I am facing an issue with the latest jQuery combobox. The use case is as described below.
- I type in something into the combobox, which brings up all matching options and I select one of the matching options. This sets the combobox text to the selected item’s text.
- Now, I focus out of the combobox, and then come back to combobox and delete all the text, but not select another item. The combobox is showing blank text even though the selected value is there. This appears not very intuitive to me as a blank text should mean no option is selected.
A video illustrating this problem can be found here: http://screencast.com/t/QLUtZYsL2
This is what I am aiming for in above use case:
I want to make sure that in case the user somehow deletes the combobox text, then on leaving the combobox, the text gets restored to selected item’s text.
Sample html page with jQuery combobox is as below.
<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>jQuery UI Example Page</title>
<link type="text/css" href="css/cupertino/jquery-ui-1.8.21.custom.css" rel="stylesheet" />
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/jquery-1.7.2.min.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/jquery-ui-1.8.21.custom.min.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://jzaefferer.github.com/jquery-validation/jquery.validate.js"></script>
<style>
.ui-combobox {
position: relative;
display: inline-block;
}
.ui-combobox-toggle {
position: absolute;
top: 0;
bottom: 0;
margin-left: -1px;
padding: 0;
/* adjust styles for IE 6/7 */
*height: 1.7em;
*top: 0.1em;
}
.ui-combobox-input {
margin: 0;
padding: 0.3em;
}
</style>
<script type="text/javascript">
(function ($) {
$.widget("ui.combobox", {
_create: function () {
var input,
self = this,
select = this.element.hide(),
selected = select.children(":selected"),
value = selected.val() ? selected.text() : "",
wrapper = this.wrapper = $("<span>")
.addClass("ui-combobox")
.insertAfter(select);
input = $("<input>")
.appendTo(wrapper)
.val(value)
.addClass("ui-state-default ui-combobox-input")
.autocomplete({
delay: 0,
minLength: 0,
source: function (request, response) {
var matcher = new RegExp($.ui.autocomplete.escapeRegex(request.term), "i");
response(select.children("option").map(function () {
var text = $(this).text();
if (this.value && (!request.term || matcher.test(text)))
return {
label: text.replace(
new RegExp(
"(?![^&;]+;)(?!<[^<>]*)(" +
$.ui.autocomplete.escapeRegex(request.term) +
")(?![^<>]*>)(?![^&;]+;)", "gi"
), "<strong>$1</strong>"),
value: text,
option: this
};
}));
},
select: function (event, ui) {
ui.item.option.selected = true;
self._trigger("selected", event, {
item: ui.item.option
});
},
change: function (event, ui) {
if (!ui.item) {
var matcher = new RegExp("^" + $.ui.autocomplete.escapeRegex($(this).val()) + "$", "i"),
valid = false;
select.children("option").each(function () {
if ($(this).text().match(matcher)) {
this.selected = valid = true;
return false;
}
});
if (!valid) {
// remove invalid value, as it didn't match anything
$(this).val("");
select.val("");
input.data("autocomplete").term = "";
return false;
}
}
}
})
.addClass("ui-widget ui-widget-content ui-corner-left");
input.data("autocomplete")._renderItem = function (ul, item) {
return $("<li></li>")
.data("item.autocomplete", item)
.append("<a>" + item.label + "</a>")
.appendTo(ul);
};
$("<a>")
.attr("tabIndex", -1)
.attr("title", "Show All Items")
.appendTo(wrapper)
.button({
icons: {
primary: "ui-icon-triangle-1-s"
},
text: false
})
.removeClass("ui-corner-all")
.addClass("ui-corner-right ui-combobox-toggle")
.click(function () {
// close if already visible
if (input.autocomplete("widget").is(":visible")) {
input.autocomplete("close");
return;
}
// work around a bug (likely same cause as #5265)
$(this).blur();
// pass empty string as value to search for, displaying all results
input.autocomplete("search", "");
input.focus();
});
},
destroy: function () {
this.wrapper.remove();
this.element.show();
$.Widget.prototype.destroy.call(this);
}
});
})(jQuery);
$(function () {
$("#combobox").combobox();
$("#toggle").click(function () {
$("#combobox").toggle();
});
});
</script>
</head>
<body>
<div class="demo">
<div class="ui-widget">
<label>
Your preferred programming language:
</label>
<select id="combobox">
<option value="">Select one...</option>
<option value="ActionScript">ActionScript</option>
<option value="AppleScript">AppleScript</option>
<option value="Asp">Asp</option>
<option value="BASIC">BASIC</option>
<option value="C">C</option>
<option value="C++">C++</option>
<option value="Clojure">Clojure</option>
<option value="COBOL">COBOL</option>
<option value="ColdFusion">ColdFusion</option>
<option value="Erlang">Erlang</option>
<option value="Fortran">Fortran</option>
<option value="Groovy">Groovy</option>
<option value="Haskell">Haskell</option>
<option value="Java">Java</option>
<option value="JavaScript">JavaScript</option>
<option value="Lisp">Lisp</option>
<option value="Perl">Perl</option>
<option value="PHP">PHP</option>
<option value="Python">Python</option>
<option value="Ruby">Ruby</option>
<option value="Scala">Scala</option>
<option value="Scheme">Scheme</option>
</select>
</div>
<button id="toggle">
Show underlying select</button>
</div>
<!-- End demo -->
</body>
</html>
I finally found a way out, but let me start with some constructive criticism. jQuery is like ROCKET SCIENCE. LOL. jQuery doesn’t have an intuitive event model, and in this area javascript defeats jQuery. I spent many hours trying to fire the change or blur or focusout event on jQuery combobox, but without any success. So, the best solution to solve the problem I have mentioned in my initial post, is to follow either of the 2 approaches given below.
Either attach the blur or focusout event to the parent of jQuery combobox. For example, a div could be the parent as it has the jQuery combobox within it. Look at code below.
Or attach the blur or focusout event to the input element of the jQuery combobox. Look at code below.
If you are selecting the first option by default to prompt the user, then code for attaching focusout event would be changed to as below. An else part is added to the logic of the event, in which the text of input element is set to the text of the first option.