I want to add a bunch of classes to some text fields so i can get their values with jquery. This seems like standard practice when using jQuery and this post suggests it as the answer but how does this affect page loading? Won't it be trying to find all these classes? I have been told in the past to try minimise the amount of classes used on controls.
I have about 12 controls i'll want to add unique classes to to get their value. I am using asp.net so I can't use the id. I also can't use the ClientID as the controls are in a table (but only 1 set of controls will show at any one time).
e.g.
<asp:TextBox ID="txtValue1" runat="server" CssClass="value1" Text='value1' />
<asp:TextBox ID="txtValue2" runat="server" CssClass="value2" Text='value2' />
<asp:TextBox ID="txtValue3" runat="server" CssClass="value3" Text='value3' />
...
var value1 = $('.value1').val();
var value2 = $('.value2').val();
var value3 = $('.value3').val();
And none of the class names will exist in css.
Thanks
Edit:
I know this works but I was more curious about the affect it had on page loading. There was an answer (seems to be deleted now) that said something like the html parser ignores the classes. The css parser will only look at classes that are defined. So it sounds like it would be completely ignored and have no affect on page load. Is this right?
It is okay to use a CSS class that doesn't exist, but if they are unique you want to use id, not class.
You say you are using ASP.Net so you can't use the ID parameter, but you can. In JQuery you can get the controls using the below
var value1 = $('[ID$=yourID]').val();
For more info on JQuery Selectors check out: JQuery Selectors and Attribute Ends With Selector
The above selector basically finds the id ENDING in "yourID" so ignoring all the masterpages extra text at the start. You just have to make sure these are unique. e.g. don't have ids like "HSBC" and "SBC" as the above selector on "SBC" will find both.
I don't think it's a problem. The only times I've had problems with non-existant classes or ID's is one time I had an onclick reference an ID that didn't exist. This messed things up...Other than that I think classes are pretty harmless. I'd be interested to know though..
Any other thoughts??
Which version of asp.net are you using? In asp.net 4.0, you have the ability to use unmangled ids. It looks like the simplest solution would be to set ClientIDMode="Static" to all of your textboxes and then refer by id. Otherwise, sure, I've created classes that don't exist to refer to things.... all the time.
Edit: (in response to your comment about the effect page load).
I think your question about having extra classes in a div that are not currently used is not a bad question (at least in a theoretical sense), and I honestly don't know the precise answer. I do believe any effect is quite minuscule. If you consider best practices to write html, you generally write and structure the HTML, with it's classes, before you write the CSS. This means at the time you write the CSS, certainly some classes will not be used. Indeed, after styling the basic tags (body, h1, a, etc), you may find you never need to create selectors with those classes for some particular design. And yet for the next design, you might need those classes. I'm pretty sure the technology behind CSS was built with those kinds of scenarios in mind, and I bet millions if not billions of pages on the internet follow that exact scenario, especially if they use something like Modernizr, which adds classes to the html element of the page as a way of providing you classes you can select against considering the possible capabilities of the current browser. You may never need those classes, but they are there if you need them.
I am trying to automate a work flow process .In this,I need to click on a link positioned in any of the rows of table.Thing is all links available in all rows have same element ID and in the source code I have a java script like " ("Element ID" # Onclick..java script****:).....SO here after clicking it is connecting one form to another form by inputting some value in java script code and also one value in java script dynamically changes.How do I click on that link now?Is there any solution using xpath or so...to exactly click on that link based on CSS classID or so...Please help me out..Main problem is...all links in rows have same element ID and dynamically changing java script .
I am trying to use selenium.focus() and selenium.clickAndwait().But these are helpless.as it is not able to identify link ID only.
The best way to do this would be with xpath.
Something like //*[#onclick='javascript'] will work but this can make the tests extremely flaky because if the inline javascript changes or if its removed in preference of addEventListener to the element.
something like //*[#class='cssClass'] will work. I think that you will need to speak to the developers and ask them to help make it more testable.
I am using master page where i need to move value of one listbox to the other with the help of jQuery I tried many ways but wasn't able to hit the nail.
