I am trying to get the text in a text box as the user types in it (jsfiddle playground):
function edValueKeyPress() { var edValue = document.getElementById("edValue"); var s = edValue.value; var lblValue = document.getElementById("lblValue"); lblValue.innerText = "The text box contains: " + s; //var s = $("#edValue").val(); //$("#lblValue").text(s); }
<input id="edValue" type="text" onKeyPress="edValueKeyPress()"><br> <span id="lblValue">The text box contains: </span>
The code runs without errors, except that the value of the input text
box, during onKeyPress
is always the value before the change:
Question: How do I get the text of a text box during
onKeyPress
?
Bonus Chatter
There are three events related to “the user is typing” in the HTML DOM:
onKeyDown
onKeyPress
onKeyUp
In Windows, the order of WM_Key
messages becomes important when the user holds down a key, and the key begins to repeat:
WM_KEYDOWN('a')
– user has pushed down the A keyWM_CHAR('a')
– ana
character has been received from the userWM_CHAR('a')
– ana
character has been received from the userWM_CHAR('a')
– ana
character has been received from the userWM_CHAR('a')
– ana
character has been received from the userWM_CHAR('a')
– ana
character has been received from the userWM_KEYUP('a')
– the user has released the A key
Will result in five characters appearing in a text control: aaaaa
The important point being that the you respond to the WM_CHAR
message, the one that repeats. Otherwise you miss events when a key is pressed.
In HTML things are slightly different:
onKeyDown
onKeyPress
onKeyDown
onKeyPress
onKeyDown
onKeyPress
onKeyDown
onKeyPress
onKeyDown
onKeyPress
onKeyUp
Html delivers an KeyDown
and KeyPress
every key repeat. And the KeyUp
event is only raised when the user releases the key.
Take aways
- I can respond to
onKeyDown
oronKeyPress
, but both are still raised before theinput.value
has been updated - I cannot respond to
onKeyUp
, because it doesn’t happen as the text in the text-box changes.
Question: How do I get the text of a text-box during onKeyPress
?
Bonus Reading
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Answer
Handling the input
event is a consistent solution: it is supported for textarea
and input
elements in all contemporary browsers and it fires exactly when you need it:
function edValueKeyPress() { var edValue = document.getElementById("edValue"); var s = edValue.value; var lblValue = document.getElementById("lblValue"); lblValue.innerText = "The text box contains: " + s; }
<input id="edValue" type="text" onInput="edValueKeyPress()"><br> <span id="lblValue">The text box contains: </span>
I’d rewrite this a bit, though:
function showCurrentValue(event) { const value = event.target.value; document.getElementById("label").innerText = value; }
<input type="text" onInput="showCurrentValue(event)"><br> The text box contains: <span id="label"></span>