What you're actually looking to do is to implement a custom Views Display Extender plugin (https://api.drupal.org/api/views/views.api.php/group/views_plugins/7.x-3.x).
It's not particularly trivial and I got most of my information from this wonderful tutorial here: How to write a Views Plugin Display Extender (D7) by Bryan Ollendyke
Here's a basic outline:
-create a custom module (let's call it mymodule) and implement hook_views_api().
/**
* Implements hook_views_api().
*/
function mymodule_views_api() {
return array(
'api' => 3,
'path' => drupal_get_path('module', 'mymodule'),
);
}
-Create a mymodule.views.inc file (remembering to add the file to your mymodule.info file) and implement hook_views_plugins(). It should look something like this:
/**
* Implements hook_views_plugins().
*/
function mymodule_views_plugins() {
$path = drupal_get_path('module', 'my_module');
$plugins = array();
$plugins['display_extender'] = array(
'mymodule' => array(
'title' => t('Some Setting'),
'help' => t('A description of the setting.'),
'path' => $path,
'handler' => 'mymodule_views_plugin_display_extender',
),
);
return $plugins;
}
-Note the "handler" index in the above array. You'll need to implement that in a file called mymodule_views_plugin_display_extender.inc (again, remembering to add that in your mymodule.info file). The implementation should look something like this:
class mymodule_views_plugin_display_extender extends views_plugin_display_extender {
/**
* Provide a form to edit options for this plugin.
*/
function options_definition_alter(&$options) {
$options['my_setting'] = array(
'default' => 0,
);
}
/**
* Provide a form to edit options for this plugin.
*/
function options_form(&$form, &$form_state) {
if ($form['#section'] == 'page-mymodule') {
$form['my_setting'] = array(
'#type' => 'checkbox',
'#title' => t('Some Setting'),
'#description' => t('A sample checkbox.'),
'#default_value' => $this->display->get_option('my_setting'),
);
}
}
/**
* Handle any special handling on the validate form.
*/
function options_submit(&$form, &$form_state) {
$this->display->set_option('my_setting', $form_state['values']['my_setting']);
}
/**
* Provide the default summary for options in the views UI.
*
* This output is returned as an array.
*/
function options_summary(&$categories, &$options) {
$options['mymodule'] = array(
'category' => 'other',
'title' => t('Some Setting'),
'value' => ($this->display->get_option('my_setting')) ? 'Yes' : 'No',
'desc' => t('Set a setting.'),
);
}
}
After all that your mymodule.info file should look something like this:
name = My Module
description = Sample views display extender
core = 7.x
version = 7.x-1.0
dependencies[] = views
files[] = mymodule.views.inc
files[] = mymodule_views_plugin_display_extender.inc
If that all works out, you should see a setting show up under "Other" (you can change that using the 'category' in the options_summary implementation in mymodule_views_plugin_display_extender.inc.
After that, in your module, you can access the option from the view using something like:
$view->display_handler->get_option('my_setting');
For instance, if you were implementing `hook_views_post_execute().
/**
* Implements hook_views_post_execute().
*/
function mymodule_views_post_execute(&$view) {
$my_setting = $view->display_handler->get_option('my_setting');
}
