Question

I have two datatables that I am merging together using Javascript and jQuery. I want to POST this data to a Rails controller action, but the results of the action will need to be displayed in another view, and I am a little tired of figuring out how to do a redirect to another action from an AJAX POST (It just refuses to display).

So now my question is, how can I change this code to actually post and do a redirect to another action?

My original code is:

submithash = {}
submithash['standard_id'] = $("#app_standard_id").val()
submithash['apps'] = apps

hash = { type: "POST", url: "create_all", data: submithash }
$.ajax(hash)

This worked GREAT in that it submitted correctly to my Rails controller action, but of course there does not appear to be a clean way to redirect from an Ajax submission and actually physically display an actual page to a user.

I tried:

$form = $("<form>").attr("method", "post").attr("action", "create_all")
$("<input type='hidden'>").attr("name", "standard_id").attr("value", $("#app_standard_id").val()).appendTo($form)
$("<input type='hidden'>").attr("name", "apps").attr("value", apps).appendTo($form)
$form.submit

but of course that refuses to work. It doesn’t even do anything, which is a little odd.

Answer 1

I ended up using this jQuery plugin:

(function($) {
$.extend({
    getGo: function(url, params) {
        document.location = url + '?' + $.param(params);
    },
    postGo: function(url, params) {
        var $form = $("<form>")
            .attr("method", "post")
            .attr("action", url);

        $.each(params, function(name, value) {
            $("<input type='hidden'>")
                .attr("name", name)
                .attr("value", value)
                .appendTo($form);
        });
        $form.appendTo("body");
        $form.submit();
    }
});
})(jQuery);

It builds a form on the fly with whatever you pass it, then appends it to the document. Then it does a regular POST (or GET, depending on what you call).