ZF: Form array field - how to display values in the view correctly - zend-framework

Question

Let's say I have a Zend_Form form that has a few text fields, e.g:
$form = new Zend_Form();
$form->addElement('text', 'name', array(
'required' => true,
'isArray' => true,
'filters' => array( /* ... */ ),
'validators' => array( /* ... */ ),
));
$form->addElement('text', 'surname', array(
'required' => true,
'isArray' => true,
'filters' => array( /* ... */ ),
'validators' => array( /* ... */ ),
));
After rendering it I have following HTML markup (simplified):
<div id="people">
<div class="person">
<input type="text" name="name[]" />
<input type="text" name="surname[]" />
</div>
</div>
Now I want to have the ability to add as many people as I want. I create a "+" button that in Javascript appends next div.person to the container. Before I submit the form, I have for example 5 names and 5 surnames, posted to the server as arrays. Everything is fine unless somebody puts the value in the field that does not validate. Then the whole form validation fails and when I want to display the form again (with errors) I see the PHP Warning:
htmlspecialchars() expects parameter 1 to be string, array given
Which is more or less described in ticket: http://framework.zend.com/issues/browse/ZF-8112
However, I came up with a not-very-elegant solution. What I wanted to achieve:
have all fields and values rendered again in the view
have error messages only next to the fields that contained bad values
Here is my solution (view script):
<div id="people">
<?php
$names = $form->name->getValue(); // will have an array here if the form were submitted
$surnames= $form->surname->getValue();
// only if the form were submitted we need to validate fields' values
// and display errors next to them; otherwise when user enter the page
// and render the form for the first time - he would see Required validator
// errors
$needsValidation = is_array($names) || is_array($surnames);
// print empty fields when the form is displayed the first time
if(!is_array($names))$names= array('');
if(!is_array($surnames))$surnames= array('');
// display all fields!
foreach($names as $index => $name):
$surname = $surnames[$index];
// validate value if needed
if($needsValidation){
$form->name->isValid($name);
$form->surname->isValid($surname);
}
?>
<div class="person">
<?=$form->name->setValue($name); // display field with error if did not pass the validation ?>
<?=$form->surname->setValue($surname);?>
</div>
<?php endforeach; ?>
</div>
The code work, but I want to know if there is an appropriate, more comfortable way to do this? I often hit this problem when there is a need for a more dynamic - multivalue forms and have not find better solution for a long time.

Answer 1

Having no better idea, I have created a view helper that handles the logic presented above. It can be found here.
If the helper is available in the view, it can be used in the following way (with the form from the question):
<?=
$this->formArrayElements(
array($form->name, $form->surname),
'partials/name_surname.phtml'
);
?>
The contents of the application/views/partials/name_surname.phtml partial view are:
<div class="person">
<?= $this->name ?>
<?= $this->surname ?>
</div>
The fields are rendered according to the posted form and validation messages are shown only next to the values that failed validation.
The helper's code is far from perfect (I just rewrote the idea from the question) but is easy to use and can be considered as good starting point.