Problems with Bootstrap 4 formatting hack in helper.FormHelper

In Cookiecutter Django we’ve discovered that when using Bootstrap 4, there is a bit of code in Crispy Forms which is causing us a lot of problems. This code is caused us serious problems with all our forms:

class FormHelper(DynamicLayoutHandler):
    ...
    if template_pack == 'bootstrap4':
        grid_colum_matcher = re.compile('\w*col-(xs|sm|md|lg|xl)-\d+\w*')
        using_grid_layout = (grid_colum_matcher.match(self.label_class) or
                             grid_colum_matcher.match(self.field_class))
        if using_grid_layout:
            items['using_grid_layout'] = True

Our issues with the above approach:

1. Fragile: Hardcoding like this assumes Bootstrap 4’s API doesn’t change (it does)
2. Unforgiving: Doesn’t allow for any variation in template design
3. Really Unforgiving: No way to override this behavior
4. Undocumented: No mention in the documentation, or it’s too hard for me to find

Right now our solution is to implement our own hack to get around this behavior, which is not ideal and something we want to fix.

[yunti]

Presumably you could set wrapper_class at the helper level rather than at every field in layout to keep things DRY?

[carltongibson]

OK. Awesome.

I think adjusting so it’s right and then adding a note to the Change Log so people know how to update is the best approach.

(Bootstrap 4 support is beta at least as long as Bootstrap 4 is, and probably until we’ve had some feedback from real world usage to go with that too.)