Question

I’m new to the play framework and I have a question about implementing ajax.
So I have implemented a search page – which has a form on it that sends back a date range.
And it is all working.
But I wanted to get it to work with ajax so I have a few questions.
Do I need to create a new Form Type in the controller? Like I have done previously? Or can I get the data out manually?

So currently in my html i have the following form:

<form action="@routes.History.search()" class="pull-right" id="formHistory">
            MinDate: <input id="mindate" name="mindate" class="input-small" type="text">
            MaxDate: <input id="maxdate" name="maxdate" class="input-small" type="text">
            <button class="btn" type="submit">Search</button>
        </form>

and here is my javascript:

$('#formHistory').submit( function(evt) {
            $('#errors').show();
            $.ajax({
                type: 'POST',
                url:  jQuery("#formHistory").attr("action"),
                data: jQuery("#formHistory").serialize(),
                dataType: "json",
                success: function(data) {
                    alert('History Search');
                    $("tableHistory").find("tr:gt(0)").remove();
                    alert(data.id[0].source);
                },
                error: function(data) {
                    $('#errors').shows();
                    alert('History search failed');
                }
            });
            return false;
        });

and in my history.java file i need to get the json information out. Previously i have done this by using

Form<Login> loginForm = form(Login.class).bindFromRequest();

But i do not have an object with min and max date can i just get the json information out manually?

public static Result search() {
//So here I would like to get the form information 
}

The next question would be how to do this in reverse? Once i have gotten the min and max date, gotten the information out of the database i need to send back a response. Should I send back a json response with a list of the data and how do handle this in javascript? or do I create html on the server and send this as a string and append this in the apporpriate element?
Or the other option i have seen in some demos is creating a view and passing that back and just rendering the smaller view

Answer 1

I ended up leaving it and not using ajax.
But if I was going to use it I would use an ajax request:

jsRoutes.controllers.Application.ajaxCommand().ajax({
    data : {
        "var1" : "a",
        "var2" : "b"
    },
    success : function(data) {
        // .. DO something
    },
    error : function(data) {
        // .. DO something
    }
});

and use DynamicForm on the server side:
Something like:

public static Result ajaxCommand() {
    DynamicForm data = form().bindFromRequest();
    String var1 = data.get("var1");
    String var2 = data.get("var2");
    // .. Do something
}