I'm trying to find the does and don'ts for implementing text fields for web pages. Some examples I can think of are
1) Consider real time limiting length of a text field versus informing users of length restrictions on submitting a page
2) Handling of special characters e.g. $!^*!( etc.
3) Special validation of text fields for specific text field types e.g. email fields, phone number fields etc.
It would be great if there was a document that covers guidelines such as these.
Type of input field
Provide the appropriate type of input field based on what is being requested. Each type of input field has its own characteristics, which users are accustomed to. For instance, use radio buttons if only one option of several is permitted, and check boxes if multiple choices are allowed.
Customizing input fields
Do not invent new types of input fields. This was common in the early days of Flash websites, and it seems to be making a comeback; I have seen some odd input fields implemented with jQuery. Simple is often the most useful. Keep input fields as close to their unaltered HTML rendering as possible.
Restricting the format of input fields
If you need to restrict the format of data inputted by users, then at least do so in a way that won’t irritate users. For example, instead of displaying MM/DD/YYYY next to a text field for a date, consider using three drop-down fields or, better yet, a calendar control.
Mandatory vs. optional fields
Clearly distinguish which input fields cannot be left blank by the user. The convention is to use an asterisk (*). Any symbol will do, as long as a legend is visible to indicate what it means (even if it’s an asterisk).
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/11/08/extensive-guide-web-form-usability/
Text fields allow the user to input text. They can be single line, with or without scrolling, or multi-line, and can have an icon. Touching a text field places the cursor and automatically displays the keyboard. In addition to typing, text fields allow for a variety of other tasks, such as text selection (cut, copy, paste) and data lookup via auto-completion. See Patterns > Selection for text selection design.
The type of text field determines what kind of characters are allowed inside the field and may prompt the virtual keyboard to optimize its layout for frequently used characters. Common types for which you should optimize include number, text, email address, phone number, person’s name, username, URL, street address, credit card number, PIN, and search query.
To read more visit http://www.google.com/design/spec/components/text-fields.html
Related
I have two fields on a form. Field 1 is auto number field named 5sID. Field 2 is a lookup field named 5sType.
When I open the VBA code for both the oncurrent and on open, I try to reference either field with a "Me.5sID" or "Me.5sType". In either case when I type in the "Me." the auto list shows the other eight fields in the table, but not these two.
I have used this for years on both datasheets or continuous forms. There are only the two fields on the form and they were selected from the table field list in the design view.
If I change the name on the Other tab of the property options, the fields then appear.
I have now rebuilt the table and the form, I have created a database and linked to the same table and still get the same results.
If I add another short text field it shows up when I type "Me." in VBA, but any other type of field does not show up.
Naming an identifier with a number as first character is a bad idea! Always start with a letter!
On Access 2013 that creates a compile error as the compiler expects a=as he interprets.5as a decimal-number.
That worked for you on older versions? Hard to believe!
As workaround use square-brackets like on identifiers containing spaces or other crap.
Me.[5sID]
or turn onShow hidden Elementsin Object-Browser , what fixes Inteli-Sense and creates automatic brackets. Seems like this is a way to create hidden members ;)
I am using Access 2013 and I am trying to create a chart report on one of my reports based on a table. There are about 30 fields in this table. The first field ID is auto number and there is another Customer ID which is set to number, the rest are all "long text" (such as name, review and etc) When I went to the form design and created the chart, at the step which it asked me to choose the fields I need, there were only two available fields - ID and customer ID - available, none of the rest popped up(like the customer name and other stuff)
Is there anything I did wrong? I recall I have made this happen in the old version. And I also realized that there is no pivotchart or table view options in 2013 anymore. Is this because the version thing please/
Thanks, any help and advice will be appreciated.
Do you really need more than 255 Characters for fields such as Customer Name? I think you need to change the datatypes of the fields you would like to include in the chart. Think about a field in a chart that used the max of a long text field.
From the MS Office website "In Access web apps, the Long Text field can store up to 2^30-1 bytes"
My guess is that access does not allow Long Text fields to appear in charts because of the most logic use case for charts, which does not involve the possibility of using a field that is THAT big.
Anyway, try fitting your data in short text fields. If that is too small, then here is a link to increase the size of your short text fields to 4000
I have an HTML data table that I am trying to make accessible. It works well enough with NVDA and Jaws. But the context of the data is such that it makes more sense to be read column by column rather than row by row as screen readers default to.
Is there a way to make sure the table is read column by column?
You don’t have to do anything, except marking it up correctly (i.e., what the headers are, and possibly what their scope is).
