T3DataStructure, the format behind FlexForms

TYPO3’s T3DataStructure is an XML format for defining hierarchical data.

On its own it serves only as a backbone. Applications such as FlexForms build upon it with their own configuration.

It can be used in other contexts, but in TYPO3 it is almost always used for FlexForms. This documentation describes the general XML format.

Key facts:

• Defined in XML with a root <T3DataStructure> tag.
• Compatible with GeneralUtility::xml2array(), mapping directly to a multidimensional PHP array.
• Can be divided into sheets, a one-dimensional categorization whose purpose depends on the application.
• Parsing to a PHP array is done via GeneralUtility::xml2array() (see Parsing T3DataStructure XML).
• “DS” is shorthand for Data Structure.

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