Text box does not scale in custom form

[Gary]

I expected the custom widget for strings to scale to the size of the
length specified in the ORM, but they all come out the same size - and
they're big.

Is there another place I should be entering something that helps me
with this? I've constructed a custom form using CRUD and the field
names are {{=form.custom.widget.fieldname}}.

Thanks in advance,
Gary

[Gary]

Sorry, missed the posting two down titled 'Length'.

That solved the problem, but is there a more eloquent way not using
JQuery?

[Thadeus Burgess]

Use CSS.

You will have to edit web2py_ajax.html and remove the javascripts that alter field lengths.

In css

input {
    width: 150px;
    height: 25px;
    font-size: 1.5em;
   ...etc etc
}

OR reference by class name or ID

-Thadeus

[mr.freeze]

I personally don't agree with using javascript to set properties like
that. I remove these lines from web2py_ajax.html:

jQuery('input.string').attr('size',50);
jQuery('textarea.text').attr('cols',50).attr('rows',10);

Then use custom widgets or just set the properties if the form
elements directly:

form = SQLFORM(...)
txt = form.elements("textarea",_class="text")
for t in txt:
t['_cols'] = 10

Or with a widget:

def textarea_factory(**attr):
def fn(f,v):
return SQLFORM.widgets.text.widget(f,v,**attr)
return fn

form = SQLFORM.factory(Field('test','text',widget=textarea_factory
(_cols=40,_rows=15)))




db.table.field.widget = textarea_factory(_cols=10)

[Thadeus Burgess]

CSS will always be the best route for this, since you are "designing" your forms. Leave the styling of your site to CSS, and the programming to web2py :)

The other benefit of this is, if you want to update the way your site looks, instead of having to edit lines of code, you just replace your CSS files.

-Thadeus

[mr.freeze]

Agreed. If you can achieve the desired effect with CSS it should be
the first choice. My examples should only be used if you need to
modify attributes.

[mdipierro]

Would you send me a patch to remove

jQuery('input.string').attr('size',50);
jQuery('textarea.text').attr('cols',50).attr('rows',10);

from web2py_ajax.html

that adds the relevant css in base.css?