how do you determine an element type?

Classic Servoy
1

Hi all,

I was wondering if someone could tell me what property or call I could use to determine the displayType of an element.

I am looping through the elements on a form and need to determine whether or not it is a text area.

Thanks

2

see: getElementType() on elements

for 6 you can do for example: if (element instanceof RuntimeTextField)

3

Johan,

Thank you.

4

Johan,

I made this global method that uses getElementType(), to change the background colour when entering any (named) field on a form via the onElementFocusGained and onElementFocusLost form events. I want only to do this for TEXT_FIELD and TYPE_AHEAD.

function onElementFocusChanged(event) {
	var vElem = event.getElementName()
	var vEventType = event.getType()
	var vForm = event.getFormName()
	if (vElem && vForm)
	{	
		var vElementType = forms[vForm].elements[vElem].getElementType();
		application.output(vElementType)
		if (vElementType == ELEMENT_TYPES.TEXT_FIELD || vElementType == ELEMENT_TYPES.TYPE_AHEAD) // doesn't look nice on combobox
		{
			if (vEventType == "focusGained")
			{
				forms[vForm].elements[vElem].bgcolor =  '#ffffcc' // pale yellow
			}
			else { // reset to white on focus lost
				forms[vForm].elements[vElem].bgcolor = '#ffffff' // white
			}				
		}
	}
}

Works for TEXT_FIELD, but for TYPE_AHEAD fields I get this error

Java class “com.servoy.j2db.scripting.info.ELEMENT_TYPES” has no public instance field or method named “TYPE_AHEAD”.

Checking the Application>Constants node, it’s not there, nor COMBOBOX, even though both are returned with getElementType();

Can you suggest a work around?

5

Found that this throws an error

if (vElementType == ELEMENT_TYPES.TYPE_AHEAD)

But this works

if (vElementType == “TYPE_AHEAD”)

Which I guess is obvious but I expected all the element types to be in the ELEMENT_TYPES set of constants.

6

Hi Antonio,

The anomaly of the missing element type constants is something already fixed for the upcoming Servoy 6.

Paul

7

Thanks Paul, roll on V6!