Rename "-none-" option for select list field type

Question

I have several list fields, one of which is a list (text) field. The default value for the form, where no value is stored if nothing is selected, is "-None-". Is there some way to alter this to say "-Select-" instead? The reason is that in the context of the field, the option of "-None-" doesn't make any sense. In this particular field, one of the actual selections being stored in the database is "None". Here's images of a few fields where -None- doesn't make any sense.

So, is there any way to change these aside from making them required fields?

Answer 1

Have you tried to override the default translation string? It can either be done by editing settings.php or with the module "String Overrides"

Here are some instructions for settings.php here, or download String Overrides

Answer 2

Implement hook_form_alter() or hook_form_FORM_ID_alter() and use the following code:

$form['field_name'][LANGUAGE_NONE]['#options']['_none'] = t('Select');

example:

function MODULE_form_FORM_ID_alter(&$form, &$form_state, $form_id) {
    $form['field_name'][LANGUAGE_NONE]['#options']['_none'] = t('Select');
}

The t() function is for translation. It may not be required, but it is good practice to use instead of hard-coded strings.

To remove - None - as a choice all together, you could unset the key using hook_form_alter as well.

example:

function MODULE_form_FORM_ID_alter(&$form, &$form_state, $form_id) {
    unset($form['field_name'][LANGUAGE_NONE]['#options']['_none']);
}

If you're not using it already, be sure to install the Devel module so you have access to the dpm() and dd() functions. They are incredibly valuable when playing with Drupal forms.

Answer 3

You can override the theme_options_none theme function. Follow the example from the Drupal API. If you want to replace "- None -" with "- Select -" everywhere, this theme implementation should do the trick:

/**
 * Returns HTML for the label for the empty value for options that are not required.
 *
 * The default theme will display N/A for a radio list and '- None -' for a select.
 *
 * @param $variables
 *   An associative array containing:
 *   - instance: An array representing the widget requesting the options.
 *
 * @ingroup themeable
 */
function MYTHEMENAME_options_none($variables) {
  return t('- Select -');
}

Place this function in your theme's template.php.

Answer 4

In Drupal 8, this worked for me:

  $form['field_name']['widget']['#options']['_none'] = t('- Select -');

Re: @Citricguy's answer, as I understand it since then:

• LANGUAGE_NONE was changed to LANGUAGE_NOT_SPECIFIED
• LANGUAGE_NOT_APPLICABLE and LANGUAGE_MULTIPLE were also added
• they were all then renamed from LANGUAGE_* to LANGCODE_*

This means you do something like:

use Drupal\Core\Language\Language;
$form['field_name'][LANGCODE_NOT_SPECIFIED]['#options']['_none'] = ...

…however I couldn't get that to work with hook_form_alter(): the actual values of those constants are three letter alphanumeric codes which don't appear to exist in the form field array.

So I reverted to the line at the top of my answer. If anyone can clear that up...?

Answer 5

If you already have some jquery/javascript included in your system, eg a custom theme or module, you can add something like:

$('select option:contains("- None -")').text("- Select -");

and it will change it up for you. You can cascade more in there if you want to be specific to just a certain select/option as the above will change all of them.

Otherwise, on the php side of things, the - None - is passed through t('- None -') so you could use one of the many localize or customtext modules to change the text, but this would be systemwide as well.

Answer 6

Similar to Drupal 7's theme_options_none(), Drupal 8 actually has hook_options_list_alter() that can be used to accomplish this task.

function MY_MODULE_options_list_alter(array &$options, array $context) {
  if ($context['fieldDefinition']->getName() === 'field_option') {
    $options['_none'] = t('- Select -');
  }
}

Note: this alter is only invoked in modules; this will not work in a theme (theme alter isn't invoked). Also, the API documentation uses $context['fieldDefinition']->id() and will not match against just a field name. This is the config identifier and is prepended with the entity type. Instead, you should use $context['fieldDefinition']->getName() which actually returns the field name.

Answer 7

Implement hook_form_alter() or hook_form_FORM_ID_alter() and identify the dropdown field and add this:

e.g.

$form['field_name'][$form['field_name']['#language']]['#options']['#empty_option'] = t('- Select -');

The key thing is to set the #empty_option attribute on your select list.