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Next generation forms in javascript

Project description

==============================
The gocept.jsform distribution
==============================

JavaScript library for simple creation of forms in your clients browser. It
just needs a JSON datastructure and creates a form with auto saving fields
from it.

Uses *knockout* for data-binding, *json-template* for templating and *jquery*
for DOM manipulation and ajax calls.


Requirements
============

If you have a server using *fanstatic* to include resources, just do::

from gocept.jsform import jsform
jsform.need()

This will require all needed resources like *jquery*, *knockout*,
*json-template*, widgets and the code to setup and run *gocept.jsform* itself.

Without fanstatic, you should include the following resources by hand:

* *ko.mapping.js*
* *helpers.js*
* *jsform.js*

You can find them in the ``resources`` directory in this package. Also, there
are some widget templates there, named ``gocept_jsform_templates_*.pt``.
You'll have to include those you need as scripts of type ``text/html`` with an
appropriate id, for example::

<script type="text/html" id="gocept_jsform_templates_form">
<form method="POST" action="{action}" id="{form_id}">
</form>
</script>

where the lines between the ``script`` tags are the content of the respective
template file.


Usage
=====

All you need to start creating forms is::

<div id="replace_this_with_my_form"></div>

<script type="text/javascript">
var my_form = new gocept.jsform.Form('replace_this_with_my_form');
my_form.load('/form_data.json');
</script>

This will inject the form in the container with the id
``replace_this_with_my_form``, load the form data via *ajax* from the url
``form_data.json`` and create input fields according to the content of
``form_data.json``.

``form.load()`` accepts javascript objects as data or a url (like in the
example above). It then guesses, which field widget to load by means of the
datatype of your field::

my_form.load(
{firstName: '', // will result in a input field with type="text"
title: [{id: 'mr', value: 'Mister'},
{id: 'mrs', value: 'Miss', selected: true}], // will result in a select box
needs_glasses: false}); // will result in a checkbox

*gocept.jsform* comes with basic templates for these three use cases. Of cource
you can provide your own templates for either the form or the fields itself.
Please refer to the customization section for further information.


Tests
=====

The tests are written in *jasmine* and run using selenium webdriver.


Customization
=============

There are various options which can be passed to customize the HTML output and
the behaviour of *gocept.jsform*.


Providing a save url for the server
-----------------------------------

The great thing about *gocept.jsform* is, that it automatically pushes changes
in your form fields to the server. For that to work you need to specify a url
where *gocept.jsform* should propagate changes to::

var form = new gocept.jsform.Form('my_form', {save_url: '/save.json'});

On every change, the following information is pushed to that url:

* ``id``: the name of the field (e.g. *firstname*)
* ``value``: the new value for that field (e.g. *Bob*)

The server should now validate the given data. If saving went fine, it must
return ``{status: 'success'}``, if there was a (validation-) error, it must
return e.g. ``{status: 'error', msg: 'Not a valid email address'}``. The error
will then be displayed next to the widget.


Customizing the form template
-----------------------------

The default behaviour is to simply append every new field in the form tag. If
you would like to customize the order of your fields or just need another
boilerplate for you form, you can use a custom form template with containers
for all or just some of the fields::

var template = new jsontemplate.Template(
['<form method="POST" action="{action}" id="{form_id}">',
'<table><tr><td class="firstname"><span id="firstname" /></td>',
'<td class="lastname"><span id="lastname" /></td></tr></table>',
'</form>'].join(''),
{default_formatter: 'html'});

var form = new gocept.jsform.Form('my_form', {form_template: template});
form.load({firstname: 'Max', lastname: 'Mustermann'});

This will replace the ``span`` containers with id ``firstname`` and
``lastname`` with the appropriate ``input`` fields.


Customizing field widgets
-------------------------

You can either customize widgets by their type (e.g. all fields rendered for
strings) or customize single widgets by their name.

Customization by field type
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

You can overwrite the default templates by providing your own templates in the
options dict passed during form initialization::

var form = new gocept.jsform.Form(
'my_form', {string_template: my_input_template,
object_template: my_select_template,
boolean_template: my_checkbox_template});

For every string data, your input template would be rendered instead of the
default input text field. Same for lists and boolean values.

Customization by field name
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Imagine you want checkboxes instead of a select field::

var template = new jsontemplate.Template(
['<div class="title">Titel:',
'{.repeated section value}',
' <div>',
' <input type="radio" name="{name}" value="{id}" class="{id}"',
' data-bind="checked: {name}" /> {value}',
' </div>',
'{.end}',
'</div>'].join(''), {default_formatter: 'html'});

var form = new gocept.jsform.Form('my_form');
form.load({title: [{id: 'mr', value: 'Mr.'},
{id: 'mrs', value: 'Mrs.'}]},
{title: {template: template}});

You can pass the *load* method a JS object containing customizations for each
field. One of these customization options is template, which results in
rendering two checkboxes instead of the default select box in the above
example.

