Question

Ok, I have really confused myself.

We have this app that concates values and sends them to TA box. I want to determine if the field has a value in it first,

• if it does have a value, add it to TA field
• if it does not have a value/empty, do not add it to the
  TA field,

How do i do this?

I want to use this on the blur event[see code example]. I know I need to use .each(), check length and/or look into each field, see if there is a value, if there is, put in TA field

Could someone show me how to accomplish this please?

jsfiddle >> http://jsfiddle.net/justmelat/6JHRT/

HTML

<form>
    <p>First name: <input type="text" name="firstname" id="firstname" value="Paul"/></p>
    <p>Last name: <input type="text" name="lastname"  id="lastname" value="Ryan" /></p>
<p>Street #: <input type="text" name="street_number"  id="street_number" value="4605"/></p>
<p>Address: <input type="text" name="address" id="address"/></p>
<p>City: <input type="text" name="city" id="city" /></p>
<p>State: <input type="text" name="state" id="state"/><br />

<span id="myzip">Zip:</span> <input type="text" name="zip"  id="zip" />
<br /><br />
<select name="hometype" id="hometype">
<option value="">Select</option>
<option value="SFH">Single Family Home</option>
<option value="Condo">Condo</option>
<option value="Trailer">Trailer</option><br />
</select><br />
<input type="radio" name="ownership" value="own" /> Own
<input type="radio" name="ownership" value="rent" /> Rent
    <hr />
<span id="allInfo">All Info:</span> <textarea id="ta_holdAll" rows="10" cols="30"></textarea><div id="charCnt"></div><br /><br />
    <input type="button" value="Add to Field" id="addField">
</form>​

JQUERY

$(document).ready(function(){

    function combineFields(event) {
      var mytextareaFld = $('#ta_holdAll');
      var fld_1 = $('#firstname').attr('name')+':  '+$('#firstname').val();
      var fld_2 = $('#lastname').attr('name')+':  '+$('#lastname').val();
      var fld_3 = $('#street_number').attr('name')+':  '+$('#street_number').val();
        var hold_all_fields = fld_1 +'\n' + fld_2 +'\n' + fld_3;
      //hold_all_fields.each();
      mytextareaFld.val(fld_1 +'\n' + fld_2 +'\n' + fld_3);
  }

    $('#addField').on('click',combineFields);

    $('#allInfo').on('click',function(event){
        combineFields(event);
        var $mytextareaFld = $('#ta_holdAll');
        var $outPutCount = $("#charCnt");
        var $ofText = " characters of 1000 remaining";
        var val = $mytextareaFld.val();
        var val2 = $outPutCount.text(val.length).append("<strong>"+$ofText+"</strong>");
    });

    $("#firstname,#lastname, #street_number").blur(combineFields);
});

​

Answer 1

Try this — just check if the field exists (has length), and if it doesn’t, use an empty string:

function combineFields(event) {
    var mytextareaFld = $('#ta_holdAll');
    var fld_1 = $('#firstname').val().length ? $('#firstname').attr('name') + ':  ' + $('#firstname').val() + '\n' : '';
    var fld_2 = $('#lastname').val().length ? $('#lastname').attr('name') + ':  ' + $('#lastname').val() + '\n' : '';
    var fld_3 = $('#street_number').val().length ? $('#street_number').attr('name') + ':  ' + $('#street_number').val() + '\n' : '';
    var hold_all_fields = fld_1 + fld_2 + fld_3;
    mytextareaFld.val(hold_all_fields);
}

http://jsfiddle.net/6JHRT/3/

For added usefulness, use jQuery.trim() to wipe out blank spaces:

function combineFields(event) {
    var mytextareaFld = $('#ta_holdAll');
    var fld_1 = $.trim($('#firstname').val()).length ? $('#firstname').attr('name') + ':  ' + $('#firstname').val() + '\n' : '';
    var fld_2 = $.trim($('#lastname').val()).length ? $('#lastname').attr('name') + ':  ' + $('#lastname').val() + '\n' : '';
    var fld_3 = $.trim($('#street_number').val()).length ? $('#street_number').attr('name') + ':  ' + $('#street_number').val() + '\n' : '';
    var hold_all_fields = fld_1 + fld_2 + fld_3;
    mytextareaFld.val(hold_all_fields);
}

http://jsfiddle.net/6JHRT/4/