Just like sighted users don’t read the whole content strictly from left-to-right, top-to-bottom, screen reader users don’t let the page read out to them from the beginning to the end -- all users scan the content and jump on the page.
Inside a table, screen readers typically allow moving from cell to cell, to beginnings and ends of columns and rows, etc. See for example the commands for reading tables with JAWS.
If you think it’s not easily understood how the data is organized, consider adding a description in the caption element, e.g., something like "The first row gives the dates, each column contains the data for a day".
In several notes applications, instead of handling related data as separate documents, if the size of the data is small (less than the 32k limit), I'll make several multi valued fields and display it in what I call a "List Panel". It's a table where each column displays one multi-value field. Since fielda(1) goes with fieldb(1) that goes with fieldc(1) there is a concept of rows. (I did a similar thing in my auditing routine discussed here )
It is always assumed that each field has exactly the same number of elements.
All the multi-value fields are then stored on the single document. This avoids several coding conventions that made my eyes bleed like having date changed, who changed it, new value fields for each field we wanted to audit. Another thing that this kept to a minimum was having to provide multiple fields for the same thing that locked you into a limit. Taxrate1, Taxrate2, Taxrate3, etc...
In my "Listpanel" the first column is a vertical checkbox. (One for each element in my lists) This is so I can select one item to bring up and edit, or select multiple values to delete "rows" or apply some kind of mass change to them.
What would be the best way to handle this under xPages to get this functionality? I tried making a table but am having the devil of a time to get the checkboxes to line up with their corresponding data items.
Views and dojo-grids seem to assume we're using a document for each row.....
This TableWalker may provide what you want http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/ddwiki.nsf/dx/Tutorial-Introduction-to-XPages-Exercise-23
It was created when XPages was all very new, so it's SSJS rather than Java. But if you're comfortable wiith Java, converting it probably won't be a challenge.
You could use a repeat control to display the values and build a table using the table row tags in the repeat. You would want to calculate the id of the checkbox to be able to take an action on that selected row. The repeat var would be just one of your multi-value fields and you use the index of the repeat to get the value for that row from the other multi-value fields.
I have just started implementing search module in a project, where I have a form with fixed fields consisting of combo box, text box, radio button etc (around 200 fields in multiple tabs), and later client should be able to add extra fields too. Once user fills the fields which he wants to search, that search criteria also he should be able to save. For all these reasons, for each field I am associating metadata in the following format.
"EntityName.attributeName": attributeValue
Once the user fills the form fields to search, I will validate form data and and only non empty fields metadata I am sending to server in JSON format. Everything is fine till now. But I am facing an issues now.
Using the metadata of each field I will create a new criteria for each field. but if there are fields where one field metadata depends on other field metadata I am struck.
In the form I have few special category fields in following format : for example DOB,
FROM DATE (meta data: entity1.dob)
TO DATE (meta data: entity1.dob)
both fields belongs to same entity and same column only field name in the UI is different
Like this I have around 20 fields which asks for FROM and TO to query the range (it need not be on date, for example no of bed rooms..it can be on integer, string etc)
My query formation should be in the following way depending on user search criteria. If user entered only FROM field of number of bed rooms then I have to query using EQUAL to operator in sql and if both mentioned then MORETHANEQUAL to for FROM field and LESSTHANEQUAL to for to field. So how I can handle this special case ?
like if he entered number of fields as 4 in TO field of number of bed rooms, then I have to query for houses having number of bed rooms equal to 4. but if in FROM he entered 3 and in To if he entered 7 then I have to query for houses having greater than or equal to 3 bed rooms and less than or equal to 7 bed rooms.
Since I have same metadata for these category fields also I am unable to proceed, to achieve this, what kind of metadata I need to prepare ?
How I can generalize this process to handle all the cases ?
my technology stack: ExtJs, Eclipse Link, spring.
and what are the best practices to follow to support custom fields adding feature in Forms in enterprise applications ?
Off of the top of my head, I would create wizards for these particular cases. So for example, have a custom wizard that allows the user to define a "from" field, a "to" field, and then the comparison operator in one action. This wizard could also be responsible for adding custom properties to the generated fields that could be used by your validation routine. So based on the combo of from, to, and operator, you could create a flexible validation mechanism for ensuring that correct values are entered, ranges are correct, whatever.
You might consider this "wizard" approach for all custom fields, in fact. I could see you predefining all the possible custom field types that could be used and create classes that can be used for those. The classes could be responsible not only for the field creation, but also for providing any custom validation, pre-submit transformation, etc. This approach would make adding new custom field types incredibly simple since all you'd have to do is follow the same implementation as the others that already exist, extend an existing one, etc.