Repeater field type for structured repeating data

[mvanhorn]

Collections often need fields that repeat -- a gallery with multiple images, an FAQ with question/answer pairs, a team page with member cards. Currently, the only option is to create a separate collection and use references, which adds unnecessary complexity for simple repeating structures.

Use cases

• FAQ items (question + answer pairs)
• Gallery images (image + caption + alt text)
• Pricing tiers (name + price + features list)
• Social media links (platform + URL pairs)
• Timeline events (date + title + description)

Proposed behavior

• New FieldType: repeater
• Defines a set of sub-fields that repeat as an ordered list
• Stored as a JSON array of objects
• Admin UI: add/remove/reorder rows, each row has the defined sub-fields
• Min/max row count validation
• TypeScript types generated as arrays of typed objects

Why not references?

References work for true one-to-many relationships (posts -> comments). But for tightly-coupled data that only exists within its parent (FAQ items on a page), repeaters are simpler to author, query, and render. You don't need a separate "FAQ Items" collection just to have Q&A pairs on a single page.

Existing work

I have a working implementation in #111 that was opened before this Discussion. Happy to adjust the approach based on feedback here.

[lightyearsagency]

Bumping this one too.
You're writing my wishlist for me Mvanhorn :)

[mvanhorn]

Thanks @lightyearsagency! Glad this lines up with what you need. The PR (#111) is approved and waiting for maintainer merge, so hopefully this lands soon. If you get a chance to test via the pkg-pr-new preview, feedback on the UX would be really helpful.

[lightyearsagency]

Fantastic. Thanks mvanhorn.
Sorry for the delay in coming back to you.

Did you want feedback here, or in a different thread?

I'll add here anyway.

Setup UI is solid, as expected! Thanks.

Setup:
A lot of the time clients want a Rich-text field in these repeaters. Should one be added as an input option?

Editing:
Looks to be a bubbling issue. Typing content into the short text field looses focus after key press. This was happening for the SEO fields as well in a separate patch. I think the saving system is triggering on every change, and booting the user focus out, instead of a save timeout after input.

Rearranging items opens all. Re-arranging closed items causes them to re-open.