Bootstrap 4 Form Theme
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Read the updated version of this page for Symfony 7.1 (the current stable version).
Symfony provides several ways of integrating Bootstrap into your application. The
most straightforward way is to just add the required <link>
and <script>
elements in your templates (usually you only include them in the main layout
template which other templates extend from):
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{# templates/base.html.twig #}
{# beware that the blocks in your template may be named different #}
{% block head_css %}
<!-- Copy CSS from https://getbootstrap.com/docs/4.4/getting-started/introduction/#css -->
{% endblock %}
{% block head_js %}
<!-- Copy JavaScript from https://getbootstrap.com/docs/4.4/getting-started/introduction/#js -->
{% endblock %}
If your application uses modern front-end practices, it's better to use Webpack Encore and follow this tutorial to import Bootstrap's sources into your SCSS and JavaScript files.
The next step is to configure the Symfony application to use Bootstrap 4 styles when rendering forms. If you want to apply them to all forms, define this configuration:
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# app/config/config.yml
twig:
form_themes: ['bootstrap_4_layout.html.twig']
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<!-- app/config/config.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<container xmlns="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/services"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns:twig="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/twig"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/services
https://symfony.com/schema/dic/services/services-1.0.xsd
http://symfony.com/schema/dic/twig
https://symfony.com/schema/dic/twig/twig-1.0.xsd">
<twig:config>
<twig:form-theme>bootstrap_4_layout.html.twig</twig:form-theme>
<!-- ... -->
</twig:config>
</container>
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// app/config/config.php
$container->loadFromExtension('twig', [
'form_themes' => [
'bootstrap_4_layout.html.twig',
],
// ...
]);
If you prefer to apply the Bootstrap styles on a form to form basis, include the
form_theme
tag in the templates where those forms are used:
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{# ... #}
{# this tag only applies to the forms defined in this template #}
{% form_theme form 'bootstrap_4_layout.html.twig' %}
{% block body %}
<h1>User Sign Up:</h1>
{{ form(form) }}
{% endblock %}
Error Messages
Form errors are rendered inside the <label>
element to make sure there
is a strong connection between the error and its <input>
, as required by the
WCAG 2.0 standard. To achieve this, form_errors()
is called by
form_label()
internally. If you call to form_errors()
in your template,
you'll get the error messages displayed twice.
Checkboxes and Radios
For a checkbox/radio field, calling form_label()
doesn't render anything.
Due to Bootstrap internals, the label is already rendered by form_widget()
.
Accessibility
The Bootstrap 4 framework has done a good job making it accessible for functional variations like impaired vision and cognitive ability. Symfony has taken this one step further to make sure the form theme complies with the WCAG 2.0 standard.
This does not mean that your entire website automatically complies with the full standard, but it does mean that you have come far in your work to create a design for all users.
Custom Forms
Bootstrap 4 has a feature called "`custom forms`_". You can enable that on your
Symfony Form RadioType
and CheckboxType
by adding a class called radio-custom
and checkbox-custom
respectively.
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{{ form_row(form.myRadio, {label_attr: {class: 'radio-custom'} }) }}
{{ form_row(form.myCheckbox, {label_attr: {class: 'checkbox-custom'} }) }}