Meta Box Conditional Logic

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Overview

The Meta Box Conditional Logic extension is one of the most popular plugins of Meta Box. It helps you to show or hide meta boxes, custom fields or any elements based on other fields’ values. Developers can control the relations between fields powerfully and create connections and perform any logic between them.

See this video below to understand how it works:

The extension is super useful when you want to:

• Show a meta box only for a specific post format
• Show page settings (a meta box) for only a specific page template
• Show a group of fields when users select a specific value from a dropdown

and a lot more.

You can also combine these options to build complex conditions. It works not only for meta boxes or custom fields, but also other HTML elements. It’s really powerful.

For more info, please see the extension page.

Installation

Before installing the extension, you need to install Meta Box plugin first.

1. Go to Plugins → Add New and search for Meta Box
2. Click Install Now button to install the plugin
3. After installing, click Activate Plugin to activate the plugin

The extension is just a WordPress plugin, you can install it like a normal WordPress plugin.

1. Go to Plugins, click Add new, then click Upload plugin.
2. Choose the .zip file you downloaded and click Install now
3. After finishing upload, click Activate to finish.

Like the Meta Box plugin, Conditional Logic was created without any options. You can start using it right after activating.

If you’re confused whilst reading this tutorial. Please refer to creating meta box.

Getting started

The code below registers a meta box that is hidden when the post format is aside. The meta box also have 2 custom fields: Brand and Product. The Product field will be hidden if user select a brand that’s not “Apple”.

add_filter( 'rwmb_meta_boxes', function( $meta_boxes ) {
    $meta_boxes[] = array(
        'title' => 'Brands and Products',
        
        // Hide this meta box when post format is aside
        'hidden' => array( 'post_format', 'aside' ),
        
        'fields' => array(
            array(
                'id'    => 'brand',
                'name'  => 'Brand',
                'desc'  => 'Pick Your Favourite Brand',
                'type'  => 'select',
                'options' => array(
                    'Apple'         => 'Apple',
                    'Google'        => 'Google',
                    'Microsoft'     => 'Microsoft'
                )
            ),
            array(
                'id'    => 'apple_products',
                'name'  => 'Which Apple product that you love?',
                'type'  => 'radio',
                'options' => array(
                    'iPhone'    => 'iPhone',
                    'iPad'      => 'iPad',
                    'Macbook'   => 'Macbook',
                    'iWatch'    => 'iWatch'
                ),
                
                // Hide this field when user selected a brand that's not 'Apple'
                'hidden' => array( 'brand', '!=', 'Apple' )
            )
        )
    );

    return $meta_boxes;
} );

Syntax

To make a meta box or a field visible/hidden, please add a setting for the meta box or the field with the following syntax:

// Condition to show.
'visible' => array( 'field', 'operator', 'value' ),

// Condition to hide
'hidden' => array( 'field', 'operator', 'value' )

Name	Description
field	Meta Box field ID or ID of a DOM element to compare.
operator	Comparison operators: =, >=, <=, >, <, !=, in, contains, between, starts with, ends with, match. All of them can combine with not operator to become negate operator. Default: =. Optional.
value	Value to compare with.

The normal operators like =, !=, etc. are pretty clear. Let’s see the advanced operators like contains, starts with, etc.

Advanced Operators

contains

The operator contains can check with string if it contains another string

'visible' => array( 'brand', 'contains', 'pp' ) // Apple, App, ...

It also can check if an array contains another array or string. For instance, if brand is a multiple field (checkbox list, select multiple…), its value is an array, then you can check if user selected ‘Apple’:

'visible' => array( 'brand', 'contains', array( 'Apple' ) )

between

This operator check if the field value is between minimum and maximum values.

Let say that we have a date field released_date and we want to show another field only when released_date is between “2015-06-01” and “2015-12-01”:

'visible' => array( 'released_date', 'between', array( '2015-06-01', '2015-12-01' ) )

Please note that the between operator does not only compare numeric fields but also date and time fields.

starts with

This operator checks if field value starts with a string:

'visible' => array( 'brand', 'starts with', 'App' ) // Apple, App

ends with

This operator checks if field value ends with a string:

'visible' => array( 'brand', 'ends with', 'le' ) // Apple, Google

match

This operator checks if field value matches a regular expression:

'visible' => array( 'brand', 'match', '[a-z]$' )

not

We can combine not operator with other operators to negative the meaning of them. So we’ll have not contains, not in, not match, not starts with, not ends with, not between.

Multiple conditions

Sometimes, you’ll need to use more than one conditional logic. To do that, you can define multiple conditions to show or hide a meta box or a custom field. For example:

// Visible when 'brand' is 'Apple' AND 'released_year' is between 2010 and 2015
'visible' => array(
    array( 'brand', 'Apple' ),
    array( 'released_year', 'between', array( 2010, 2015 ) )
)

By default, if you define compound statement, the logic will correct if ALL of them are correct. In case you want to visible a field if ONE of them is correct, simply move all statements to when key and put new relation key like this example:

// Visible when 'brand' is 'Apple' OR 'released_year' is between 2010 and 2015
'visible' => array(
    'when' => array(
         array( 'brand', 'in', array( 'Apple', 'Microsoft' ) ),
         array( 'released_year', 'between', array( 2010, 2015 ) )
     ),
     'relation' => 'or'
)

Getting values for special fields

This section shows you how to specify the value in the conditions for some specific fields.

