Question

I have a query builder form that allows a user to enter values into fields that once complete allows them to pass the entered values to a search field. Not all the fields have to be completed by the user within the form.

sample of html

<div id="advanceSearchCriteria">
    <div class="searchHeader">Person</div>
    <div class="contentBorders" id="person">
        <div class="searchdiv">
            <span class="smLabel">Last Name</span><br />
            <input type="text" name="lastname" value="" size="15" />
        </div>
        <div class="searchdiv">
            <span class="smLabel">First Name</span><br />
            <input type="text" name="namefirst" value="" size="15" />
        </div>
        <div class="searchdiv">
            <span class="smLabel">Middle Name</span><br />
            <input type="text" name="namemiddle" value="" size="10" />
        </div>
        <div class="searchdiv">
            <span class="smLabel">Suffix</span><br />
            <input type="text" name="suffix1" value="" size="5" />
        </div>
</div>
</div>

Within jQuery I created a function to pass the values of the fields to an asp.net textbox control

    function setAdvancedSearchString() {
    checkField();
    var txt = $("input[name='tbsearchterm']");
    var fields = $("#advanceSearchCriteria :input").serializeArray();
    jQuery.each(fields, function (i, field) {
        if (txt) {
            txt.val(txt.val() + field.name + ": " field.value + " ");
        }
    });
}

With the current approach this returns all input fields and their values. What I would like to have is only fields that contain a value entered by the user to be serialized and passed to search term. For example if the user only entered last name I would only like that fieldname and value returned (lastname: james)

I’ve tried to test for null on the var fields but my syntax is wrong or I am testing for null in the wrong location

So far I have tried the following:

var fields = if($("#advanceSearchCriteria :input") != null) 
{
$("#advanceSearchCriteria :input").serializeArray();
}

but this seems to cause a compile error.

Can anyone provide some help on how to only serialize and return fieldnames and values that have a value entered?

Thank you,

Answer 1

You can use attribute not equals selector to select fields with text and you don’t have to use .serializeArray(). Check this (example):

function setAdvancedSearchString() {
   checkField();
   var txt = $("input[name='tbsearchterm']");
    $("#advanceSearchCriteria :input[value!='']").each(function(i, field) {
        txt.val(function(index, value) {
            return [value, field.name, ": ", field.value, " "].join('');
        });
    });
}

Extra
I used an anonymous function for setting the value of txt and used array/join for string concatenation.