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Enabling/disabling form fields [message #1284497]

Fri, 04 April 2014 14:52

davide .

Messages: 12
Registered: March 2014

Junior Member

Hello there. In my application I'd like to enable or disable (content gets "greyed-out" or maybe change buttons icons, ...) some form fields according to business logic. for example, when I open a form to insert data for a new db record, I'd like to disable or hide the id field. But using the same form I'd like to show the id field when the very same form is opened to view or modify a db record.
In a similar way I'd like to enable/disable or show/hide some other input widgets (buttons, text fields, ...) or group of widgets according to user input or click.

How can I accomplish this in scout forms?
thanks in advance

[Updated on: Fri, 04 April 2014 14:53]

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Re: Enabling/disabling form fields [message #1285243 is a reply to message #1284497]

Sat, 05 April 2014 10:16

Bertin Kiekebosch

Messages: 330
Registered: August 2011

Senior Member

In a Form you can get any field and then use setEnabled(false);

Examples

getIdField().setEnabled(true);
getFisrtNameField().setEnabled(false);

Hope this is what you mean.

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Re: Enabling/disabling form fields [message #1290953 is a reply to message #1285243]

Thu, 10 April 2014 15:30

davide .

Messages: 12
Registered: March 2014

Junior Member

Bertin, thanks for your answer.
Yes, I've got it and I did found the enabled properties of fields. But my question was about the architecture of scout: where are the code you wrote supposed to be put? Keep in mind that I want these fields greyed out (not enabled) when form is opened to input a new entity, and not greyed out (enabled) when the *same* form is opened to edit an existing entity (loaded from db).
thanks in advance!

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Re: Enabling/disabling form fields [message #1291105 is a reply to message #1290953]

Thu, 10 April 2014 18:16

Bertin Kiekebosch

Messages: 330
Registered: August 2011

Senior Member

Hi,

if I need controles to be enabled or disable I normally create a enableControls() routine in which the controls are enabled or disabled and call it after the formadata is imported in the form.

Regards Bertin

  public class NewHandler extends AbstractFormHandler {

    @Override
    public void execLoad() throws ProcessingException {
      ITestResultaatProcessService service = SERVICES.getService(ITestResultaatProcessService.class);
      TestResultaatFormData formData = new TestResultaatFormData();
      exportFormData(formData);
      formData = service.prepareCreate(formData);
      importFormData(formData);
      enableControls();
    }
  }

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Re: Enabling/disabling form fields [message #1291756 is a reply to message #1290953]

Fri, 11 April 2014 07:31

Jeremie Bresson

Messages: 1252
Registered: October 2011

Senior Member

You can have 2 handlers in you form (NewHandler and ModifiyHandler).

In the execLoad() method of each handler you can call your enable/not enabled logic.
As Bertin wrote, the logic can be packed in a method that is called with some paramter (isNew as boolean for example).

If you need to enable/disable all fields of a form or of a groupBox you can also call setEnable(boolean) of the form or of the group box.

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Re: Enabling/disabling form fields [message #1293420 is a reply to message #1291756]

Sat, 12 April 2014 16:23

Bertin Kiekebosch

Messages: 330
Registered: August 2011

Senior Member

The fact that a field is enabled or disabled in our application often depends on some business rules that are executed on the server. I don't know if it is the right way to do it but it works for our appliaction.

On the form I add an array:

  private ArrayList<String> m_enabledFields;

and the method for enabling the fields (called in the execLoad() )

  public void enableControls() {
    // Enable all true formFields (not buttons). That is everything on the form that ends with "Field"
    ArrayList<String> enabledFields = getEnabledFields();

    IFormField[] formFields = getAllFields();
    for (int i = 0; i < formFields.length; i++) {
      IFormField ff = formFields[i];
      if (ff.getFieldId().endsWith("Field")) {
        ff.setEnabled(enabledFields.contains(ff.getFieldId().substring(0, ff.getFieldId().length() - 5)));
      }
    }
  }

On the server we create and fill the array with all the fields that must be enabled, example:

    ArrayList<String> enabledFields = new ArrayList<String>();
    enabledFields.add(testResultaatFormData.getAantalFout().getFieldId());
    ...
    ...
    formData.setEnabledFields(enabledFields);

I know it is a little tricky because it works on the fieldId but for us it works.

Regards Bertin

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