Posts Tagged ‘jQuery’
jQuery Org Chart – a plugin for visualising data in a tree-like structure
jQuery OrgChart is a plugin that allows you to render structures with nested elements in a easy-to-read tree structure. To build the tree all you need is to make a single line call to the plugin and supply the HTML element Id for a nested unordered list element that is representative of the data you’d like to display. Features include:
- Very easy to use given a nested unordered list element.
- Drag-and-drop reorganisation of elements.
- Showing/hiding a particular branch of the tree by clicking on the respective node.
- Nodes can contain any amount of HTML except
<li>and<ul>. - Easy to style.
Expected Markup & Example Usage
All documentation can be found on github.
Demo
You can view a demo of this here.
Sourcecode
Source code with an example is available here.
Salesforce: A better way to work with Visualforce Component Ids and JavaScript
Irregular Expressions
I get very sad when discussing this particular topic. There are a variety of ways of get Visualforce component Ids and using them in JavaScript but all of them keep me awake at night. Srsly. A commenter on one of my posts got me thinking about how we can do this better and I’ve come up with a way that I think is great. Hopefully you’ll agree.
This post means that my older posts here and here are now retired in favour of this method.
If the world was on the brink of nuclear war with no clear path to peace what could you count on to save the day? Regular Expressions of course. If a meteor the size of Pluto was about to crash into Earth and Bruce Willis was too old to land on it and blow it up what could we count on to rid us of the troublesome rock. Yes that’s right, Regular Expressions. I think you can guess where I’m going with this.
jQuery has the ability to understand very simple regular expressions in it’s attribute selectors. The full documentation can be found here.
To solve our particular problem however the code is simple:
<apex:page>
<head>
<style>
a,span{
display:block;
}
</style>
<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4.2/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script>
jQuery(document).ready(function($){
$('#btn').click(function(e){
e.preventDefault();
console.log('The following element was found when looking for an id of \'output1\':');
console.log($('[id$=output1]')); /* Here's where we're grabbing the element. */
});
});
</script>
</head>
<apex:outputText value="She sells seashells by the seashore." id="output1"/>
<apex:outputText value="Peter Piper picked a pack of pickled peppers." id="output2"/>
<a href="" id="btn">Click me.</a>
</apex:page>
The important part here is the selector $(‘[id$=output1]‘) which says, “Find the id value that ends with ‘output1′”. This comes with a warning though! Do not duplicate the Visualforce Id that you give to your elements otherwise this piece of code will find all of them.
When I first wrote this post I used a selector extension library that gives you the full power of JavaScript-based regular expression but Ryan Fritts has rightly shown that the above will deal with 99% of use cases and is simpler. For those of you that need to deal with the extra 1% I’ve implemented a wrapper to regex selector as an example. It does exactly what jQuery is doing above and gives you access to the regex flags as documented here.
Thanks again Ryan!
Client-Side VisualForce Pagination with Pajinate
Pajinated DataTable
Pagination is an essential, and not so easy to implement user interface device that allows the developer to break long lists of items, or one very long item into sub-pages. I love the challenge that pagination brings (who doesn’t really) when developing efficient and reusable server-side code, but this article isn’t about that. Sometimes I need things done quickly, easily, and preferably with as little compromise as possible, and that’s what client-side pagination is all about. Read the rest of this entry »
Pajinate – A jQuery Pagination Plugin
Pajinate is a simple and flexible jQuery plugin that allows you to divide long lists or areas of content into multiple separate pages. Not only is it a simpler alternative to server-side implementations, the time between paginated-page loads is almost nil (up to a reasonable page-size of course).
Pajinate - A pagination plugin the whole family can enjoy!
Read the rest of this entry »
Salesforce Form Validation Enhanced
I have a dream, and in this dream form-validation is not a chore. All the nasty work is done client-side, and we – the developers – control what an error message says and where it says it! Server-side validation?! Pah, I spit in it’s general direction (but only if no ladies are present). I don’t need or want client-server round-trips.. I want speed, I want beauty, I want control; and I think you do too.
Our end goal: A neat, realtime, client-side validation technique for VisualForce.
Using either inputFields, Apex exception handling and/or the ‘required’ attribute in VisualForce, we have a number of mechanisms to deal with form-validation, but if we’re honest with ourselves, they’re the ten-thousands-spoons when all we need is a knife. I know you’ve heard me singing it’s praise from the rooftops, but yet again, jQuery is here to save the day. Read the rest of this entry »
VisualForce Element Ids in jQuery selectors
I have retired this approach in favour of a much neater solution that can be found here.
This tricky topic had me puzzled for some time and in earlier posts I went the way of using CSS classes to identify DOM elements; but was always a touch dissatisfied with the solution. Not only is it less efficient – valid XHTML pages should only have one element with any Id, although CSS classes can be shared by many elements – but it also feels all hacky ‘n stuff. I’m a bit older now, a bit more experienced and I RTFM. Without further ado, here is why it’s tricky, and how to fix it. Read the rest of this entry »
Masking Input on VisualForce Pages
I am a developer and (at least as often) a (l)user. UI and UX design are important from both perspectives, and it’s important to bear this in mind whilst creating any application. What is this waffle all about? There are some platforms, based in yonder cloud that could tweak the tiniest of features, and make the lives of their users (and administrators) 1 x shed-load better. Until they do that, we’re gonna have to do it ourselves.
Let’s get specific. Typically, validation error messages provided by Apex and VisualForce are only apparent after form is submitted ( or when we’re on the last page of a 39-page wizard ). Of course some cases require that it be this way, but for other cases it’s like my (very) old professor used to say, “Jus’ don’t let em make the mistake in the first place boy *tongue-click*”. Heeding Prof. Swart’s advice, let’s see how we can easily do this. Read the rest of this entry »
Flickr + jQuery + Salesforce = Awesome^5 [Part 2]
Okay software developing enthusiasts, I’m back from Paris (you didn’t know I was gone did ya?), I’m a year older and culturally, I’m richer (well I’d like to think so at least). It’s time to complete our two-part series on integrating disparate systems using the most-excellent combination of web services, jQuery and the Force.com platform. In part 1 we learnt how to connect to a third-party endpoint (Flickr in our case), and consume their SOAP-based web services. Now we’re going to jazz it all up with our spiffy jQuery gallery carousel. Let’s have another look at where we want to be at the end of this all,