The methods I tried are as follows:
$("[id$='ModuleMasterListBox option:[#selected]']").appendTo($("[id$='ModuleSelectListBox']"));
$("[id$='ModuleMasterListBox option:#selected]'").appendTo($("[id$='ModuleSelectListBox']"));
var module = $("[id$='ModuleMasterListBox']").val();
module.appendTo($("[id$='ModuleSelectListBox']"));
These are the methods I tried which failed - please help me out....
You should be able to do it like this:
$("[id$='ModuleMasterListBox'] :selected").appendTo("[id$='ModuleSelectListBox']");
From your markup and the # sign it looks like you're using an outdated version of jQuery, you may want to consider upgrading. In the above we're using the attribute-ends-with selector to get the <select> the using :selected to grab the selected <option> before moving it.
Keep in mind since it looks like you're using ASP.Net this will by default throw validation errors on the server-side, you'll have to disable page validation for it to allow items it didn't bind.
OK, I have a ton of controls on my page that I need to individually place. I need to set a margin here, a padding there, etc. None of these particular styles that I want to apply will be applied to more than control. What is the bets practice for determining at which level the style is placed, etc?
OK, my choices are
1) External CSS file
1A) Using ClientIdMode = Auto (the default)
I could assign a unique CssClass value to the ASP.NET control and, in the external CSS file, create a class selector that would only be applied to that one control.
1B) User Client ID = Predicatable
In the external CSS file, I could determine what the ID will be for the controls of interest and create an ID selector (#ControlID{Style} ). However, I fear maintenance issues due to including/removing parent containers that would cause the ID to change.
1C) User Client ID = Static.
I could choose static IDs for the controls such that I minimize the likelihood of a clash with auto generated IDs (perhaps by prefixing the ID with "StaticID_" and use an external stylesheet with ID selectors.
2) I could place the style right on the control. The only disadvantage here, as I see it, is that style info is brought down each time instead of being cached , which is what I'd get using an external CSS. If a style isn't resused, I personally don't see much benefit to placing it in an external file, though please explain why if you disagree. Is there moire of a reason that "It's nice to have all the CSS in one place?"
Definitely use an external CSS file.
Options 1 A-C are really a personal preference. I would go with ClientIDMode="Static" as it gives you the most control over the Ids and it will simplify accessing the elements with Javascript (if needed). I've always hated the ugly generated Ids in the earlier versions of ASP.NET. Using a unique CSS class for each element kinda defeats the purpose of a class, which is intended for use on multiple elements.
Just to confirm your thoughts of option 2, this is not the best approach. Putting your styles in an external CSS file will result in the file being downloaded once and cached, rather than having inline styles bloat your HTML that is sent to the client each time.
I am refactoring some CSS on a website. I have been working on, and noticed the absence of traditional HTML IDs in the code.
There is heavy use of CssClass='…', or sometimes just class='…', but I can't seem to find a way to say id='…' and not have it swapped out by the server.
Here is an example:
<span id='position_title' runat='server'>Manager</span>
When the response comes back from the server, I get:
<span id='$aspnet$crap$here$position_title'>Manager</span>
Any help here?
Use jQuery to select the element:
$("span[id$='position_title']")....
jQuery's flexible selectors, especially its 'begins with'/'ends with selectors' (the 'end with' selector is shown above, provide a great way around ASP.NET's dom id munge.
rp
The 'crap' placed in front of the id is related to the container(s) of the control and there is no way (as far as I know) to prevent this behavior, other than not putting it in any container.
If you need to refer to the id in script, you can use the ClientID of the control, like so:
<script type="text/javascript">
var theSpan = document.getElementById('<%= position_title.ClientID %>');
</script>
Most of the fixes suggested her are overkill for a very simple problem. Just have separate divs and spans that you target with CSS. Don't target the ASP.NET controls directly if you want to use IDs.
<span id="FooContainer">
<span runat="server" id="Foo" >
......
