Tabular Form – set default values with jQuery

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I have a simple tabular form with a numeric “sort order” column. I want the value of this column to be defaulted automatically, based on the maximum value of the rest of the records on the screen. Unfortunately the builtin Apex default type for columns in a tabular form can only be based on an Item, or a PL/SQL expression or function. I didn’t want to make a database call to get the maximum value because the user may have added multiple records which have not yet been saved to the database.

I tried basing the default on a hidden page item which I kept updated based on the values entered, but it seems the tabular form only gets the item’s value on page load and doesn’t re-examine the item’s value when you click the “Add” button. Instead, I had to turn to javascript and jQuery to get the job done.

1. Add a class to the tabular form column by setting the Element CSS Classes column attribute (I’ve used “sortorder” as the class name).

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2. Add a javascript function to the page that searches for all the “sortorder” items, calculates the maximum value and adds 10, and assigns it to the last sortorder item on the page.

function setNextSortOrder() {
  var highest=0;
  $(".sortorder").each(function(){
    if (this.value != "") {
      highest=Math.max(highest,parseFloat(this.value));
    }
  });
  $(".sortorder").last().val(highest+10);
}

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3. Modify the javascript for the “Add” button to call the setNextSortOrder function immediately after adding a row.

javascript:{apex.widget.tabular.addRow();setNextSortOrder();}

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It’s a bit hackish and might not work correctly in some cases but it’ll do for now.

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