I’m building an application where the user is working with something
that is a combination of a spreadsheet and an outliner (a statement of
corporate finances, actually). This requires the user to work with
multiple data points arranged in a spreadsheet-like presentation (a
grid). Each individual data point can be stored as a record, but the
user should not need to work with the data on a record-by-record basis;
instead, they should be able to select a cell (ideally by keyboard as
well as by mouse), edit the data in it, and then continue in the same
way.
At the moment I’m not too worried about recalculations–they can be done
on the server and passed back by Ajax. I’m just trying to figure out the
best way to use views and other Rails features to get the desired UI.
Both the presentation of multiple records in a grid, and the desire to
move seamlessly in that grid, aren’t supported by Rail’s builtin
functionality, as far as I can tell.
Does anyone have any suggestions, or examples to point to? I’m sure I
can find a nasty, difficult way to do this, but it’d be nice if someone
else could advise me of an elegant, easy way :-).
Thanks,
Ken