# Updating inside the Browser with observe\_field

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/updating-inside-the-browser-with-observe-field/116609>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [October 7, 2007, 11:08pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/updating-inside-the-browser-with-observe-field/116609 "2007-10-07T23:08:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![rykkers](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@rykkers](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/rykkers)\
**Post date:** [October 7, 2007, 11:08pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/updating-inside-the-browser-with-observe-field/116609/1 "2007-10-07T23:08:29Z")

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A few days ago I spent some time scratching my head about how to use  
the prototype observe\_field helper to update fields in the browser DOM  
when a checkbox is clicked without a remote server request.

The function option of observe\_field (also observe\_form) is not well  
documented, and google didn’t help much.

I worked it out and just blogged about what I found at  
[http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/articles/2007/10/07/observing-fields-with-rails-in-the-browser](http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/articles/2007/10/07/observing-fields-with-rails-in-the-browser)

And I submitted a rails trac ticket with a doc patch to improve the  
documentation.  
[http://dev.rubyonrails.org/ticket/9808](http://dev.rubyonrails.org/ticket/9808)

Consider this a plea for folks to verify the patch.

–  
Rick DeNatale

My blog on Ruby  
[http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/](http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/)