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@@ -4,7 +4,28 @@ Extract form values through the DOM. |
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## Motivation |
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There are many ways to lay out forms. |
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Forms are used to package related data, typically sent to an external location or processed internally. In the browser, |
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the default behavior of submitting form data is not always preferred, as this is done through loading a document, |
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typically the same document, as soon as the form is submitted. In addition, [applications have limited control over how |
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the data are formatted on submission](https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/form-control-infrastructure.html#dom-fs-enctype) |
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with this approach. This is why the new way of sending form data is done through AJAX/fetch requests, wherein the data |
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are serialized into formats like JSON. To turn form data into a specific format requires access to the elements holding |
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the values to each field in the form. |
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Some libraries for extracting form values query field elements in the DOM, which is inefficient since they need to |
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traverse the DOM tree in some way, using methods such as `document.getElementsByTagName()` and |
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`document.querySelector()`. |
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Upon retrieving the field values somehow, some libraries attempt to duplicate the values of the fields as they change, |
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for instance by attaching event listeners and storing the new values into some internal object or map, which can be |
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retrieved by some other exposed function. |
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With `formxtr`, there is no need to traverse the DOM for individual fields to get their values. Provided the fields are |
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associated to the form (either as a descendant of the `<form>` element or [associated through the `form=""` |
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attribute](https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/form-control-infrastructure.html#attr-fae-form)) and has a valid |
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`name`, the values of these fields can be easily extracted, using the `form.elements` attribute built-in to the DOM and |
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used for getting its currently associated fields. With this, only the reference to the form is needed. The current state |
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of the field elements are already stored in the DOM, waiting to be accessed. |
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## Installation |
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@@ -42,7 +63,7 @@ const form: HTMLFormElement = document.getElementById('form'); |
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// individual submitters can be considered |
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const submitter = form.querySelector('[type="submit"][name="type"][value="client"]'); |
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const values = getFormValues(form, submitter); |
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const values = getFormValues(form, { submitter }); |
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const processResult = (result: Record<string, unknown>) => { |
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throw new Error('Not yet implemented.'); |
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@@ -53,7 +74,7 @@ form.addEventListener('submit', async e => { |
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const { target: form, submitter } = e; |
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e.preventDefault(); |
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const values = getFormValues(form, submitter); |
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const values = getFormValues(form, { submitter }); |
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// Get the form values and send as request to some API |
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const response = await fetch( |
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@@ -77,4 +98,4 @@ form.addEventListener('submit', async e => { |
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## Tests |
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The library has been tested on JSDOM through Jest, and the real DOM using Cypress. |
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The library has been tested on the static DOM using JSDOM and Jest, and the real dynamic DOM using Cypress. |