You can also specify a label or other options for the fields::

var template = new jsontemplate.Template(
['{label}: <input type="text" name="{name}" value="{default}"',
' data-bind="value: {name}" {readonly} />'].join(''),
{default_formatter: 'html', undefined_str: ''});

var form = new gocept.jsform.Form('my_form');
form.load({firstname: 'Sebastian'},
{firstname: {template: template,
label: 'First name',
default: 'Max'}});

.. image:: https://builds.gocept.com/job/gocept.jsform/badge/icon
:target: https://builds.gocept.com/job/gocept.jsform/


========================
Developing gocept.jsform
========================

:Author:
`Sebastian Wehrmann <http://gocept.com/>`_ <sw@gocept.com>
`Maik Derstappen <http://derico.de/>`_ <md@derico.de>

:Online documentation:
http://pythonhosted.org/gocept.jsform/

:PyPI page:
http://pypi.python.org/pypi/gocept.jsform/

:Issues:
https://bitbucket.org/gocept/gocept.jsform/issues

:Source code:
https://bitbucket.org/gocept/gocept.jsform/

:Current change log:
https://bitbucket.org/gocept/gocept.jsform/raw-file/tip/CHANGES.txt


============================
Change log for gocept.jsform
============================

1.2.0 (2014-10-22)
==================

- Improved handling of object and multiselect fields such that the values
loaded are actually just the values, with select options being passed as the
``source`` field option. This is an important backwards-incompatible change.

- Added a field option ``multiple`` that, when truthy and the selected type is
object, makes the field be considered a list of objects. When using the
default templates, this turns a select widget into multi-select.

- When loading values into a form via the JS API rather than via HTTP as JSON,
assume full objects, not tokens to be contained.

- Add textarea template.

- Added the concept of required fields which cannot be saved when blank.

- More Bootstrap 3 compatibility.

- Simplified HTML mark-up of form elements.

- Removed the package metadata's implicit dependency on the test extra.

- Use `classy <https://github.com/mitsuhiko/classy>`_ classes.

- Consider HTTP error responses unrecoverable errors. This distinguishes them
from time-outs and connection errors.

- Add ``loaded`` property on Form, a Deferred so clients can check whether
loading has finished. This is mainly helpful for tests, e.g.::
selenium.waitForEval(
'$("#jsform").data("form") && '
'$("#jsform").data("form").loaded.state()', '"resolved"')

- Expose the ``get_template`` function for reuse outside the Form class.

- If an empty string is specified as ``form_template``, just use the existing
form DOM node without applying any template.

- Add jQuery plugin ``$().jsform_submit_button(callback)`` that sets up a
button that saves the jsform and calls a function after the successful save.


1.1 (2014-04-07)
================

- Propagate save message of server using ``after-save`` trigger.

- Added infrastructure for displaying and clearing status messages, use it for
announcing HTTP faults during AJAX calls.

- Display and clear field-related errors both at the widget and via status
messages.

- When saving data, count anything but a JSON response with a status value of
"success" as an error. Give up completely after an incomprehensible
response, retry on connection errors either after the next successful server
access for any other field, or when requested by a call to ``retry()``.

- Added an API method ``save_remaining()`` that causes any fields to be saved
that have not been modified so far. While this should only save the initial
values loaded from the server, it is useful to apply the same validation and
error handling to all fields.

- Added an API method ``when_saved(retry)`` that returns a promise that
aggregates any pending and completed save calls, either propagating the
retry behaviour of single fields (the default) or failing on server errors.

- Provide a visual clue and status message while saving a field.

- Some refactoring to improve code readability.

- Made code pass jshint check.

- Made default and currently not overrideable status message behaviour
compatible to bootstrap 3

- Properly unsubscribe change handlers when updating fields.

- Added simple localization.


1.0 (2013-12-13)
================

- Remove console calls as they are not understood by all browsers.


0.8 (2013-12-10)
================

- Fixed: jsform did not render in IE8 if form template started with line break.


0.7 (2013-12-03)
================

- Add ability to send a CSRF token with every request. This token must be
available via the id `csrf_token` (can be customized) in the DOM.

- Added minified versions of javascript resources.


0.6 (2013-09-06)
================

- Bugfix: Use ``indexOf`` instead of ``startsWith``, which is not available on
all browsers.


0.5 (2013-09-06)
================

- Declare ``for`` attribute on form labels.

- Store "save on change" subscriptions so they can be cancelled.

- Ignore ``null`` values for data fields. (#1)


0.4 (2013-08-27)
================

- Made it possible to define templates as template files on file system.


0.3 (2013-08-27)
================

- Add events ``after-load`` and ``after-save``.

- Fix ``JSON`` serialization to be able to handle Knockout observables.

- Added ``reload`` functionality to the form class.


0.2 (2013-08-26)
================

- Made it possible to preselect values in arrays when the form is rendered.

- Changed form submit behaviour:

- Default submit type is not ``POST`` instead of ``GET``. (Change it with the
``save_type`` option)

- Data is now submitted as ``JSON`` type.


0.1 (2013-08-17)
================

initial release

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