<span>
</span>
You can embed your CSS within the page, sprinkled with some server tags to overcome the problem. At runtime the code blocks will be replaced with the ASP.NET generated IDs.
For example:
[style type="text/css"]
#<%= AspNetId.ClientID %> {
... styles go here...
}
[/style]
[script type="text/javascript"]
document.getElementById("<%= AspNetId.ClientID %>");
[/script]
You could go a bit further and have some code files that generate CSS too, if you wanted to have your CSS contained within a separate file.
Also, I may be jumping the gun a bit here, but you could use the ASP.NET MVC stuff (not yet officially released as of this writing) which gets away from the Web Forms and gives you total control over the markup generated.
Ok, I guess the jury is out on this one.
#leddt, I already knew that the 'crap' was the containers surrounding it, but I thought maybe Microsoft would have left a backdoor to leave the ID alone. Regenerating CSS files on every use by including ClientIDs would be a horrible idea.
I'm either left with using classes everywhere, or some garbled looking IDs hardcoded in the css.
#Matt Dawdy: There are some great uses for IDs in CSS, primarily when you want to style an element that you know only appears once in either the website or a page, such as a logout button or masthead.
The best thing to do here is give it a unique class name.
You're likely going to have to remove the runat="server" from the span and then place a within the span so you can stylize the span and still have the dynamic internal content.
Not an elegant or easy solution (and it requires a recompile), but it works.
.Net will always replace your id values with some mangled (every so slightly predictable, but still don't count on it) value. Do you really NEED to have that id runat=server? If you don't put in runat=server, then it won't mangle it...
ADDED:
Like leddt said, you can reference the span (or any runat=server with an id) by using ClientID, but I don't think that works in CSS.
But I think that you have a larger problem if your CSS is using ID based selectors. You can't re-use an ID. You can't have multiple items on the same page with the same ID. .Net will complain about that.
So, with that in mind, is your job of refactoring the CSS getting to be a bit larger in scope?
I don't know of a way to stop .NET from mangling the ID, but I can think of a couple ways to work around it:
1 - Nest spans, one with runat="server", one without:
<style type="text/css">
#position_title { // Whatever
}
<span id="position_titleserver" runat="server"><span id="position_title">Manager</span></span>
2 - As Joel Coehoorn suggested, use a unique class name instead. Already using the class for something? Doesn't matter, you can use more than 1! This...
<style type="text/css">
.position_title { font-weight: bold; }
.foo { color: red; }
.bar { font-style: italic; }
</style>
<span id="thiswillbemangled" class="foo bar position_title" runat="server">Manager</span>
...will display this:
Manager
3 - Write a Javascript function to fix the IDs after the page loads
function fixIds()
{
var tagList = document.getElementsByTagName("*");
for(var i=0;i<tagList.length;i++)
{
if(tagList[i].id)
{
if(tagList[i].id.indexOf('$') > -1)
{
var tempArray = tagList[i].id.split("$");
tagList[i].id = tempArray[tempArray.length - 1];
}
}
}
}
If you're fearing classitus, try using an id on a parent or child selector that contains the element that you wish to style. This parent element should NOT have the runat server applied. Simply put, it's a good idea to plan your structural containers to not run code behind (ie. no runat), that way you can access major portions of your application/site using non-altered IDs. If it's too late to do so, add a wrapper div/span or use the class solution as mentioned.
Is there a particular reason that you want the controls to be runat="server"?
If so, I second the use of < asp : Literal > . . .
It should do the job for you as you will still be able to edit the data in code behind.
I usually make my own control that extends WebControl or HtmlGenericControl, and I override ClientID - returning the ID property instead of the generated ClientID. This will cause any transformation that .NET does to the ClientID because of naming containers to be reverted back to the original id that you specified in tag markup. This is great if you are using client side libraries like jQuery and need predictable unique ids, but tough if you rely on viewstate for anything server-side.
If you are accessing the span or whatever tag is giving you problems from the C# or VB code behind, then the runat="server" has to remain and you should use instead <span class="some_class" id="someID">. If you are not accessing the tag in the code behind, then remove the runat="server".