eprints_tech messages

From: David Lewis <david.lewis AT utc.fr>
Date: Thu, 08 May 2008 20:05:52 +0200

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*** EPrints community wiki - http://wiki.eprints.org/

Hi,

I'm wondering what's the best way to implement a "constrained ↵
keywords" 
field in EP3.0

I'm autocompleting on user input as follows:

<field ref="utc_keywords_rameau" 
input_lookup_url="{$config{perl_url}}/users/lookup/simple_sql" 
input_lookup_params="table=utc_keywords_rameau&amp;mode=prefix"/>

However, I want to prevent users from entering anything OTHER than 
values proposed in the lookup table .. i.e. force them to choose from a 
finite list of accepted values.

Anybody else been faced with this problem and found a neat way around it?

Thanks for ideas,
David

From: Tim Brody <tdb01r AT ecs.soton.ac.uk>
Date: Fri, 16 May 2008 07:18:44 +0100

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*** EPrints community wiki - http://wiki.eprints.org/

David Lewis wrote:
> *** http://www.eprints.org/tech.php/id/%3C48234100.60703%40utc.fr%3E
> *** EPrints community wiki - http://wiki.eprints.org/
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm wondering what's the best way to implement a "constrained 
> keywords" field in EP3.0
>
> I'm autocompleting on user input as follows:
>
> <field ref="utc_keywords_rameau" 
> input_lookup_url="{$config{perl_url}}/users/lookup/simple_sql" 
> ↵
input_lookup_params="table=utc_keywords_rameau&amp;mode=prefix"/>
>
> However, I want to prevent users from entering anything OTHER than 
> values proposed in the lookup table .. i.e. force them to choose from 
> a finite list of accepted values.
>
> Anybody else been faced with this problem and found a neat way around it?
How large are the number of predefined keywords?

You could use a NamedSet (i.e. a "select" box). Or you could enforce 
something during validation.

Without implementing your own bits of javascript you can't have a text 
field that only allows certain words.

All the best,
Tim.

From: David Lewis <david.lewis AT utc.fr>
Date: Tue, 20 May 2008 11:33:52 +0200

This is a cryptographically signed message in MIME format.

David Lewis wrote:
>> However, I want to prevent users from entering anything OTHER than 
>> values proposed in the lookup table .. i.e. force them to choose from 
>> a finite list of accepted values.
>>
>> Anybody else been faced with this problem and found a neat way around ↵
it?

Tim Brody wrote:
> How large are the number of predefined keywords?
> 
> You could use a NamedSet (i.e. a "select" box). Or you could ↵
enforce 
> something during validation.
> 
> Without implementing your own bits of javascript you can't have a text 
> field that only allows certain words.

Thanks for that, Tim. For me right now it's a question of working out 
which bits of "official" Eprints javascript I might possibly dare to 
tweak without the risk of causing massive collateral damage!

One way to avoid modifying .js files would be to use a complex authority 
list with a block of xhtml that does a bit more than just changing the 
value of a text field. The autocompleter lets you use a 'block' 
attribute as well as a 'value' attribute, so I thought for starters I 
might try and include something along the lines of

<li id='for:block:relative:_xxxx'> zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz </li>

where zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz would be replaced by something to set the 
value attribute of _xxxx AND ALSO to set the READONLY attribute to true.

If this is feasible I might then think about changing the text field 
into something else, like a select box with the SELECTED value depending 
on the string entered, in which case zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz would no doubt 
become a lot longer and more unwieldy, but not a single line of 
javascript would have been harmed .. yes, well, this might be pure 
folly. I still have to determine whether I can make zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz 
generate a simple readonly attribute.

Best wishes,
David



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