selected options' value. Nunjucks provides the {% for %} template tag that you can use to loop over the array.

<ul>
  {% for genre in data.piece.genres %}
    <li>{{ genre }}</li>
  {% endfor %}
</ul>