Submitting a form without clicking the submit button?

Rails
1

I’m using AJAX with 2 select pulldowns. When you select an item in the
first pulldown, it dynamically populates the second pulldown. However,
I need to value of the first select pulldown to know how to populate the
second pulldown. When I select an element in the first pulldown, and
submit via clicking the submit button, it posts the value as needed and
sends in in the params hash. I’m trying to get the selected value to
return via the params hash but to do so “onchange” instead of by
clicking the submit button. Does anyone know how to submit a form
without having the user click the button?

2

Hi Daniel,

Daniel L. wrote:

I’m using AJAX with 2 select pulldowns. When you select an item in the
first pulldown, it dynamically populates the second pulldown. However,
I need to value of the first select pulldown to know how to populate the
second pulldown. When I select an element in the first pulldown, and
submit via clicking the submit button, it posts the value as needed and
sends in in the params hash. I’m trying to get the selected value to
return via the params hash but to do so “onchange” instead of by
clicking the submit button. Does anyone know how to submit a form
without having the user click the button?

You don’t submit the form. Use observe_field to submit the change to
the
first pulldown, then RJS to render the second. There’s been quite a bit
of
discussion here about how to use observe_field with select boxes and I’m
sure you can Google it up.

hth,
Bill

3

Thanks Bill. I just figured it out a few minutes ago. I wasn’t sure if
the method I chose was appropriate, but it looks like it is. Again,
thanks for your help!

Bill W. wrote:

Hi Daniel,

Daniel L. wrote:

I’m using AJAX with 2 select pulldowns. When you select an item in the
first pulldown, it dynamically populates the second pulldown. However,
I need to value of the first select pulldown to know how to populate the
second pulldown. When I select an element in the first pulldown, and
submit via clicking the submit button, it posts the value as needed and
sends in in the params hash. I’m trying to get the selected value to
return via the params hash but to do so “onchange” instead of by
clicking the submit button. Does anyone know how to submit a form
without having the user click the button?

You don’t submit the form. Use observe_field to submit the change to
the
first pulldown, then RJS to render the second. There’s been quite a bit
of
discussion here about how to use observe_field with select boxes and I’m
sure you can Google it up.

hth,
Bill

4

Daniel L. wrote:

Thanks Bill. I just figured it out a few minutes ago. I wasn’t sure if
the method I chose was appropriate, but it looks like it is. Again,
thanks for your help!

You’re welcome!

Bill