Formello: Laravel Package for Creating Forms Quickly & Easily

Formello: A Practical Solution for Creating Forms in Laravel 🚀

If you frequently code in Laravel, you’ve probably experienced the hassle of creating repetitive forms. From creating input fields, validation, error handling, to rendering in Blade. Well, now there’s Formello, a Laravel package specifically designed to simplify developers’ lives when creating forms.

Formello offers the perfect compromise::

• Simpler than complex form libraries.
• Lighter than full-featured admin panels such as Nova or Filament.

So, if you need to create forms quickly but still want them to be flexible and easy to manage, Formello could be your new best friend.

✨ Key Features of Formello

• Easy-to-use form definition using Laravel classes.
• Automatic rendering directly to Blade.
• Supports various fields: text, textarea, select, select2, radio, checkbox, toggle, date, datetime, upload, hidden, and custom widgets.
• Automatic error handling (no need to create manually).
• Form validation is directly integrated.
• Styling support: Bootstrap 5 (Tailwind CSS coming soon).

With this feature, you can focus on the logic of the application without having to copy and paste boilerplate forms.

🛠️ Formello Installation

Installation is very easy. Install the package via composer:

composer require metalogico/laravel-formello

Publish your assets:

php artisan vendor:publish --tag=formello-assets

To automatically update assets every time composer updates, just add this to composer.json:

"scripts": {
    "post-update-cmd": [
        "@php artisan vendor:publish --tag=formello-assets --force"
    ]
}

😎 How to Use Formello in Laravel

Alright, let’s get hands-on with Formello. Here’s how you can start using it in your Laravel project.

1. Create a Form Class

First, create a form class that extends Metalogico\Formello\Formello.
Here’s a simple example for a ProductForm:

<?php

namespace App\Forms;

use Metalogico\Formello\Formello;
use Metalogico\Formello\Widgets\SelectWidget;

class ProductForm extends Formello
{
    protected function create(): array
    {
        return [
            'method' => 'POST',
            'action' => route('products.store'),
        ];
    }

    protected function edit(): array
    {
        return [
            'method' => 'POST',
            'action' => route('products.update', $this->model->id),
        ];
    }    

    protected function fields(): array
    {
        return [
            'name' => [
                'label' => __('Product Name'),
                'help' => 'Enter the name of the product',
            ],
            'description' => [
                'label' => __('Description'),
            ],
            'category_id' => [
                'label' => __('Category'),
                'widget' => 'select',
                'choices' => Category::pluck('name', 'id')->toArray(),
            ],
            'in_stock' => [
              'label' => __('In Stock'),
            ],
        ];
    }
}

⚠️ Note: Make sure these fields are added to your model’s $fillable array, otherwise Formello won’t render them.

class Product extends Model
{
    protected $fillable = [
        'name',
        'category_id',
        'description',
        'in_stock',
    ];
}

2. Generate a Form Automatically with Artisan

Too lazy to write everything manually? Formello can generate the form for you based on your model’s fillable fields:

php artisan make:formello --model=Product

This command will create a skeleton form based on the fillable fields in the model. It saves a lot of time, doesn't it?

3. Rendering the Form in Controller & Blade

Controller – Create Form (New Record)

public function create()
{
    $formello = new ProductForm(Product::class);
    return view('products.create', [
      'formello' => $formello
    ]);
}

Controller – Edit Form (Update Record)

public function edit(Product $product)
{
    $formello = new ProductForm($product);
    return view('products.edit', [
        'formello' => $formello
    ]);
}

Blade Template – Render the Form

{!! $formello->render() !!}

If you only want to render the fields without the <form> tag:

@foreach ($formello->getFields() as $name => $field)
    {!! $formello->renderField($name) !!}
@endforeach

4. Conditional Logic (Different for Create & Edit)

Formello provides handy methods isCreating() and isEditing() to adapt your form fields dynamically.

protected function fields(): array
{
    return [
        'name' => [
            'label' => __('User Name'),
            'help' => 'Enter the name of the user',
        ],
        'password' => [
            'label' => __('Password'),
            'type' => 'password',
            'required' => $this->isCreating(),
            'help' => $this->isEditing() ? 'Leave empty to keep current password' : '',
        ],
    ];
}

This way, the password field is required when creating a new record, but optional when editing.

🎉 Done! With these steps, you can create Laravel forms faster, cleaner, and more flexibly using Formello.

Currently supports Bootstrap 5, and for Tailwind CSS enthusiasts, just wait a little longer it's coming soon!

👉 For more information, see the source code on Github.