Supplying a predefined list of options for an exposed item in a view in Drupal?

Question

I've got a view that filters by year. The year is a normal text CCK field on the content type. I've exposed this field in the view, so that the user can type in a value for it. E.g. 2010. It will then show all the content types with the field set to 2010. My problem is, I don't want the user to type in the value. I want to change that text field to a dropdown with several years.

My options are:

1. Hack it with JQuery --> VERY BAD
2. Edit the exposed value using some hook or something BEFORE it's outputted on the page
3. Any other options?

My question is, how do I do option 2, or worst case, option 3?

Answer 1

When you edit the CCK field in Manage fields, you can set the allowed values for that field. If you do, when you go back into the View, you'll have a new filter, Field - allows values which will give you a select menu of the allowed values when you expose it.

If you don't want to limit the values during creation, you're going to have to alter the exposed form in a custom module:

function mymodule_form_alter(&$form, $form_state, $form_id) {
  if ($form_id === 'views_exposed_form') {
    // Change field_test_value to the name of your field
    $form['field_test_value']['#type'] = 'select';
    $form['field_test_value']['#options'] = array(
      '' => '', 
      '2010' => '2010', 
      '2009' => '2009');
  }
}

See the Form API reference to see what else you can do.