This project was bootstrapped with Create Contentful App.

Goal

The goal of this POC was to figure out how to implement conditional fields in Contentful using a custom app.

Setting up a React app for this requires significant overhead and adds unnecessary complexity. Each field needed individual rendering with Contentful’s Forma36 lib, and custom fields were required to individually track values for conditional logic. Manual handling of some input data was also needed.

A universal implementation would be possible with more time, but existing apps in the Contentful Marketplace might be better. Properly showing and hiding fields conditionally (and not just via CSS) would be ideal as the validation logic of the model further complicates things.

My recommendation to avoid a custom Contentful app and instead deal with the fields being visible or explore existing solutions instead.

Available Scripts

In the project directory, you can run:

npm start

Creates or updates your app definition in Contentful, and runs the app in development mode. Open your app to view it in the browser.

The page will reload if you make edits. You will also see any lint errors in the console.

npm run build

Builds the app for production to the build folder. It correctly bundles React in production mode and optimizes the build for the best performance.

The build is minified and the filenames include the hashes. Your app is ready to be deployed!

npm run upload

Uploads the build folder to contentful and creates a bundle that is automatically activated. The command guides you through the deployment process and asks for all required arguments. Read here for more information about the deployment process.

npm run upload-ci

Similar to npm run upload it will upload your app to contentful and activate it. The only difference is that with this command all required arguments are read from the environment variables, for example when you add the upload command to your CI pipeline.

For this command to work, the following environment variables must be set:

• CONTENTFUL_ORG_ID - The ID of your organization
• CONTENTFUL_APP_DEF_ID - The ID of the app to which to add the bundle
• CONTENTFUL_ACCESS_TOKEN - A personal access token

Libraries to use

To make your app look and feel like Contentful use the following libraries:

• Forma 36 – Contentful's design system
• Contentful Field Editors – Contentful's field editor React components

Using the contentful-management SDK

In the default create contentful app output, a contentful management client is passed into each location. This can be used to interact with Contentful's management API. For example

  // Use the client
  cma.locale.getMany({}).then((locales) => console.log(locales))

Visit the contentful-management documentation to find out more.

Learn More

Read more and check out the video on how to use the CLI.

Create Contentful App uses Create React App. You can learn more in the Create React App documentation and how to further customize your app.