Unexpected field in POST data with a multiple choice fieldName

Question

What I have

foreach ($statuses as $key=>$value) {
    echo $this->Form->control('Filter.statuses['.$key.']', array(
        'type' => 'checkbox',
        'value' => $key,
        'label' => $value,
    ));
}

What I'm getting

Unexpected field 'Filter.statuses[1' in POST data

Unexpected field 'Filter.statuses[2' in POST data

Unexpected field 'Filter.statuses[3' in POST data ...

What I have tried

$this->Form->unlockField('Filter.statuses');
$this->Form->unlockField('Filter.statuses[]');

If I remove the Filter. prefix, the errors are gone and I no longer need the unlockField() call.

References

• In cakephp 3 I got error Unexpected field in POST data
• Unexpected field 'g-recaptcha-response' in POST data on CakePHP 3
• https://book.cakephp.org/3.0/en/controllers/components/security.html

Answer 1

You're not supposed to use brackets in the field name, the form helper doesn't support that. If you ever need an unconventional name that the form helper doesn't support, then use the name option to specify it, while passing a compatible field name to the control() method's first argument.

Use the dot syntax all the way:

echo $this->Form->control("Filter.statuses.$key", /* ... */);

That way the form helper will be able to secure the fields, and create proper HTML name attribute values like Filter[statuses][1].