Programmatically create a menu

Question

How can I programmatically create a menu? I have 3 different menus I want to create: The first menu will be placed in the top left of the header; the second menu will be placed below the first menu; the third menu will be the main navigation.

Answer 1

If you are trying to do this in an update script, this should work:

$menus = array(
  array(
    'menu_name' => 'menu_test_one',
    'title' => 'My Menu One',
    'description' => 'Lorem Ipsum',
  ),
  array(
    'menu_name' => 'menu_test_two',
    'title' => 'My Menu Two',
    'description' => 'Lorem Ipsum',
  ),
  array(
    'menu_name' => 'menu_test_three',
    'title' => 'My Menu Three',
    'description' => 'Lorem Ipsum',
  ),
);

$links = array(
  array(
    array(
      'link_title' => 'Link1',
      'link_path' => 'http://yourdomain.com/link1',
      'menu_name' => 'menu_test_one',
      'weight' => 0,
      'expanded' => 0,
    ),
    array(
      'link_title' => 'Link2',
      'link_path' => 'http://yourdomain.com/link2',
      'menu_name' => 'menu_test_one',
      'weight' => 1,
      'expanded' => 0,
    ),
  ),
  array(
    array(
      'link_title' => 'Link3',
      'link_path' => 'http://yourdomain.com/link3',
      'menu_name' => 'menu_test_two',
      'weight' => 0,
      'expanded' => 0,
    ),
    array(
      'link_title' => 'Link4',
      'link_path' => 'http://yourdomain.com/link4',
      'menu_name' => 'menu_test_two',
      'weight' => 1,
      'expanded' => 0,
    ),
  ),
  array(
    array(
      'link_title' => 'Link5',
      'link_path' => 'http://yourdomain.com/link5',
      'menu_name' => 'menu_test_three',
      'weight' => 0,
      'expanded' => 0,
    ),
    array(
      'link_title' => 'Link6',
      'link_path' => 'http://yourdomain.com/link6',
      'menu_name' => 'menu_test_three',
      'weight' => 1,
      'expanded' => 0,
    ),
  ),
);

// Save menu group into menu_custom table
foreach ($menus as $menu) {
  // Look the table first if the data does exist
  $exists = db_query("SELECT title FROM {menu_custom} WHERE menu_name=:menu_name", array(':menu_name' => $menu['menu_name']))->fetchField();
  // Save the record if the data does not exist
  if (!$exists) {
    menu_save($menu);
  }
}

$item = ''; 
foreach ($links as $layer1) {
  foreach ($layer1 as $link) {
    // Build an array of menu link 
    $item = array(
      'link_path' => $link['link_path'],
      'link_title' => $link['link_title'],
      'menu_name' => $link['menu_name'],
      'weight' => $link['weight'],
      'expanded' => $link['expanded'],
    );
    // Look the table first if the data does exist
    $exists = db_query("SELECT mlid from {menu_links} WHERE link_title=:link_title AND link_path=:link_path", array(':link_title' =>  $link['link_title'], ':link_path' => $link['link_path']))->fetchField();
    // Save the record if the data does not exist
    if (!$exists) {  
      menu_link_save($item);
    }
  }
}

Comments are welcome if my approach is wrong. Thanks.

Answer 2

Here's a way to easily populate a menu from an array :

<?php
function populate_menu($links, $menu_name, $plid = 0) {
  foreach ($links as $link) {
    $ls = array(
      'menu_name' => $menu_name,
      'link_title' => $link['link_title'],
      'link_path' => $link['link_path'],
      'plid' => $plid,
    );
    $newpid = menu_link_save($ls);
    if (!empty($link['childs'])) {
      populate_menu($link['childs'], $menu_name, $newpid);
    }
  }
}


$items = array(
  array(
    'link_title' => 'Menu1',
    'link_path' => '<front>',
    'childs' => array(
      array(
        'link_title' => 'Sub Item 1',
        'link_path' => '<front>',
        'childs' => array(
          array(
            'link_title' => 'Link item 1',
            'link_path' => '<front>',
          ),
          array(
            'link_title' => 'Link item 2',
            'link_path' => '<front>',
          ),
        ),
      ),
      array(
        'link_title' => 'Sub Item 2',
        'link_path' => '<front>',
        'childs' => array(
          array(
            'link_title' => 'Link item',
            'link_path' => '<front>',
          ),
        ),
      ),
    ),
  ),
);
populate_menu($items, 'main-menu');

Answer 3

hook_menu() is all you need to implement in you custom module. For creation of custom module, refer to this documentation.

