Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
Styling form elements is a frustrating and, often, futile effort. Roger Johansson has a nice article with explanations [1] I think sticking to the submit buttons is the best way to go. Prabhath http://nidahas.com [1] http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200410/styling_even_more_form_controls/ On 6/1/05, Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Here's one I have been working on for a while: I have got a couple of text-links that I want to use to submit a form. The deal: it has to be accessible (has to work with JavaScript disabled). The closest I have come to a solution is to style input buttons with css so they look similar to text links, but it won't work in all browsers. Opera decides to add a shadow, even with background-color and border turned off. IE adds a bit of spacing left and right, even with padding and margin turned off. Has anybody else found a better solution to this? Thanks for the feedback! Andreas. Andreas Boehmer User Experience Consultant Phone: (03) 9386 8907 Mobile: (0411) 097 038 http://www.addictiveMedia.com.au Consulting | Accessibility | Usability | Development ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
-Original Message- From: Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 4:35 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links -Original Message- From: Prabhath Sirisena [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 4:13 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links Styling form elements is a frustrating and, often, futile effort. I think sticking to the submit buttons is the best way to go. Yeah, I would love to stick to the form buttons, but it just won't look good. Hmmm... What do you think about this one: I use javascript to display text links that use javascript to submit the form and noscript to display Form buttons. Something like this: script type=javascript document.write(a href=\javascript:submitForm()\Click Here/a); /script noscript input type=submit name=submit value=Click Here /noscript Does anybody see any problems with this solution? Fair enough, users without Javascript will see lots of form buttons, but at least the functionality is there and most users will have Javascript enabled. ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
I'm going to chime in with why do you want to do this? too, I'm afraid. Users don't expect a text link to submit a form, so doing this makes your form less usable, more confusing, IMHO. Have You Validated Your Code? John Horner(+612 / 02) 8333 3488 Developer, ABC Kids Onlinehttp://www.abc.net.au/ ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
-Original Message- From: John Horner [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 4:51 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links I'm going to chime in with why do you want to do this? too, I'm afraid. Users don't expect a text link to submit a form, so doing this makes your form less usable, more confusing, IMHO. I completely agree that generally text links should not be used to submit forms as such. However, in this particular case the links are not being used to finalise a form and submit it, but to remember the selection the user has made so far. Imagine 10 pages of search results. The user can select any of the search results by ticking a checkbox. Once they have selected all of the results they want, they can hit a SUBMIT button to do something with the results (e.g. email them to a friend). Fair enough. That button will be a normal input button. BUT: users are accustomed to have text-links to allow them to jump in between search result pages (e.g. Google). So those links I would like to keep as text. The problem is, that when the users go to another page the selection they made on the current page should be remembered. The only way of doing that is by submitting the form. :) Fair enough? ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] wrote:
Making all the Page Numbers form buttons doesn't really look good, if you
know what I mean. Would be great to get around it.
Even if you assign a specific class to those submit buttons?
input.submit { font-size: 0.76em; color: #00f; background: transparent;
border: none; }
input type=submit value=1 class=submit title=results page: 1 /
--
Patrick H. Lauke
_
re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively
[latin : re-, re- + dux, leader; see duke.]
www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.uk
http://redux.deviantart.com
**
The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/
See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm
for some hints on posting to the list getting help
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RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
-Original Message- From: Patrick H. Lauke [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 5:19 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] wrote: Making all the Page Numbers form buttons doesn't really look good, if you know what I mean. Would be great to get around it. Even if you assign a specific class to those submit buttons? Works in IE/Win and FF/Win, but not in Opera. I don't have any possibility to test it on the Mac at the moment, but I think Safari will play up as well. ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] wrote: BUT: users are accustomed to have text-links to allow them to jump in between search result pages (e.g. Google). So those links I would like to keep as text. The problem is, that when the users go to another page the selection they made on the current page should be remembered. The only way of doing that is by submitting the form. :) Would the users expect to be able to tick different checkboxes, then click any of the 1 2 3 4 ... links? Or would they tick different boxes, then submit the search, and *then* use the numbered links to flick between results? To me, the latter makes far more sense...if I change search criteria, how can I know that there *will* be, say, 10 pages of results? And in this case (which would really mirror what, say, Google does...you can't change your search string and then hit one of the following results pages...you have to explicitly submit the new search first, and *then* flick through results), your numbered links don't need to submit anything...just make sure that, as part of your href in those links, you pass the *current* state of the checkboxes as a GET parameter. -- Patrick H. Lauke _ re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively [latin : re-, re- + dux, leader; see duke.] www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.uk http://redux.deviantart.com ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