Checkbox field

For checkboxes, use 0 or false if it’s not checked, 1 or true if it’s checked.

'visible' => array( 'checkbox_field', true ) // Visible if checkbox_field is checked

Media fields

For media fields that use WordPress media popup to handle upload like file_advanced, image_advanced, the extension checks number of uploaded files instead of their values.

This example shows or hides a field depends on there’s a file uploaded:

// Visible when file_advanced field is has file
'visible' => array( 'file_advanced', '>', 0 )

// Or hidden if image_advanced doesn't contains anything
'hidden' => array( 'image_advanced', 0 )

Toggle by other elements

Meta Box Conditional Logic can work with other HTML elements the same as Meta Box fields. With this feature, you can show or hide any meta box or field based on post types, page parent, post ID, categories…

To make it work with HTML element, instead of passing the field ID as the first parameter, please pass the element’s ID.

Here are the list of available built-in WordPress elements:

Param	Description
post_ID	Post ID
page_template	Page template
parent_id	Parent post ID
post_format	Post format

Examples:

Display a meta box (or a field) if page template is template-custom.php:

'visible' => array( 'page_template', 'template-custom.php' )

Featured image

Featured image is a special HTML element. It has the field name/ID _thumbnail_id and when empty, WordPress sets the value to -1. Since version 1.5.3, the plugin can detect changes for featured image and let you define conditions with it.

Examples:

Make a field visible if no featured image:

'visible' => array( '_thumbnail_id', '=', '-1' ),

Make a field visible if featured image is set:

'visible' => array( '_thumbnail_id', '!=', '-1' ),

Or make a field visible only if featured image is a specific image with ID 123:

'visible' => array( '_thumbnail_id', '=', '123' ),

Using outside meta boxes

The extension can even work with elements outside meta boxes, for example: post title, post content, post excerpt…

Let’s say you want to hide the WordPress core submitdiv meta box (the meta box that contains Publish button) when brand is ‘Microsoft’:

add_filter( 'rwmb_outside_conditions', function( $conditions ) {
    $conditions['submitdiv'] = array(
        'hidden' => array( 'brand', 'Microsoft' ),
    );
    return $conditions;
} );

Another example: hide post title for aside post format:

add_filter( 'rwmb_outside_conditions', function( $conditions ){
    $conditions['post_title'] = array(
        'hidden' => array( 'post_format', 'aside' )
    );
    return $conditions;
} );

The key for the conditions can be ID of the element (default) or any CSS selector:

add_filter( 'rwmb_outside_conditions', function( $conditions ){
    $conditions['.rwmb-tab-bio'] = array(
        'hidden' => array( 'post_format', 'aside' )
    );
    return $conditions;
} );

If you want to hide a tab created by Meta Box Tabs, see this.

Using with taxonomies

Post category

For post category, use post_category as the first parameter:

'visible' => array( 'post_category', 'in', array( 4, 5, 6 ) )

By default, the extension uses category IDs to check. Since 1.3, you can define the condition’s value using slug:

'visible' => array( 'slug:post_category', 'in', array( 'fashion', 'gaming', 'technology' ) )

Post tag

Support for post tag is added in version 1.6.5 and works only for Gutenberg editor.

To add conditions by post tag, use tags as the first parameter:

'visible' => array( 'tags', 'in', array( 4, 5, 6 ) )

Unlike post category, you have to use tag IDs.

Custom taxonomies

For custom taxonomies, use tax_input[taxonomy_slug] as the first parameter:

'hidden' => array( 'tax_input[product]', 'in', array( 5, 6, 7 ) ),

Similarly to post category, it works with slug, too.

'hidden' => array( 'slug:tax_input[product]', '!=', 'drones' )

Custom callback

Since 1.3, you can set conditional logic with custom JavaScript callback, just put your function call in the first parameter. Like so:

In your JavaScript file:

// Your custom JavaScript function that checks the condition
function my_custom_callback() { return true; }

In your PHP file:

'visible' => array( 'my_custom_callback()', true )

Please note that your function can return anything you want and you can use any operator to compare. For example

// Your js
function dummy_function(){ return ['foo', 'bar', 'baz]; }

// Your field or meta box
'hidden' => array( 'dummy_function()', 'contains', 'bar' );

Toggle types

By default, we use jQuery .show() and .hide() method (which equivalent to CSS display property) to toggle elements. Imagine you have three fields named A, B, and C. So by default it will display vertical like so:

A
-
B
-
C

Or if you use Column extension, it will display horizontal like so:

A | B | C

What happen when field B is hidden? The field C will jump to B place, sometimes, you will want to keep the position of these field, so if field B is hidden, it should keep the blank space like so:

A
-

-
C

Or

A | | C

So, basically, we have to use CSS visibility property instead of display property. To do so, just add 'toggle_type' => 'visibility' to your Meta Box.

Since 1.5, we do support slideUp, slideDown, fadeIn, fadeOut animation. In order to use these animation just set toggle_type to slide or fade.

In short, we supports 4 toggle types to: visibility, display, slide, fade.

Known issues

Conditional Logic doesn’t works with autocomplete field. We’ll try to update in the next release.