Meta UI presets
Meta UI Presets provide a structured and validated way to manage metadata in the Crystallize Admin UI. Instead of relying on free-form key/value fields, presets allow you to define type-safe input components with validation and contextual behavior.
This ensures metadata remains consistent, predictable, and reliable across editors, projects, and tenants.
Overview
Crystallize metadata is intentionally flexible, allowing teams to attach arbitrary data to items, products, orders, and other entities. While powerful, this flexibility can lead to inconsistent or invalid data when values are entered manually.
Meta UI Presets introduce structured UI components for metadata, enforcing rules directly in the Admin UI. By defining presets, you control how metadata is entered, validated, and presented to editors.
Meta UI Presets enable:
- Strongly typed metadata input
- Required and optional field enforcement
- Context-aware and conditional UI behavior
- A more intuitive and consistent editing experience
Meta UI Presets are built on top of existing metadata. They do not change how metadata is stored or processed on the server. Validation is applied only in the Admin UI. The backend does not validate metadata against presets, and presets are not considered during metadata persistence.
Why meta UI presets matter
Without meta UI presets
- Editors can enter inconsistent or incorrectly formatted values
- Required metadata fields may be omitted
- Metadata editing experiences vary across projects and teams
With meta UI presets
- Metadata is entered using structured input types such as booleans, numbers, and select components
- Validation is enforced directly in the Admin UI
- Manual input errors are significantly reduced
- Metadata remains consistent and type-safe across tenants
This is especially important in commerce scenarios where metadata often drives business logic, automation, and third-party integrations.
Preset definition
A Meta UI Preset is a configuration that defines how a metadata field behaves in the Admin UI.
Each preset includes the following properties:
Property | Description |
|---|---|
Meta key name | The label displayed in the Admin UI |
Meta key | The metadata key the preset maps to |
Key type | The data type (Boolean, Number, Text, Select, etc.) |
Validation rules | Constraints such as required fields or value limits |
Scope limitations | Defines which item or entity types the preset applies to |
Presets allow metadata fields to be clearly defined, validated, and reused across relevant entities.
Supported input types / components
Meta UI Presets support a range of common input types for structured metadata.
Type | Description |
|---|---|
Boolean | Checkbox or toggle for true/false values |
Number | Numeric input with optional minimum and maximum validation |
Text | Single-line text input |
Select | Dropdown with predefined options |
Multiselect | Selection of multiple predefined options |
These input types ensure metadata values are entered consistently and correctly.
Using presets in the admin UI
After presets are defined and their scope conditions are met, the Admin UI automatically displays the relevant presets for an item.
- If a preset is required, it is shown automatically
- If multiple presets match an item, editors can add additional presets manually
Data format expectations
Most preset components store metadata as strings, which works transparently in most cases. However, some components expect specific formats:
- Boolean component
Expects"true","false", or an empty value - Multiselect / checkbox components
Expect a stringified array of strings, for example:["morning","noon","afternoon"]
Ensuring metadata follows these formats allows presets to function correctly in the Admin UI.
