Trying to programmatically alter the id of an exposed filter in views
I think you might be using the wrong tool for the job. It sounds like this is a theming problem, not a views data structure problem (which would use something like hook_views_pre_view().

You can override the template views-exposed-form.tpl.php to override the markup of the exposed form &amp; the preprocess function template_preprocess_views_exposed_form() to override the markup form widgets:

function MYTHEME_preprocess_views_exposed_form(&amp;$vars, $hook) {
  // @TODO: alter markup of $vars['widgets']['filter-MYFILTER']-&gt;widget.
}


Alternatively, the views UI provides a means to change the id element by changing the Filter identifier underneath the More fieldset which also changes the URL query parameter used as well.