CodeIgniter: Controller structure for forms with many inputs

Question

I'm developing a site using CodeIgniter and am trying to adhere to the "Fat Model / Skinny Controller" paradigm, but am running into some problems when it comes to pages containing forms with a number of inputs. The code below is what I'm using to define the inputs for the address fields

Part of my Controller (where I'm defining the form inputs and their attributes):

$this->data['address1'] = array(
            'name' => 'address1',
            'id' => 'address1',
            'type' => 'text',
            'class' => 'field text addr',
            'tabindex' => '10',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('address1'),
            'placeholder' => 'Street Address'
        );

$this->data['address2'] = array(
            'name' => 'address2',
            'id' => 'address2',
            'type' => 'text',
            'class' => 'field text addr',
            'tabindex' => '11',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('address2'),
            'placeholder' => 'Address Line 2',
        );

$this->data['city'] = array(
            'name' => 'city',
            'id' => 'city',
            'type' => 'text',
            'class' => 'field text addr',
            'tabindex' => '12',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('city'),
            'placeholder' => 'City'
            );

$this->data['state'] = array(
            'name' => 'state',
            'id' => 'state',
            'class' => 'field addr',
            'tabindex' => '13',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('state'),
            'label' => array('class' => 'desc')
            );

$this->data['zip'] = array(
            'name' => 'zip',
            'id' => 'zip',
            'type' => 'text',
            'class' => 'field text addr',
            'tabindex' => '14',
            'maxlength' => '20',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('zip'),
            'placeholder' => 'Zip / Postal Code'
            );

$this->data['country'] = array(
            'name' => 'country',
            'id' => 'country',
            'class' => 'field addr',
            'tabindex' => '15',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('country')
            );

Part of my View (minus all the HTML to position the form inputs):

<?php
    echo form_open("address/add");
    echo form_input($address1);
    echo form_input($address2);
    echo form_input($city);

    $options = array();
    $options[''] = 'State / Province / Region';
    foreach($province_options AS $prov)
    {
            $options[$prov->id] = $prov->province;
    }
    echo form_dropdown('state',$options,'',$state);

    echo form_input($zip);

    $options = array();
    $options[''] = 'Country';
    foreach($country_options AS $cnt)
    {
            $options[$cnt->id] = $cnt->country;
    }
    echo form_dropdown('country',$options,'',$country);
    echo form_submit('submit', 'Submit & Continue');
    echo form_close();
?>

I feel like my Controller is overly verbose, but I can't think of what the alternative would be for how to organize the information necessary to represent my form if I'm planning on using the Form Helper to generate the form inputs in my view. Is this the right way to be doing things, or is there a better approach?

Answer 1

There is a little bit of logic that can be moved to the controller or even model layer:

$options = array();
$options[''] = 'Country';
foreach($country_options AS $cnt)
{
        $options[$cnt->id] = $cnt->country;
}
echo form_dropdown('country',$options,'',$country);

Could probably look like:

echo form_dropdown('country', $countries, '', $country);

...if you move the options to the controller or view.

This is a problem I run into all the time trying to keep things DRY as possible, where to define the form data? I think sometimes we forget the power of the "V" in "MVC". You could define all the view logic in the view instead.

Things like id, tabindex and placeholder are only necessary and useful in the view. Things like form validation rules and data checking/prepping belong in the Controller/Model layer.

The form helper functions are useful, but sometimes raw HTML is better. For example:

// Controller
$this->data['address1'] = array(
            'name' => 'address1',
            'id' => 'address1',
            'type' => 'text',
            'class' => 'field text addr',
            'tabindex' => '10',
            'value' => $this->form_validation->set_value('address1'),
            'placeholder' => 'Street Address'
        );
// View
echo form_input($address1);

Or simply:

<input name="address1" id="address1" tabindex="10" type="text" placeholder="Street Address" value="<?php echo set_value('address1'); ?>" class="field text addr">

I wrote a bunch of applications last year where I defined all this stuff in the Model, and now I'm regretting it as I've been going back to do maintenance on them and all the view logic is obscured away in the Model or Controller. Editing a Controller or Model to change a class attribute is just silly.