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Ajax Autocomplete for jQuery allows you to easily create autocomplete/autosuggest boxes for text input fields.
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Ajax Autocomplete for jQuery
Ajax Autocomplete for jQuery allows you to easily create autocomplete/autosuggest boxes for text input fields.
It has no dependencies other than jQuery.
The standard jquery.autocomplete.js file is around 13KB when minified.
API
The following sets up autocomplete for input fields where
options
is an object literal that defines the settings to use for the autocomplete plugin. All available option settings are shown in the tables below.$(selector).autocomplete(options);
General settings (local and Ajax)
Setting Default Description noCache
false
Boolean value indicating whether to cache suggestion results delimiter
optional String or RegExp, that splits input value and takes last part to as query for suggestions. Useful when for example you need to fill list of comma separated values. minChars
1
Minimum number of characters required to trigger autosuggest triggerSelectOnValidInput
true
Boolean value indicating if select
should be triggered if it matches suggestionpreventBadQueries
true
Boolean value indicating if it should prevent future Ajax requests for queries with the same root if no results were returned. E.g. if Jam
returns no suggestions, it will not fire for any future query that starts withJam
autoSelectFirst
false
If set to true
, first item will be selected when showing suggestionsbeforeRender
optional function (container, suggestions) {}
called before displaying the suggestions. You may manipulate suggestions DOM before it is displayedformatResult
optional function (suggestion, currentValue) {}
custom function to format suggestion entry inside suggestions containerformatGroup
optional function (suggestion, category) {}
custom function to format group headergroupBy
optional property name of the suggestion data
object, by which results should be groupedmaxHeight
300
Maximum height of the suggestions container in pixels width
auto
Suggestions container width in pixels, e.g.: 300, flex
for max suggestion size andauto
takes input field widthzIndex
9999
'z-index' for suggestions container appendTo
optional Container where suggestions will be appended. Default value document.body
. Can be jQuery object, selector or HTML element. Make sure to setposition: absolute
orposition: relative
for that elementforceFixPosition
false
Suggestions are automatically positioned when their container is appended to body (look at appendTo
option), in other cases suggestions are rendered but no positioning is applied. Set this option to force auto positioning in other casesorientation
bottom
Vertical orientation of the displayed suggestions, available values are auto
,top
,bottom
. If set toauto
, the suggestions will be orientated it the way that place them closer to middle of the view portpreserveInput
false
If true
, input value stays the same when navigating over suggestionsshowNoSuggestionNotice
false
When no matching results, display a notification label noSuggestionNotice
No results
Text or htmlString or Element or jQuery object for no matching results label onInvalidateSelection
optional function () {}
called when input is altered after selection has been made.this
is bound to input elementtabDisabled
false
Set to true to leave the cursor in the input field after the user tabs to select a suggestion Event function settings (local and Ajax)
Event setting Function description onSearchStart
function (params) {}
called before Ajax request.this
is bound to input elementonHint
function (hint) {}
used to change input value to first suggestion automatically.this
is bound to input elementonSearchComplete
function (query, suggestions) {}
called after Ajax response is processed.this
is bound to input element.suggestions
is an array containing the resultstransformResult
function(response, originalQuery) {}
called after the result of the query is ready. Converts the result into response.suggestions formatonSelect
function (suggestion) {}
Callback function invoked when user selects suggestion from the list.this
inside callback refers to input HtmlElement.onSearchError
function (query, jqXHR, textStatus, errorThrown) {}
called if Ajax request fails.this
is bound to input elementonHide
function (container) {}
called before container will be hiddenLocal only settings
Setting Default Description lookupLimit
no limit
Number of maximum results to display for local lookup lookup
n/a Callback function or lookup array for the suggestions. It may be array of strings or suggestion
object literalssuggestion
n/a Not a settings, but in the context of above row, a suggestion is an object literal with the following format: { value: 'string', data: any }
lookupFilter
n/a function (suggestion, query, queryLowerCase) {}
filter function for local lookups. By default it does partial string match (case insensitive)Ajax only settings
Setting Default Description serviceUrl
n/a Server side URL or callback function that returns serviceUrl string type
GET
Ajax request type to get suggestions dataType
text
type of data returned from server. Either text
,json
orjsonp
, which will cause the autocomplete to use jsonp. You may return a json object in your callback when using jsonpparamName
query
The name of the request parameter that contains the query params
optional Additional parameters to pass with the request deferRequestBy
0
Number of miliseconds to defer Ajax request ajaxSettings
optional Any additional Ajax Settings that configure the jQuery Ajax request Default Options
Default options for all instances can be accessed via
$.Autocomplete.defaults
.Instance Methods
Autocomplete instance has following methods:
setOptions(options)
: you may update any option at any time. Options are listed above.clear
: clears suggestion cache and current suggestions.clearCache
: clears suggestion cache.disable
: deactivate autocomplete.enable
: activates autocomplete if it was deactivated before.hide
: hides suggestions.dispose
: destroys autocomplete instance. All events are detached and suggestion containers removed.
