Execute a view without rendering

Question

I'd like to programmatically execute a view (providing arguments) and get the raw results, without rendering it. Is it possible?

When I use $view->preview('default', $args); it converts the results to HTML. I know I can use $view->result to iterate the raw results, but the custom rendered I'm using for some fields are buggy and give me a WSOD (I have no interest or ability to fix the renderer, it's an edge case :) )

I'm using Views 3 with Drupal 7

Answer 1

There is already a function that does exactly what you want:

  $result = views_get_view_result('my_view_name', 'default', $arg1, $arg2, ...);

Read more at its page at api.drupal.org:

https://api.drupal.org/api/views/views.module/function/views_get_view_result/7

Answer 2

$view->preview() is generally used to simply view the display so in other words it will render it via the specified format.

$view->execute_display() also returns the display in relevant format specified in view.

I think you may have to result to executing query direct i.e. db_query()

Answer 3

You should get some success if you stub out view::preview() into your own code, but change it so that, instead of calling ->display_handler->preview(), it calls ->execute() instead:

$view = views_get_view($view_name);
$view->set_display($display_name);
$view->preview = TRUE;
$view->pre_execute($args);
$view->execute($display_name);

This should work because, for most display handlers, the call to ...->display_handler->preview() is actually just a wrapper around a call back to view::render(). Which itself starts by calling $this->execute(...).