RE: @number attribute on xforms:repeat

Excited by this thread (c:, I have been trying to create a form that uses a
repeat as a look up list, ie gradually filtering the xPath expression that
the repeat is based on according to user input.

I'm trying to create a nodeset with an expression similar to a SQL "Like",
and change the like as the instance data changes during data entry; am I
going too far out of the xForms box here?

Rob



-----Original Message-----
From: www-forms-request@w3.org [mailto:www-forms-request@w3.org]On
Behalf Of Peter Nunn
Sent: 29 November 2005 19:30
To: Allan Beaufour
Cc: Erik Bruchez; www-forms@w3.org
Subject: Re: @number attribute on xforms:repeat



I have worked with both mozilla (which does not implement @number) and
formsplayer.  Formsplayer had a bug where insert did not set the index,
but I believe that is now fixed.  It does implement @number which uses
the index as the start row and the displays a repeat with at least that
number of rows.  Unfortunately this is not a good solution as if you
have say a trigger in the repeat it will repeat that for all of the rows
that don't exist at the end of the list.
I think if a uniform way of displaying a repeat is to be defined then
some of the issues to consider are:

@number is the number of visible rows.  What happens at the end, do you
force a display of 'at least @number rows' or 'at most @number' rows.

Is @number used to display modulus of the display rows so the index is
visible somewhere in the area or always at the first/last/middle row.

What happens when the area in the repeat elements is variable height.
Generally the developer is setting @number to form some sort of grid to
give a consistent display, having the display then go back to a liquid
layout is probably not what was wanted.

There are probably more issues than just these, but if a standard way of
handling @number and setindex is to be developed then at least these
three should be explained as well.

Received on Tuesday, 29 November 2005 20:46:37 UTC