There are two ways that you can invoke Autocomplete method. One is calling autocomplete on jQuery object and passing method name as string literal. If method has arguments, arguments are passed as consecutive parameters:
$('#autocomplete').autocomplete('disable'); $('#autocomplete').autocomplete('setOptions', options);
Or you can get Autocomplete instance by calling autcomplete on jQuery object without any parameters and then invoke desired method.
$('#autocomplete').autocomplete().disable(); $('#autocomplete').autocomplete().setOptions(options);
Usage
Html:
<input type="text" name="country" id="autocomplete"/>
Ajax lookup:
$('#autocomplete').autocomplete({ serviceUrl: '/autocomplete/countries', onSelect: function (suggestion) { alert('You selected: ' + suggestion.value + ', ' + suggestion.data); } });
Local lookup (no Ajax):
var countries = [ { value: 'Andorra', data: 'AD' }, // ... { value: 'Zimbabwe', data: 'ZZ' } ]; $('#autocomplete').autocomplete({ lookup: countries, onSelect: function (suggestion) { alert('You selected: ' + suggestion.value + ', ' + suggestion.data); } });
Custom lookup function:
$('#autocomplete').autocomplete({ lookup: function (query, done) { // Do Ajax call or lookup locally, when done, // call the callback and pass your results: var result = { suggestions: [ { "value": "United Arab Emirates", "data": "AE" }, { "value": "United Kingdom", "data": "UK" }, { "value": "United States", "data": "US" } ] }; done(result); }, onSelect: function (suggestion) { alert('You selected: ' + suggestion.value + ', ' + suggestion.data); } });
Styling
Generated HTML markup for suggestions is displayed below. You may style it any way you'd like.
<div class="autocomplete-suggestions"> <div class="autocomplete-group"><strong>NHL</strong></div> <div class="autocomplete-suggestion autocomplete-selected">...</div> <div class="autocomplete-suggestion">...</div> <div class="autocomplete-suggestion">...</div> </div>
Style sample:
.autocomplete-suggestions { border: 1px solid #999; background: #FFF; overflow: auto; } .autocomplete-suggestion { padding: 2px 5px; white-space: nowrap; overflow: hidden; } .autocomplete-selected { background: #F0F0F0; } .autocomplete-suggestions strong { font-weight: normal; color: #3399FF; } .autocomplete-group { padding: 2px 5px; } .autocomplete-group strong { display: block; border-bottom: 1px solid #000; }
Response Format
Response from the server must be JSON formatted following JavaScript object:
{ // Query is not required as of version 1.2.5 "query": "Unit", "suggestions": [ { "value": "United Arab Emirates", "data": "AE" }, { "value": "United Kingdom", "data": "UK" }, { "value": "United States", "data": "US" } ] }
Data can be any value or object. Data object is passed to formatResults function and onSelect callback. Alternatively, if there is no data you can supply just a string array for suggestions:
{ "query": "Unit", "suggestions": ["United Arab Emirates", "United Kingdom", "United States"] }
Non standard query/results
If your Ajax service expects the query in a different format, and returns data in a different format than the standard response, you can supply the "paramName" and "transformResult" options:
$('#autocomplete').autocomplete({ paramName: 'searchString', transformResult: function(response) { return { suggestions: $.map(response.myData, function(dataItem) { return { value: dataItem.valueField, data: dataItem.dataField }; }) }; } })
Grouping Results
Specify
groupBy
option of you data property if you wish results to be displayed in groups. For example, setgroupBy: 'category'
if your suggestion data format is:[ { value: 'Chicago Blackhawks', data: { category: 'NHL' } }, { value: 'Chicago Bulls', data: { category: 'NBA' } } ]
Results will be formatted into two groups NHL and NBA.
Known Issues
If you use it with jQuery UI library it also has plugin named
autocomplete
. In this case you can use plugin aliasdevbridgeAutocomplete
:$('.autocomplete').devbridgeAutocomplete({ ... });
It seems that for mobile Safari click events are only triggered if the CSS of the object being tapped has the cursor set to pointer:
.autocomplete-suggestion { cursor: pointer; }
See issue #542
License
Ajax Autocomplete for jQuery is freely distributable under the terms of an MIT-style license.
Copyright notice and permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
Authors
Tomas Kirda / @tkirda