Yii2 Kartik SideNav How to set 'active' option - yii2

Question

I have Kartik's SideNav (http://demos.krajee.com/sidenav-demo/profile/default) working properly by setting the url's to controller/action, but don't understand how to set the active option so that the menu stays open and the correct menu item stays selected.
I've tried setting 'active'=> 'controller/action' (see below) as well as
'active' => 'controller/action/default#demo' but to no avail. When I do set it as 'employee/employee-dashboard/default#demo' it does keep that one tab highlighted but won't change the others when I do it the same way on those tabs. The original was set to 'active'=> 'home' which I assume is just the action but that didn't work for me either.
$type = SideNav::TYPE_DEFAULT;
$heading = '<i class="glyphicon glyphicon-cog"></i> Employee Menu';
$item = '/employee/employee-dashboard/default#demo';
echo SideNav::widget([
'type' => $type,
'encodeLabels' => false,
'heading' => $heading,
'items' => [
// Important: you need to specify url as 'controller/action',
// not just as 'controller' even if default action is used.
//
// NOTE: The variable `$item` is specific to this demo page that determines
// which menu item will be activated. You need to accordingly define and pass
// such variables to your view object to handle such logic in your application
// (to determine the active status).
//
['label' => 'Dashboard', 'icon' => 'home', 'url' => Url::to(['/employee/employee-dashboard', 'type'=>$type]), 'active' => ($item == '/employee/employee-dashboard/default#demo')]
['label' => 'Paycheck Info', 'icon' => 'book', 'items' => [
['label' => '<span class="pull-right badge">10</span> W2 Forms', 'url' => Url::to(['/employee/w2-form', 'type'=>$type]), 'active' => ($item == 'w2-form')],

Answer 1

'active'=>($item == 'about')
where
$item = Yii::$app->controller->action->id;
This is how i used
<?php
$item = Yii::$app->controller->action->id;
echo SideNav::widget([
'type' => SideNav::TYPE_DEFAULT,
'heading' => 'Options',
'items' => [
[
'url' => Yii::$app->homeUrl,
'label' => 'Home',
'icon' => 'home',
'active'=>($item == 'index')
],
[
'label' => 'Help',
'icon' => 'question-sign',
'items' => [
['label' => 'About', 'icon'=>'info-sign', 'url'=>Yii::$app->homeUrl.'site/about', 'active'=>($item == 'about')],
['label' => 'Contact', 'icon'=>'phone', 'url'=>Yii::$app->homeUrl.'site/contact', 'active'=>($item == 'contact')],
],
],
],
]);
?>

Answer 2

One solution I found if you want to set the active menu item on a per page basis is:
Create a separate view file (e.g. sidemenu.php) with just the SideNav widget, which accepts a parameter called 'currentPage'.
echo SideNav::widget([
'type' => SideNav::TYPE_DEFAULT,
'heading' => 'Options',
'items' => [
[
'url' => Url::toRoute('/site/index'),
'label' => 'Home',
'icon' => 'file',
'active'=>($currentPage == 'home'),
],
[
'url' => Url::toRoute('/site/about'),
'label' => 'About',
'icon' => 'file',
'active'=>($currentPage == 'about'),
],
Then in the view page where you are rendering the menu, set the currentPage property -- for example:
echo $this->render('sidemenu', ['currentPage'=>'home']);
or
echo $this->render('sidemenu', ['currentPage'=>'about']);