[Django]-Asynchronous forms with bootstrap and django

I struggled horribly with AJAX when I started with Django due to a lack of JS experience.

I will give you an example of an aync form I use to add options and display the options.

My template modal code is as follows, and it will work just as well with the form being rendered rather than my lazy hardcoded html.

   <div class="modal" id="AddOptions" style="display:none;">
  <div class="modal-header">
    <button class="close" data-dismiss="modal">X</button>
    <h3>Add Options</h3>
  </div>
  <div class="modal-body">

<form id="OptionForm" action="." method='POST'>
  <div id="OptionValueError" class="control-group">
  <span class="help-inline"></span><br>
  <br>Value&nbsp;<input type="text" name="OptionValue" id="id_OptionValue" /><br>Label&nbsp;<input type="text" name="OptionLabel" id="id_OptionLabel"/><input type="hidden" name="VariableID">
  </div>
<div id="divid_OptionTable">
<table class="table table-condensed" id="OptionTable">
<thead>
  <th>Value</th>
  <th colspan="2">Label</th>
</thead>
<tbody>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
</div>
  <div class="modal-footer">
  <input type="submit" class="btn btn-primary" value="Add">&nbsp;<button type="reset" class="btn">Reset</button>
</form>
  </div>
</div>

Next, make sure that the following is in your to take care of CSRF token issues.

<script type="text/javascript"> 
jQuery(document).ajaxSend(function(event, xhr, settings) {
    function getCookie(name) {
        var cookieValue = null;
        if (document.cookie && document.cookie != '') {
            var cookies = document.cookie.split(';');
            for (var i = 0; i < cookies.length; i++) {
                var cookie = jQuery.trim(cookies[i]);
                // Does this cookie string begin with the name we want?
                if (cookie.substring(0, name.length + 1) == (name + '=')) {
                    cookieValue = decodeURIComponent(cookie.substring(name.length + 1));
                    break;
                }
            }
        }
        return cookieValue;
    }
    function sameOrigin(url) {
        // url could be relative or scheme relative or absolute
        var host = document.location.host; // host + port
        var protocol = document.location.protocol;
        var sr_origin = '//' + host;
        var origin = protocol + sr_origin;
        // Allow absolute or scheme relative URLs to same origin
        return (url == origin || url.slice(0, origin.length + 1) == origin + '/') ||
            (url == sr_origin || url.slice(0, sr_origin.length + 1) == sr_origin + '/') ||
            // or any other URL that isn't scheme relative or absolute i.e relative.
            !(/^(\/\/|http:|https:).*/.test(url));
    }
    function safeMethod(method) {
        return (/^(GET|HEAD|OPTIONS|TRACE)$/.test(method));
    }

    if (!safeMethod(settings.type) && sameOrigin(settings.url)) {
        xhr.setRequestHeader("X-CSRFToken", getCookie('csrftoken'));
    }
});
</script>

Second, this is what a basic AJAX POST would look like using jQuery. Notice it is based on preventing the Default submission behaviour of the form living in our modal. On success I am appending the newly added values to the table. It would be less troublesome to add the values as part of catching the form, but I like to be sure everything has been saved and processed before being added to the table.

   $(document).ready(function() {
   $("#OptionForm").submit(function(event){
       event.preventDefault();
       $.ajax({
            type:"POST",
            url:"{% url builder.views.addoption %}",
            data: {VariableID: $('input:hidden[name=VariableID]').val(), OptionLabel: $('input:text[name=OptionLabel]').val(), OptionValue: $('input:text[name=OptionValue]').val()},
            success: function(data){
            console.log(data['OptionID']);
            $("#OptionValueError").removeClass("error");  
            $("#OptionValueError span").text("");  
            $("#OptionValueError span").removeClass("error");
            $('#OptionTable > tbody:last').append('<tr id=Option_'+data['OptionID']+'><td>'+data['OptionValue']+'</td><td>'+data['OptionLabel']+'</td><td><a href="#" onClick="deleteOption('+data['OptionID']+')"><i class="icon icon-remove"></i></a>');
            $('input:text[name=OptionValue]').val('');
            $('input:text[name=OptionLabel]').val('');
            }
          });
       });
    });

Lastly, you just need the view that captures this AJAX request, which would look like this partially written one below.

def addoption(request):
    if request.is_ajax():
        OptionValue = int(request.POST['OptionValue'])
        OptionLabel = request.POST['OptionLabel']
        VariableID = int(request.POST['VariableID'])
        getVar = Variable.objects.get(id=VariableID)
        newOption = Option(VariableID=getVar,
                Value=OptionValue,
                Label=OptionLabel)
        newOption.save()
        response = {'OptionValue': OptionValue, 'OptionLabel': OptionLabel, 'OptionID': newOption.id}
        json = simplejson.dumps(response)
        return HttpResponse(json, mimetype="text/json")
    else:
        pass

The response dict that we are json serializing is what is fed back as data and subsequently used to append the values to the table. All without reloading the main page.

Hopefully the example helped. Let me know if you have anymore questions.

JD