Creating a Field

A field is one property of your records (title, body text, category, …). Create fields first, then attach them to a Datatype. Fields are stored as their own records, independent of any datatype. This has two practical effects: you can reuse one field (for example “Title”) in several datatypes, and changing a field changes the form of every datatype that uses it. Each field later becomes one column in the datatype’s database table and one property in its PHP class.

Create a field

Open a storage folder in Records (v14: Content > Records; v12/v13: Web > List).
Create new record → tonictypes → Field.
Set Type and Frontend Label (this also builds the Fluid variable name).
Save. Repeat for each property.

General — pick the field type Changing the Type reloads the form, because every type has its own TCA Field Configuration options below it (for example the number of rows of a textarea, or the allowed file extensions of an image field). In the Records list a field is labelled [pid] TYPE: Label {variable} — for example [77] INPUT: Title {title} — so you can see its storage page, type and variable name at a glance.

A field only appears in a datatype’s Fields selector if it is on the same storage page as the datatype and has a Frontend Label, a variable name and at least one Field Value.

Field types in Core

Type	Use it for
Input Field	Short single-line text such as a title, a name or a price
Textarea	Longer plain text without formatting
Rich-Text Editor (RTE)	Formatted text with headings, lists and links
Select Field / Multiselect Field	Choose one / several options from a list defined in Field Values
Radio Buttons / Checkboxes	Visible options to pick one (radio) or several (checkboxes)
Date Field / Date and Time Field	Dates with a date picker, optionally with time
Image / File Relations	Images or other files from the file list (FAL)
Link	A link to a page, file, URL or e-mail address
Page / Tree Selection	Pick pages or items from a tree
Group Field / Folder Field	Relations to records of other tables / to folders
Table	Simple tabular data
Code Editor	Code snippets with syntax highlighting
Color Picker	A colour value

Pro types (FlexForm, Content, Fluid, UserFunc, …): Tonictypes Pro. Developers can register their own field types under plugin.tx_tonictypes.fieldtypes in TypoScript (class, icon, label, FlexForm) — the Core setup contains a commented customfieldtype example.

Main tabs (what they mean)

Tab	Use for
General	The field Type and the TCA Field Configuration for that type. This decides how the input looks in the record form.
Frontend Settings	Frontend Label (the label editors see), Custom Variable Name (lowercase letters only; used in Fluid as `{record.yourname}` and as the database column name), Frontend Type Definition (the PHP type of the property in the generated class, e.g. `string`, `int` or a class name) and Is Object Storage (store several related objects of that class).
Backend Settings	Use as record title (value shown as the record’s label in lists), Use value as path segment (value builds the record’s URL segment), Searchable in Backend (included in the List module search), Exclude for non-admin users / Exclude from translations, Palette (put fields side by side) and Backend Description (help text under the field).
Database Settings	Database Type Definition — keep Inherit from Tca/Field Class unless you need a different column type (e.g. `mediumtext` for long text). Is Index Field adds a database index, useful for fields you filter or sort by.
Field Values	Options for select-like fields and default values — see below.
Display Conditions	Show or hide this field depending on other fields. Request Update (onChange) reloads the form when this field changes, so conditions on other fields react immediately. The condition itself uses TYPO3’s `displayCond` syntax; Available Field Ids lists the fields you can refer to.
Language	Language / translation parent (only shown on multi-language sites)
Access	Hide, Start, Stop for the field itself
Advanced Settings	Cache generated TCA

Field Values (select options)

A field value is a source of values for a field. For select, radio and checkbox fields the field values become the options; for other types the value marked Is Default pre-fills new records.

Field Values — titled static options (e.g. Option 1–3)

Static Value — fixed text. Write Label|value to show a label but store a different value (for example Red|red); without | label and value are the same.
Database Value — rows from a table: choose Table Content, Column Name and an optional Where Clause; the Value Content is Fluid, rendered once per row, so you can combine columns into a label.
TypoScript — the result of a TypoScript object, useful when options depend on site configuration.
Values of all records — values already used in existing records of this field.

Two switches refine each value:

Option	Effect
Is Default	This value is pre-selected / pre-filled when an editor creates a new record.
Pretends to be an empty value	The option is shown with its label, but stores an empty value — for a “Please choose” entry.

Access

Use Hide to take a field out of all record forms without deleting it, or Start / Stop to limit that to a time window. Existing record data stays in the database.

Hide, Start, Stop

Advanced Settings

Cache generated TCA stores the generated form configuration of this field, so TYPO3 does not rebuild it on every request. The cache is refreshed when the field’s type, configuration, variable name or exclude setting changes. If the datatype itself has caching enabled, all its fields are cached anyway.

Advanced Settings — Cache generated TCA

Creating a Datatype

Home

Get Started

AI Extensions

Templates & Themes

TYPO3 Extensions

Create a field

Field types in Core

Main tabs (what they mean)

Field Values (select options)

Access

Advanced Settings

Next

​Create a field

​Field types in Core

​Main tabs (what they mean)

​Field Values (select options)

​Access

​Advanced Settings

​Next

Create a field

Field types in Core

Main tabs (what they mean)

Field Values (select options)

Access

Advanced Settings

Next