Summary
Drupal 8 introduces an entity view builder for rendering entities consistently. The view builder renders one or more entities in a given view mode and language, including attaching field data where appropriate.
API changes
Added interface and base class
The Drupal\Core\Entity\EntityViewBuilderInterface and Drupal\Core\Entity\EntityViewBuilder class have been added. Additionally, several core entity types subclass EntityViewBuilder for their rendering:
- Drupal\comment\CommentViewBuilder
- Drupal\node\NodeViewBuilder
- Drupal\taxonomy\TermViewBuilder
- Drupal\user\UserViewBuilder
Custom entity types may use EntityViewBuilder directly or extend it.
Added functions
The following procedural API functions have been added:
- entity_view(EntityInterface $entity, $view_mode, $langcode = NULL): Returns a render array structure for the entity in the given view mode and language.
- entity_view_multiple(array $entities, $view_mode, $langcode = NULL): Returns a render array structure for multiple entities in the given view mode and language.
Removed functions
The following functions have been removed in Drupal 8:
entity_prepare_view()comment_build_content()node_build_content()taxonomy_term_show()taxonomy_term_build_content()user_build_content()
Examples
You can define a view builder for a given entity type by setting the 'view_builder' key in the EntityType 'controllers' annotation array and implementing EntityViewBuilderInterface (or extending EntityViewBuilder).
/**
* @file
* Contains \Drupal\my_module\Plugin\Core\Entity\MyEntity.
*/
namespace Drupal\my_module\Plugin\Core\Entity;
use Drupal\Core\Entity\Entity;
use Drupal\Core\Entity\Annotation\EntityType;
use Drupal\Core\Annotation\Translation;
use Drupal\my_module\MyEntityInterface;
/**
* Defines a custom entity.
*
* @EntityType(
* id = "my_entity",
* label = @Translation("My entity"),
* controllers = {
* "storage" = "Drupal\Core\Entity\DatabaseStorageController",
* "view_builder" = "Drupal\my_module\MyViewBuilder"
* },
* entity_keys = {
* "id" = "id",
* "label" = "label"
* "uuid" = "uuid"
* }
* )
*/
class MyEntity extends Entity implements MyEntityInterface {
}
namespace Drupal\my_module;
use Drupal\Core\Entity\EntityViewBuilder;
/**
* Defines the view builder for my_entity_type entities.
*/
class MyViewBuilder extends EntityViewBuilder {}
To render an entity, simply call the view() or viewMultiple() methods:
$view_builder = \Drupal::entityTypeManager()->getViewBuilder('my_entity_type');
$full_output = $view_builder->view($entity);
$rss_output = $view_builder->view($entity, 'rss');
