Disabling Form Elements

[shankwheat]

I have a function which passes text from txtdebt to debtsbox which
works fine. However, I want to add code which examines the value of
debtsbox and if any of the values the user entered contain the string
"d" then I want to emable rblDebts which is disabled when the page
loads. This part is not working (no errors) and I'm not sure why.
Thanks.

<script type="text/javascript" language="JavaS cript">
<!-- Begin
oldvalue = "";
function passText(passed value) {
if (passedvalue != "") {
var totalvalue = passedvalue+"\n "+oldvalue;
document.form1. debtsbox.value = totalvalue;
oldvalue = document.form1. debtsbox.value;
}

var searchfor = "d";
if (oldvalue.searc h(searchfor) -1) {
document.form1. rblDebts.disabl ed = false;
} else
document.form1. rblDebts.disabl ed = true;
}
// End -->
</script>

<form id="form1">
Debt ID: <input type="text" name="txtdebt" maxlength="5" />
<input type="button" value="Add to list" class="buttonst yle2"
onClick="passTe xt(this.form.tx tdebt.value);">

Debts added to your list:
<textarea cols="40" rows="5" name="debtsbox" ></textarea>

<input type="radio" id="rblDebts" disabled="true" >

</form>

[nutso fasst]

"shankwheat " <ev*******@gmai l.comwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ i42g2000cwa.goo glegroups.com.. .

<input type="radio" id="rblDebts" disabled="true" >

One radio button makes no sense.

http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html40...rms.html#radio

nf

[shankwheat]

Right..Adding a bunch of radio buttons wasn't relevant to my question.
What is important is that it's a form element.
nutso fasst wrote:

"shankwheat " <ev*******@gmai l.comwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ i42g2000cwa.goo glegroups.com.. .

<input type="radio" id="rblDebts" disabled="true" >

One radio button makes no sense.

http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html40...rms.html#radio

nf

[nutso fasst]

"shankwheat " <ev*******@gmai l.comwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ m73g2000cwd.goo glegroups.com.. .

Right..Adding a bunch of radio buttons wasn't relevant to my question.
What is important is that it's a form element.

Ah, but in that case, doesn't rblDebts represent an array of form elements?
You can't disable an array. Try
document.form1. rblDebts[0].disabled = false
and see what happens.

nf

[nutso fasst]

"nutso fasst" <no********@no. wherewrote in message
news:QJ******** *******@newssvr 14.news.prodigy .com...

>
"shankwheat " <ev*******@gmai l.comwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ m73g2000cwd.goo glegroups.com.. .

Right..Adding a bunch of radio buttons wasn't relevant to my question.
What is important is that it's a form element.

Ah, but in that case, doesn't rblDebts represent an array of form

elements?

You can't disable an array. Try
document.form1. rblDebts[0].disabled = false
and see what happens.

nf

Oh, and one other thing. Your form element needs a name before you can refer
to it as document.form1:

<form name="form1">

Using id, you'd need to refer to it by id, e.g.:

document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts[0].disabled = false

nf

[mick white]

shankwheat wrote:

[snip]

>
<input type="radio" id="rblDebts" disabled="true" >

<input type="radio" id="rblDebts" disabled>

OR

<input type="radio" id="rblDebts" disabled="disab led" />

Mick.

>
</form>

[RobG]

nutso fasst wrote:

"nutso fasst" <no********@no. wherewrote in message
news:QJ******** *******@newssvr 14.news.prodigy .com...

"shankwheat " <ev*******@gmai l.comwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ m73g2000cwd.goo glegroups.com.. .

Right..Adding a bunch of radio buttons wasn't relevant to my question.
What is important is that it's a form element.

Ah, but in that case, doesn't rblDebts represent an array of form

elements?

No, it is an HTMLCollection of form controls:

<URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/DOM-Level-2-HTM...ml#ID-75708506 >

which has some similarities to an array, but is generally very
different.

You can't disable an array.

Quite correct, but it isn't an array. Some browsers support disabling
all the controls in a form by setting a disabled attribute for the form
element, but it's not part of the W3C standard and is not widely
supported.

