Using views with a custom table/schema

Question

I need to set up some views that will pull some data from a custom table I created. Some views will need to pull content the regular way and from my custom table (where I may query for a particular nid, etc.).

How do I do this, or where is a good place to research?

Answer 1

Your module needs to implement hook_views_data().

The example given in the hook documentation is for a table defined from the following SQL.

CREATE TABLE example_table (
  nid INT(11) NOT NULL,
  plain_text_field VARCHAR(32,
  numeric_field INT(11),
  boolean_field INT(1),
  timestamp_field INT(8),
  PRIMARY KEY(nid)
);

function mymodule_views_data() {
  $data['example_table']['table']['group'] = t('Example table');

  $data['example_table']['table']['base'] = array(
    'field' => 'nid',
    'title' => t('Example table'), 
    'help' => t('Example table contains example content and can be related to nodes.'), 
    'weight' => -10,
  );

  $data['example_table']['table']['join'] = array(
    'node' => array(
      'left_field' => 'nid', 
      'field' => 'nid',
    ),
  );

  $data['example_table']['nid'] = array(
    'title' => t('Example content'), 
    'help' => t('Some example content that references a node.'),
    'relationship' => array(
      'base' => 'node',
      'base field' => 'nid', // The name of the field on the joined table.
      // 'field' => 'nid' -- see hook_views_data_alter(); not needed here.
      'handler' => 'views_handler_relationship', 
      'label' => t('Example node'),
    ),
  );

  $data['example_table']['plain_text_field'] = array(
    'title' => t('Plain text field'), 
    'help' => t('Just a plain text field.'), 
    'field' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_field', 
      'click sortable' => TRUE,
    ), 
    'sort' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_sort',
    ), 
    'filter' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_filter_string',
    ), 
    'argument' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_argument_string',
    ),
  );

  $data['example_table']['numeric_field'] = array(
    'title' => t('Numeric field'), 
    'help' => t('Just a numeric field.'), 
    'field' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_field_numeric', 
      'click sortable' => TRUE,
    ), 
    'filter' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_filter_numeric',
    ), 
    'sort' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_sort',
    ),
  );

  $data['example_table']['boolean_field'] = array(
    'title' => t('Boolean field'), 
    'help' => t('Just an on/off field.'), 
    'field' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_field_boolean', 
      'click sortable' => TRUE,
    ), 
    'filter' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_filter_boolean_operator',
      'label' => t('Published'),
      'type' => 'yes-no',
      'use equal' => TRUE,
    ), 
    'sort' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_sort',
    ),
  );

  $data['example_table']['timestamp_field'] = array(
    'title' => t('Timestamp field'), 
    'help' => t('Just a timestamp field.'), 
    'field' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_field_date', 
      'click sortable' => TRUE,
    ), 
    'sort' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_sort_date',
    ), 
    'filter' => array(
      'handler' => 'views_handler_filter_date',
    ),
  );

  return $data;
}

Answer 2

I think it would probably be worth investigating the Data module. This is very powerful, since it allows you to declare a non-Drupal table to Drupal such that it becomes visible in Views as a data source (like "Content", "Taxonomy", etc). You can also declare joins between the non-Drupal table and Drupal entities (so for example if you can stock a nid in your non-Drupal table, then you can declare a join on the nid with any node).

There is also a submodule which allows you to declare your non-Drupal table as an entity, but so far I've not tried that.