Hi Andreas, This isn't really the accessible solution you're looking for, but if you want to avoid submitting a form but retain information between pages, you could try to set a cookie. Cheers, Blair On 01/06/05, Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Here's one I have been working on for a while: I have got a couple of text-links that I want to use to submit a form. The deal: it has to be accessible (has to work with JavaScript disabled). The closest I have come to a solution is to style input buttons with css so they look similar to text links, but it won't work in all browsers. Opera decides to add a shadow, even with background-color and border turned off. IE adds a bit of spacing left and right, even with padding and margin turned off. Has anybody else found a better solution to this? Thanks for the feedback! Andreas. Andreas Boehmer User Experience Consultant Phone: (03) 9386 8907 Mobile: (0411) 097 038 http://www.addictiveMedia.com.au Consulting | Accessibility | Usability | Development ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** -- Blair Millen http://theletter.co.uk http://doepud.co.uk ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
-Original Message- From: Patrick H. Lauke [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 5:32 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] wrote: BUT: users are accustomed to have text-links to allow them to jump in between search result pages (e.g. Google). So those links I would like to keep as text. The problem is, that when the users go to another page the selection they made on the current page should be remembered. The only way of doing that is by submitting the form. :) Would the users expect to be able to tick different checkboxes, then click any of the 1 2 3 4 ... links? Or would they tick different boxes, then submit the search, and *then* use the numbered links to flick between results? I think you misunderstood what I had planned. Sorry, I might have been a bit vague. Have a look at this page: http://www.seek.com.au/jobsearch/index.ascx?DateRange=31catlocation=1002st ateselected=truecatindustry=1200 They do exactly what I want to do, but they use Javascript. The checkboxes are not part of the search criteria. They come *after* the search has been done. So the user searches for jobs. They find a range of jobs that match their search criteria. In fact they found 10 pages of jobs. Now I want to give them the option to select any of these jobs and Send them to their friends. To make it clear to the user that their selection is being stored, I will add a little note under the Next Page link (similar to how Seek have solved it in the above link). ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
-Original Message- From: discusster [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 5:44 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: Re: [WSG] Submit a form with text links Hi Andreas, This isn't really the accessible solution you're looking for, but if you want to avoid submitting a form but retain information between pages, you could try to set a cookie. The problem is I cannot get the info into the cookie without submitting a form first. :) ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
On Wed, 2005-06-01 at 17:55 +1000, Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] wrote: The problem is I cannot get the info into the cookie without submitting a form first. :) I'll confess to never having actually used AJAX, but would it be possible to make the page work such that standard selection would involve clicking link by link (and the page reloading each time) with each link having a different URI string (so ./bla?bla=jobID), or, if the user has JavaScript enabled, storing their selections in an array until they submit it using JavaScript? (Or alternatively using AJAX to dynamically submit data and update the page rather than submitting all at once) I have no idea how this would be done, only a vague idea that it _can_ be, and in an accessible way (albeit one way that is easier to use - but that's the notion of graceful degradation, so don't criticise the idea on that point). Kind Regards, Joshua Street base10solutions Website: http://www.base10solutions.com.au/ Phone: (02) 9898-0060 Fax: (02) 8572-6021 Mobile: 0425 808 469 Multimedia Development Agency E-mails and any attachments sent from base10solutions are to be regarded as confidential. Please do not distribute or publish any of the contents of this e-mail without the senders consent. If you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender by replying to the e-mail, and then delete the message without making copies or using it in any way. Although base10solutions takes precautions to ensure that e-mail sent from our accounts are free of viruses, we encourage recipients to undertake their own virus scan on each e-mail before opening, as base10solutions accepts no responsibility for loss or damage caused by the contents of this e-mail. ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] Have a look at this page: http://www.seek.com.au/jobsearch/index.ascx?DateRange=31catlo cation=1002st ateselected=truecatindustry=1200 So the user searches for jobs. They find a range of jobs that match their search criteria. In fact they found 10 pages of jobs. Now I want to give them the option to select any of these jobs and Send them to their friends. Ah...(little lightbulb flashes on) got you. I was looking at the checkboxes at the very top, not even seeing the ones next to each individual job posting. Right, in this case possibly a clumsy, but workable solution could well be to have numbered submit buttons, but turn them into normal links with javascript functionality via the DOM on load...or to use a script/noscript block. Patrick Patrick H. Lauke Webmaster / University of Salford http://www.salford.ac.uk ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links
-Original Message- From: Patrick Lauke [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, 1 June 2005 7:19 PM To: wsg@webstandardsgroup.org Subject: RE: [WSG] Submit a form with text links Andreas Boehmer [Addictive Media] Have a look at this page: http://www.seek.com.au/jobsearch/index.ascx?DateRange=31catlo cation=1002st ateselected=truecatindustry=1200 So the user searches for jobs. They find a range of jobs that match their search criteria. In fact they found 10 pages of jobs. Now I want to give them the option to select any of these jobs and Send them to their friends. Right, in this case possibly a clumsy, but workable solution could well be to have numbered submit buttons, but turn them into normal links with javascript functionality via the DOM on load...or to use a script/noscript block. Yeah, I think that's probably the best solution. I have played with the script/noscript solution and that seems to work alright. So we ended up in two discussions: 1) Should it be done 2) How can it be done Thanks for the feedback, guys! ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