Try document.form1. rblDebts[0].disabled = false
and see what happens.

nf

Oh, and one other thing. Your form element needs a name before you can refer
to it as document.form1:

<form name="form1">

Using id, you'd need to refer to it by id, e.g.:

document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts[0].disabled = false

Not at all - in modern browsers either name or ID will do when using
the forms collection. Keep using names if old browsers need to be
supported. If an ID is used, the syntax must be:

document.forms. form1.rblDebts

which works for names too.
--
Rob

[nutso fasst]

"RobG" <rg***@iinet.ne t.auwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ m7g2000cwm.goog legroups.com...

No, it is an HTMLCollection of form controls:

<URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/DOM-Level-2-HTM...ml#ID-75708506 >

which has some similarities to an array, but is generally very
different.

I appreciate exegesis, Rob, but in this I'm dubious. If it were an
HTMLCollection it would have a namedItem method, and how can that be when
all nodes have the same name? In any case, relative to the OP's need to
access attributes, a list of nodes and an array are not at all different.

Using id, you'd need to refer to it by id, e.g.:

document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts[0].disabled = false

Not at all - in modern browsers either name or ID will do when using
the forms collection. Keep using names if old browsers need to be
supported. If an ID is used, the syntax must be:

document.forms. form1.rblDebts

which works for names too.

And so is clearly superior syntax, thank you. But it's not how the syntax
"must be" when the form element has an ID.
document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts also works in modern browsers.

In the OP's example the form had ID="form1" but his script referred to
document.form1. rblDebts, which is not correct syntax and will not work in
modern browsers.

nf

[ASM]

nutso fasst a écrit :

> document.forms. form1.rblDebts

which works for names too.

And so is clearly superior syntax, thank you. But it's not how the syntax
"must be" when the form element has an ID.

Usualy each element of a form has a name ... !

document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts also works in modern browsers.

If and *only* if 'form1' is really an id
(IE understanding name and id are same)
and if 'rblDebts' is itself a name (and not an id)

In the OP's example the form had ID="form1" but his script referred to
document.form1. rblDebts, which is not correct syntax and will not work in
modern browsers.

Right.

[RobG]

nutso fasst wrote:

"RobG" <rg***@iinet.ne t.auwrote in message
news:11******** **************@ m7g2000cwm.goog legroups.com...

No, it is an HTMLCollection of form controls:

<URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/DOM-Level-2-HTM...ml#ID-75708506 >

which has some similarities to an array, but is generally very
different.

I appreciate exegesis, Rob

exegesis: critical explanation or interpretation of a text or portion
of a text, esp. of the Bible.
<URL: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/exegesis >

>, but in this I'm dubious.

You should be certain that it isn't a javascript Array at least. :-)

If it were an HTMLCollection it would have a namedItem method,
and how can that be when all nodes have the same name?

That logic isn't particularly convincing, did you test it? The object
returned by using dot property access to a set of radio buttons does in
fact have a namedItem method in IE, but not Firefox.

Firefox doesn't implement the namedItem method for forms either, but I
don't think you'd deduce from that that a form isn't a dinky-di
HTMLForm. :-)

In any case, relative to the OP's need to access attributes, a list of
nodes and an array are not at all different.

That is about the only feature that they share, along with a
self-adjusting length property. Some people have come here wondering
why such "arrays" don't behave when asked to pop(), slice(), shift(),
etc.

HTML collections are *always* contiguous and start from zero, from
which can be deduced that if there is no item(0) (i.e. it is undefined)
then the length *must* be zero and also that you can't add an item
beyond an index equal to the length - neither of which is necessarily
true for an Array.

Using id, you'd need to refer to it by id, e.g.:
>
document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts[0].disabled = false

Not at all - in modern browsers either name or ID will do when using
the forms collection. Keep using names if old browsers need to be
supported. If an ID is used, the syntax must be:

document.forms. form1.rblDebts

which works for names too.

And so is clearly superior syntax, thank you. But it's not how the syntax
"must be" when the form element has an ID.
document.getEle mentById('form1 ').rblDebts also works in modern browsers.

The point was in regard to dot property access to the forms collection
using IDs. Where a name is used instead of, or in addition to, an ID
the syntax can be as the OP wrote.

In the OP's example the form had ID="form1" but his script referred to
document.form1. rblDebts, which is not correct syntax and will not work in
modern browsers.

Which is why I pointed out the correct syntax to use with IDs. It is
generally recommended to use the relevant collection, rather than
getElementById, when accessing forms and their controls.
--
Rob