Field Descriptions Extended

A ProcessWire module that extends field descriptions in the admin by splitting them into a short visible part and a longer hidden part revealed by clicking an inline icon. Field descriptions can also be sourced from a dedicated ProcessWire page, enabling rich content (images, links, Hanna Codes, etc.) via the full content editor.

Requires: ProcessWire >= 2.8.0 · PHP >= 7.0

Features

• Inline toggle trigger — a small icon sits at the end of the visible description text, opening and closing the extended content in place
• Separate Lucide icons for inline-toggle descriptions (ⓘ) vs. page-content panel descriptions
• UIKit tooltip on all trigger icons (instant hover label, no OS-delay)
• Page content descriptions open in a UIKit offcanvas panel (AdminThemeUikit) or a Magnific Popup modal (legacy themes)
• Optional SimpleMDE editor on the field description textarea
• Markdown support in field descriptions (bold, italic, lists, headings, external links)

Inline Toggle Descriptions

How it works

Add five dashes (-----) anywhere in a field's Description field. Everything above the delimiter is shown immediately; everything below is hidden. An ⓘ icon appears inline at the end of the visible text. Clicking it reveals the extended content and the icon changes to ✕. Clicking again collapses the content and restores the ⓘ icon.

Short description shown to the editor.
-----
This longer content is hidden until the icon is clicked.

It supports **markdown**, including lists, headings, and [external links](https://example.com).

Notes

• Both sections support full Markdown. External links are automatically decorated with target="_blank", rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow", and an external-link icon.
• The toggle is suppressed on FieldtypePage fields and InputfieldRadios to avoid layout conflicts.
• AJAX-collapsed fields (collapsedYesAjax, collapsedBlankAjax) are handled correctly — the description is preserved and processed once the field renders.

Page Content Descriptions

Instead of writing a description directly in the field settings, you can point to a ProcessWire page whose content becomes the description. This enables rich content: images, links, Hanna Codes, formatted text via the full CMS editor.

Page content only activates when the field's own description is blank. It is not context-sensitive — the same content appears on every template where the description is blank.

UIKit theme — offcanvas panel

On AdminThemeUikit (all current PW admin themes), clicking the trigger icon slides open a UIKit offcanvas panel on the right side of the screen, 600 px wide, containing the page's content. Superusers see a pencil icon linking directly to the page's edit screen.

Legacy themes — Magnific Popup modal

On older themes without UIKit, the trigger opens the page content in a Magnific Popup lightbox modal. This path requires the JqueryMagnific module to be available (included with ProcessWire).

Setup (both methods)

In the module config (Admin → Modules → Field Descriptions Extended):

1. Check Enable Page Content Descriptions.
2. Set Content Field to the textarea or CKEditor field on your description pages that holds the content (e.g. body). This is required for both methods.

Method A — Per-field page selection (recommended)

No extra modules required. In the field editor (Admin → Fields → your field → Basics tab), a Description Page tree selector appears below the Description field. Browse and select any page whose Content Field holds the description.

• The field editor shows a notice on the Description textarea confirming the page is linked. If the Description field has text it overrides the page content; the notice turns red to flag this.
• Only pages on templates that contain the configured Content Field appear in the tree.
• Set Description Page Branch in the module config to limit the tree to a specific branch (e.g. a Settings or Help section), keeping the selector tidy on large sites.

Method B — FieldtypeFields (bulk setup / backwards compatibility)

Use this method to map many fields at once via a dedicated template, or if you have an existing setup using this approach.

1. Install FieldtypeFields — lets a page reference another PW field by name.
2. Create a field using FieldtypeFields, e.g. field_select.
3. Create a template for description pages (e.g. field-description) and add field_select plus your content field.
4. Create pages under a settings branch using that template. On each page, select the target field and write the description content.
5. In the module config, set Field Field (legacy) to field_select and Field Description Template (legacy) to your template.

When both methods point to a description for the same field, Method A (per-field) takes precedence.

Optional: split page content with a short intro

Use the ----- delimiter inside page content. The text above the delimiter becomes an inline intro shown alongside the trigger icon; the full content appears in the panel/modal.

SimpleMDE Integration

If InputfieldSimpleMDE is installed, enable the Enable SimpleMDE option in the module config. This attaches a Markdown editor to the field description textarea in field settings, making it easier to write and preview formatted descriptions.

When using SimpleMDE, the toolbar's Insert Horizontal Rule button (—) inserts the five-dash delimiter automatically.

Icons

Trigger icons are Lucide SVGs stored in the icons/ subdirectory of this module. They use stroke="currentColor" so they inherit the surrounding link colour.

To swap an icon, replace the corresponding SVG file. Any standard Lucide icon (or any viewBox="0 0 24 24" SVG) will work. Icon size and alignment are controlled entirely by CSS (.fde-icon in fieldStyles.css).

Additional Resources

• Modules Directory
• GitHub Repository
• ProcessWire Forum Thread