theme_field() render array

Question

I hoped the documentation for theme_field() would tell me how to create a render array that may be parsed by that function.

Based on that, I thought something like this would work.

return array(
    'test' => array(
        '#theme' => 'field',
        '#label_hidden' =>  false,
        '#title_attributes' => 'class="test123"',
        '#label' => 'test',
        '#content_attributes' => 'class="test456"',
        '#items' => array()
    )
);

It prints a  .

what am I doing wrong?

The ultimate goal is of course printing some field_items, but I can find no documentation on how the render array for #items should look; nothing I tried outputs anything.

A pointer to better documentation might answer my questions.

Answer 1

If you absolutely need to piggyback on theme_field() rather than implement your own theme function (which would be preferable IMHO), then you'll have to jump through a few more hoops.

The key place to look is template_preprocess_field(), which will show you all of the elements that are expected to be in the array. Specifically for the label, the #title property is used. So this

return array(
  'test' => array(
    '#theme'                => 'field',
    '#label_hidden'         =>  false,
    '#title_attributes'     => 'class="test123"',
    '#label'                => 'test',
    '#title' => 'test',  // Required
    '#label_display' => 'visible',  // Required
    '#content_attributes'   => 'class="test456"',
    '#items'    => array()
  )
);

will return what you're looking for (with a bunch of notices about undefined indicies).

Eventually you'll also need to provide #field_name, #field_type, #bundle and #entity_type for each of your 'field' items.