Checkbox to activate text box in form

Len Whistler · 10-06-2005, 06:04 AM

I would like to have a checkbox and text box beside each other in a form. The text box would be greyed out and no info can be entered UNTIL the checkbox is checked. Once the checkbox is checked the text box becomes active and numbers then can be entered.

Can this be done with javascript? If not what are my options?

Thanks

_Aerospace_Eng_ · 10-06-2005, 06:19 AM

Your original question would have been just fine. Now you have gone and cross posted which is against the forum rules.

Code:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" />
<title>Untitled Document</title>
<script type="text/javascript">
function checkMe(){
if(document.forms[0].thecheck.checked==1){
	document.forms[0].test.disabled=false;
	document.forms[0].test.value='1';
}
else if(document.forms[0].thecheck.checked==0){
	document.forms[0].test.disabled=true;
}
}	
</script>
</head>

<body>
<form action="#" method="post">
<input type="text" name="test" disabled="disabled" /><input type="checkbox" name="thecheck" onclick="checkMe()" />
</form>
</body>
</html>

Vladdy · 10-06-2005, 06:20 AM

While it can be done with javascript to enhance user experience, you, first, need to design a usable form without relying on javascript.

Considering your post in HTML section, the checkbox seems to be a superfluous element. Why not default your quantity textboxes to 0 so that if a user wants an item he/she changes the text in that box to a different value. This scenario does not require client side scripting to be operational and reduces the amount of "clicks" user has to make to get the result.

As far as that code above goes it is way too inefficient. Here is how you implement this approach (points of emphasis in red)

Code:

<script type="text/javasript">
function buyThis(checkbox)
  {  // Use a sequence of nextSibling or previousSibling to reflect your markup 
     var textbox = checkbox.previousSibling;
     textbox.disabled = !checkbox.checked;
     textbox.value = checkbox.checked?'1':'0';
  }
</script>

<fieldset><legend>Products</legend>
....
<input type="text" name="qty5" value="0" /><input type="checkbox" name="prod5" onchange="buyThis(this)" />
....
</fieldset>
  }

Len Whistler · 10-06-2005, 06:32 AM

Ok...thanks for the replies in the morning I will be looking more into both suggestions. It's getting late.

Re:"Now you have gone and cross posted which is against the forum rules."

I always thought cross posting was cut & paste the exact same post within seconds in other forums. My original post was 1 hour or more before this one and then after some thought decided maybe the JavaScript section would be better, plus I rewrote it.