//Define the menus in the function which goes in your MYMODULE.module file

function MYMODULE_menu() {
  //the menu which will point to http://yoursite/first-menu
  $items['first-menu'] = array(
    'title' => 'First menu',  // will appear as the name of the link
    // Page callback, etc. need to be added here.
  );

  //the menu which will point to http://yoursite/second-menu
  $items['second-menu'] = array(
    'title' => 'Second menu',  // will appear as the name of the link
    // Page callback, etc. need to be added here.
  );

  //the menu which will point to http://yoursite/third-menu
  $items['third-menu'] = array(
    'title' => 'third menu',  // will appear as the name of the link
    // Page callback, etc. need to be added here.
  );

  return $items;
}

You could print the menu in any region by adding the following code to the page.tpl.php file of you theme.

// Add this line in <div id="header"></div> to print it in header.
<?php
$menu1 = menu_navigation_links('first-menu');
print theme('links__first_menu', array('links' => $menu1));

//Print the second menu right after the first menu.
$menu2 = menu_navigation_links('second-menu');
print theme('links__second_menu', array('links' => $menu1));
?>

You don't need to print the third menu because by default it will appear on the navigation menu.

Note

This is not the best practice for creating a navigation menu and adding it to a page. hook_menu() is for creating page callbacks and not for creating navigation menus. Please read Menu system, which explains the differences. I answered this when I had started to learn Drupal and I don't recommend this answer anymore.

Answer 4

You can also try the Menu Import module. It's very cool and easy for menu deployment. You can create menu by hands on your website and use generated JSON. Also you can create nodes for non-existing pages.

Here is example of export script:

$menu_name = 'menu-footer-secondary-menu';

// Create menu if doesn't exist.
if (!menu_load($menu_name)) {
  $menu = array(
    'menu_name' => $menu_name,
    'title' => t('Footer secondary menu'),
    'description' => '',
  );
  menu_save($menu);
}

// Import menu links from JSON.
$menu_string = 'Impressum {"url":"node\/1","options":{"attributes":[]}}
Datenschutzbestimmungen {"url":"node\/2","options":{"attributes":[]}}
Nutzungsbedingungen {"url":"node\/3","options":{"attributes":[]}}
';

$options = array(
  //'link_to_content' => TRUE, // Look for existing nodes and link to them.
  'create_content' => TRUE, // Create new content (also if link_to_content not set).
  'remove_menu_items' => TRUE, // Removes current menu items.
  'node_type' => 'page',
  'node_body' => 'Page is in development...',
  'node_author' => 1,
  'node_status' => 1,
);

menu_import_string($menu_string, $menu_name, $options);

You can run this script with hook_update_N() or Update script processor

Answer 5

For creating a menu block, in your .install file add the following code. (Replace mymodule with the module machine name.)

function mymodule_enable() {
  $t = get_t();

  if (module_exists('menu')) {
    menu_save(array(
      'menu_name' => 'my-new-menu',
      'title' => $t('My New Menu'),
      'description' => $t('My Menu description'),
    ));
  }
}

function mymodule_uninstall() {
  if (module_exists('menu')) {
    if ($my_menu = menu_load('my-new-menu')) {
     menu_delete($my_menu);
    }
  }
}

In the .module file, add this code.

function mymodule_menu() {
  return array(
   'mypage' => array(
   'title' => 'My Page',        
   'description' => 'My Page description',    
   'page callback' => 'my_page_callback_func',
   'page arguments' => array(arg(0)),
   'access arguments' => array('access content'),
   'menu_name' => 'my-new-menu',
   'file' => 'my.new.page.inc',
   'file path' => drupal_get_path('module', 'mymodule') . '/includes',
  ),
 );     
}