Webware for Python

I'm going through a list of last minute changes to a small application, one of the new features is the ability to save the input
selection of a large form ~25 fields - all different types.

Three lines of code!
When you process the form add
      self.session().setValue('CurrentQ',fields)

when you display the form
add
     if (self.session().hasValue('CurrentQ')):
           defaults = self.session().value('CurrentQ')
assuming you display the form via
  rf = self.renderableForm(defaults=defaults, optionSet=options)

The ability to easily add unforseen functionality is what led me to webware in the first place.  Of course the time that this saved
me over manually coding the system I then wasted writing this email......

Thanks,
-Aaron
===================================================================
As Isaac Newton would say now:
        If I see further than others, it is because I stand on
        the shoulders of giants too dumb to patent their discoveries.
  (Gregory Palast, http://www.observer.co.uk/ )

Re: [Webware-discuss] Why I love FunFormKit! From: Luke Opperman <luko@ro...> - 2001-12-14 19:47 Question about FunFormKit: Is it easy/possible to integrate with complex form layout? (i.e, is the presentation separate from the form logic?) Our graphics department designs forms that "look good" (typically in tables, heavy use of styles for background color grouping and text classes, help and section headings...) I read through the FunFormKit docs, and lots of it sounded good from my programming perspective. But I don't recall anything about feeding it a template for the layout or anything... I guess what I'm imagining would be an HTML chunk that has the form, the appearance, etc (straight from the graphics folk). And FunFormKit (or my imaginary equivalent) uses this (the form fields have matching names to the formDef) for display. Feasible? Cause I'm working my way through 4 forms each with 20+ fields, this project isn't on Webware but the next probably will be and I'd like to imagine my life getting easier then. :) I'd be willing to write a modification along these lines if someone will say "that sounds like it fits into the FunFormKit ideal". Luke ===== ------------------ Reference Counting Garbage Collection: Look out philosophy majors, things really DO cease to exist when no one is looking at them! ------------------ __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Check out Yahoo! Shopping and Yahoo! Auctions for all of your unique holiday gifts! Buy at http://shopping.yahoo.com or bid at http://auctions.yahoo.com

RE: [Webware-discuss] Why I love FunFormKit! From: Matt Feifarek <mjf@da...> - 2001-12-14 20:05 | Is it easy/possible to integrate with complex form layout? | (i.e, is the presentation separate from the form logic?) Not really. We did this, and basically wrote wrapper classes using a completely simple template/string-substitution method. All we rely on FFK for is the <input nnnn> tags. We wrap them up in divs or whatever is required via the template. | easier then. :) I'd be willing to write a modification | along these lines if someone will say "that sounds like it | fits into the FunFormKit ideal". It seems difficult to "fit" something into FFK. FFK seems very full-featured, but the whole paint/input/post/validate loop is quite complicated and makes it hard to adapt. We have satisfactory results with our wrapper, but I don't feel good about our code... it's pretty crufty. After we do a cleanup pass (or two) perhaps we'll let everyone see the code and rip it up.

Re: [Webware-discuss] Why I love FunFormKit! From: Aaron Held <aaron@me...> - 2001-12-14 20:55 From: "Matt Feifarek" <mjf@...> > | Is it easy/possible to integrate with complex form layout? > | (i.e, is the presentation separate from the form logic?) > > Not really. We did this, and basically wrote wrapper classes using a You can use Cheetah - in your servlet rf = self.renderableForm(defaults=defaults, optionSet=options) t = Template(file=templateFile,searchList=[{'rf':rf, 'user':userToView}]) and in the template: <tr><td align="right" valign="top" class="label">$rf['username'].description:</td><td>$rf['username'] $rf > | easier then. :) I'd be willing to write a modification > | along these lines if someone will say "that sounds like it > | fits into the FunFormKit ideal". > > It seems difficult to "fit" something into FFK. FFK seems very > full-featured, but the whole paint/input/post/validate loop is quite > complicated and makes it hard to adapt. We have satisfactory results with Basically you can tie any code either a submit button or a field validation routine. I have one form w/ five buttons and each button calls a different method in the code. I have not run into anything too complex for this system. You can also stick code in a custom validator for any field, or for the whole form. An example was posted to the mailing list a while ago but I cannot find it. I can send my example if you like. But I'd love to see your code as well. -Aaron

