Skip to main content

Jquery Mobile Form - Text inputs

    In this post on "form text input's" styling and usage using Jquery Mobile we will cover various input types and textarea styling using JQM. We will also cover the various attributes that can be used with the input types. Text inputs and textareas are coded with standard HTML elements, then enhanced by Jquery Mobile to make them more attractive and useable on a mobile device.

    The text input elements are available in 2 flavors/sizes - regular and mini. Following is a standard HTML syntax for an input element.


    Adding a data attribute data-mini="true" to the input tag renders a smaller sized input element. Let's take a look at the code sample below to understand the working in a better way.

    Apart from the regular input type, to accept multi-line input, use the textarea element. The advantage of using textarea in Jquery Mobile is that, the framework auto grows the height of the textarea, avoiding the need for the content in the textarea to be scrolled internally. In the example below, you will see to implementations of textareas - one with label and textarea on 2 separate lines and the other with the label and textarea on the same line.



    In the code above, you will see 4 different implementations of the input element. The first one is a regular input of type text with the label and the textbox one below the other. The second implementation is exactly similar to the first implementation with the only difference of the added data attribute "data-mini="true"" which reduces the size (basically height) of the textbox.

    The third implementation gets the label and the textbox on the same line. This implementation is done using a div with data attribute data-role="fieldcontain" around the label and input tags. This div has to be within a form tag. Maintaining the HTML structure is very important when using JQuery Mobile framework.

    In the fourth implementation, we have used the HTML5 placeholder property and done away with the label completely. However, for the sake of accessibility, we have included the label tag with class="ui-hidden-accessible" so that the label is not displayed but is present in the HTML structure. This implementation is popularly used on mobile sites as this reduces the amount of scroll.

    To disable the input field just add the keyword "disabled" to the input tag and your input type would be disabled.

    A note on accessibility:
    For the sake of accessibility, jQuery Mobile requires that all form elements be paired with a meaningful label. To hide labels in a way that leaves them visible to assistive technologies — for example, when letting an element's placeholder attribute serve as a label — apply the helper class ui-hidden-accessible to the label itself. While the label will no longer be visible, it will be available to assisitive technologies such as screen readers.

    You can use the various input types supported in HTML5. The advantage of using the HTML5 input types is that keybords default to the particular input type are displayed by default. The following example demonstrates the various HTML5 input types that you can use. Try out the example on a mobile device and you will see for yourself the various keyboards that default the particular input type.



    The mobile browsers that do not support the new HTML5 input types will fall back to the default input type="text" and show the default alpha-numeric keyboard. Adding the images (screenshots) of default keyboards displayed for different input types on the Android and iOS devices, to this post would make the post really long and so I have included these images here.

    Hope this post has been informative to you and helps you use the various input types effectively in your next Jquery Mobile based application. Drop a comment to let me know what you feel about this post as well as the earlier series on Jquery Mobile listview. Share the post if is has helped you, so that maximum developers benefit from this one. Till next time, happy coding!

Comments

Recommended for You

Geodesic Polyline

    Today we will have a look at a very interesting polyline example - "The geodesic polyline". Now the first question that will pop is "What is geodesic?". Mathematically, geodesic means the shortest line between two points on a mathematically defined surface, as a straight line on a plain or an arc of a great circle or sphere.     The next question after reading the above definition is clearly, "Why do we need geodesic polylines?" and that would be followed up with "What is this Great Circle?". We will discuss this first, before we move on to the actual example today. The example is very very similar to the normal polyline example, with just a small change.     Having said so, I will now try to explain why we need a geodesic polyline? The shortest distance between two locations on the earth is rarely a straight line as the earth is roughly spherical in nature. So any two points on the earth, even if they are very close lie on a curve a...

Where does Google get it's live traffic data from?

Referring to a post that I wrote earlier, Google’s - Live traffic Layer , ever wondered how Google collected this data? I was wondering the other day, how Google received live data to display it on their maps as a layer! I looked up the web and found something very interesting and am sharing the same with you all. As we all know, the traffic layer is available most accurately in several states in USA. Most major metro areas in the US have sensors embedded in their highways. These sensors track real time traffic data. Easy to miss at high speeds (hopefully anyway, traffic permitting), more commonly noticed may be the similar sensors that often exist at many busy intersections that help the traffic lights most efficiently let the most amount of people through. The information from these tracking sensors is reported back to the Department of Transportation (DOT). The DOT uses this data to update some of the digital signs that report traffic conditions in many metro areas. They als...

Four maps on the same page - Playing with events

    In today's example we will see how to add 4 maps on the same web page and then play a bit around with some events in Google Maps API. Lets have a look at the code. All that you have to do to get the code working is copy the code in a text file and save it with .html extension. Open this html file in your browser and you will see the four maps in action!     Adding the four maps on a webpage should not be a challenge anymore, and all the more after the example Two Google Maps - Side by side that I shared a few weeks back! All you need to pay attention is to the events. There are two events "drag" and "zoom_changed". As the event names suggest, when you will drag or zoom the first map (upper left map), the remaining three maps will also zoom and pan accordingly! Try it out and leave a comment of what you think of it! You can also drop your queries or doubts about the same here!     The output of the above code appears as seen in th...

Jquery Mobile - Basic Listview

    Continuing with the Jquery Mobile Examples, today we will take a look at the listviews in Jquery Mobile. Listviews are popularly used in websites and web-applications that are built on the Jquery Mobile platform and hence we will look at the various list patterns available with Jquery Mobile. Lists are used for a various purposes like data display, navigation, result lists and data entry. We will start with the most basic listview example and look through several examples over a number of posts.     A listview is simply an unordered list containing linked list items with a data-role="listview" attribute. jQuery Mobile will apply all the necessary styles to transform the list into a mobile-friendly listview with right arrow indicator that fills the full width of the browser window. When you tap on the list item, the framework will trigger a click on the first link inside the list item, issue an Ajax request for the URL in the link, create the new pag...

50000 hits and live examples

    Hello to all the blog readers - to the regulars and the first timers. Spatial Unlimited just crossed the 50,000 all time hits milestone and so its time to celebrate and also mark the occasion with something new and interesting.       The new addition to this blog is that, you will now be able to enjoy the codes live on the blog. I am adding some life to the blog by converting all the earlier life-less codes to JsFiddle powered live examples. I have converted a few and am sharing the links here. Please share your feedback and let me know what you think of the new additions. Hope you keep enjoying the blog as much as I enjoy updating it! Cheers! Links to Live Examples: 1. Simple Google Map 2. Simple Map Marker 3. Multiple Markers 4. KML Layer