Re: [Webware-discuss] Why I love FunFormKit! From: Ian Bicking <ianb@co...> - 2001-12-15 00:31 On Fri, 2001-12-14 at 14:54, Aaron Held wrote: > From: "Matt Feifarek" <mjf@...> > > | Is it easy/possible to integrate with complex form layout? > > | (i.e, is the presentation separate from the form logic?) > > > > Not really. We did this, and basically wrote wrapper classes using a > > You can use Cheetah - > in your servlet > rf = self.renderableForm(defaults=defaults, optionSet=options) > t = Template(file=templateFile,searchList=[{'rf':rf, 'user':userToView}]) > > and in the template: > <tr><td align="right" valign="top" class="label">$rf['username'].description:</td><td>$rf['username'] $rf Yes, this is how you're supposed to template FFK, generally. It should be possible to use $rf.username (instead of $rf['username']) as well. I've generally been satisfied enough with htFormTable, but Jeff Johnson has used it with Cheetah in this way. htFormTable only provides very simple layout, so really the intention is that you use something else for more complicated layout -- though I'm open something inbetween htFormTable and a full templating language. Someone suggested that before. The one place where, currently, you can't get control is with multi-checkbox and radio fields, because I haven't decided on what the interface to access subelements might be. The same problem exists for grouped/repeating fields. Ian

Re: [Webware-discuss] Why I love FunFormKit! From: <iron@ms...> - 2001-12-15 01:00 On Fri, Dec 14, 2001 at 06:35:03PM -0600, Ian Bicking wrote: > > <tr><td align="right" valign="top" class="label">$rf['username'].description:</td><td>$rf['username'] $rf I would use the ${} syntax in this case so that the poor maintainer doesn't have to stop and think about where the placeholder ends. <tr><td align="right" valign="top" class="label">${rf['username'].description}:</td><td>${rf['username']} $rf > Yes, this is how you're supposed to template FFK, generally. It should > be possible to use $rf.username (instead of $rf['username']) as well. Good point. <tr><td align="right" valign="top" class="label">${rf.username.description}:</td><td>${rf.username} $rf -- -Mike (Iron) Orr, iron@... (if mail problems: mso@...) http://iron.cx/ English * Esperanto * Russkiy * Deutsch * Espan~ol

RE: [Webware-discuss] Why I love FunFormKit! From: Ian Bicking <ianb@co...> - 2001-12-15 01:07 On Fri, 2001-12-14 at 14:05, Matt Feifarek wrote: > | Is it easy/possible to integrate with complex form layout? > | (i.e, is the presentation separate from the form logic?) > > Not really. We did this, and basically wrote wrapper classes using a > completely simple template/string-substitution method. All we rely on FFK > for is the <input nnnn> tags. We wrap them up in divs or whatever is > required via the template. What did you do in your wrapper class? RenderableForm is basically a wrapper class itself, and is intended to be usable for templates and such -- though some template systems might not be able to access everything, if they can't access attributes and functions. > | easier then. :) I'd be willing to write a modification > | along these lines if someone will say "that sounds like it > | fits into the FunFormKit ideal". > > It seems difficult to "fit" something into FFK. FFK seems very > full-featured, but the whole paint/input/post/validate loop is quite > complicated and makes it hard to adapt. We have satisfactory results with > our wrapper, but I don't feel good about our code... it's pretty crufty. > > After we do a cleanup pass (or two) perhaps we'll let everyone see the code > and rip it up. I've been thinking that I should document some of the inner workings, as people will feel more comfortable with FFK they understand what its doing. The actual FormServlet class is fairly small (though dense), but the size might actually make it harder to understand -- the actual logic and flow of the code goes between the various classes quite a lot. Maybe a FunFormKitAnatomy document. Some of the confusion might be because of some ways in which I generalized the code which might not really be necessary, for instance all the method names you pass in, when predefined method names would probably be easier to understand. Ian

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