Any recommendations for multiple forms in catalyst (have been using HTML::FormFu)?

[kakimoto]

hello all :)

  i;m trying to build a system with catalyst. Followed the tutes and
used html::FormFu. Works great but fails when i have multiple step
operations.

 been introduced to Catalyst-Controller-FormBuilder-MultiForm and will
look at it.

Any more recommendations to achieve the purpose below?

step 1: generate a form prompting users to choose "loan" type (ie. home,
personal, corporate)
step 2: generate a form based on the type of loan chosen from step 2
step 3: save loan type to "loans" table (attributes from form in step
1), get ID ,
           save the attributes from the form in step 2

Using Html::FormFu,
in step 2, i have loaded the specific YAML config based on the loan type
by instantiating a new html::Formfu object.

problem is, in step 3, by using $c->{stash}->{form}, i cannot get any
attributes found in step3.


Any ideas??

Also, any recommendations for multiple forms in catalyst?



Thanks all


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[Carl Franks]

2008/7/3  <kakimoto@...>:

>
> hello all :)
>
>  i;m trying to build a system with catalyst. Followed the tutes and
> used html::FormFu. Works great but fails when i have multiple step
> operations.
>
>  been introduced to Catalyst-Controller-FormBuilder-MultiForm and will
> look at it.
>
> Any more recommendations to achieve the purpose below?
>
> step 1: generate a form prompting users to choose "loan" type (ie. home,
> personal, corporate)
> step 2: generate a form based on the type of loan chosen from step 2
> step 3: save loan type to "loans" table (attributes from form in step
> 1), get ID ,
>           save the attributes from the form in step 2
>
> Using Html::FormFu,
> in step 2, i have loaded the specific YAML config based on the loan type
> by instantiating a new html::Formfu object.
>
> problem is, in step 3, by using $c->{stash}->{form}, i cannot get any
> attributes found in step3.

I'm guessing that in step 3, your $c->stash->{form} is the one created
by the FormConfig action - in which case it's the same form used for
step 1.
It won't validate the submitted parameters, because it doesn't know
about any of the fields you generated in step 2.
What you need to do is again generate the same form as step 2, and use
that to validate the submitted parameters.
Something like this:


sub form1 : Path : FormConfig {
    my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

    my $form = $self->stash->{form};

    if ( $form->submitted_and_valid ) {
        $c->stash->{loan_type} = $form->param_value('loan_type');

        $c->detach('form2');
    }
}

sub form2 : Path : FormMethod('_build_form2') {
    my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

    my $form = $self->stash->{form};

    if ( $form->submitted_and_valid ) {
        # save to database
    }
    elsif ( $c->stash->{loan_type} ) {
        # save loan-type value to hidden field
        $form->get_field('load_type')->default( $c->stash->{loan_type} );
    }
}

sub _build_form2 {
    my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

    # return hash-ref based on $c->req->params->{loan_type}
    # automatically gets passed to $form->populate
}

Although I haven't yet thought about how to handle auto-generated
forms, there's also HTML-FormFu-MultiForm and the appropriate
MultiForm* catalyst actions. These are all still in svn, but do work.

Carl

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[kakimoto]

Hello Carl,
  Thanks for that. Sounds good but a few questions to ask.

1) I have read through the Actions section in
http://search.cpan.org/~zarquon/Catalyst-Manual-5.7012/lib/Catalyst/Manual/Intro.pod#Actions
and yet I couldn't really find anything that describes what the third
argument in
"sub form2 : Path : FormMethod('_build_form2')" means. In that, I meant,
"FormMethod('_build_form2')".

2) From sub build_form_2, you mentioned that
>     # return hash-ref based on $c->req->params->{loan_type}
>     # automatically gets passed to $form->populate

Is it possible for me to:
 a) load_config_file() of a certain file which I define (for example,
"home_loans.yml")
 b) and return  the form object that has just runned load_config_file
(as per the step above)?


Any sites you could point me to read in reference to the first question
would be great.

 Thanks!

kakimoto




Quoting Carl Franks <fireartist@...>:

> 2008/7/3  <kakimoto@...>:
> >
> > hello all :)
> >
> >  i;m trying to build a system with catalyst. Followed the tutes
> and
> > used html::FormFu. Works great but fails when i have multiple step
> > operations.
> >
> >  been introduced to Catalyst-Controller-FormBuilder-MultiForm and
> will
> > look at it.
> >
> > Any more recommendations to achieve the purpose below?
> >
> > step 1: generate a form prompting users to choose "loan" type (ie.
> home,
> > personal, corporate)
> > step 2: generate a form based on the type of loan chosen from step
> 2
> > step 3: save loan type to "loans" table (attributes from form in
> step
> > 1), get ID ,
> >           save the attributes from the form in step 2
> >
> > Using Html::FormFu,
> > in step 2, i have loaded the specific YAML config based on the loan
> type
> > by instantiating a new html::Formfu object.
> >
> > problem is, in step 3, by using $c->{stash}->{form}, i cannot get
> any
> > attributes found in step3.
>
> I'm guessing that in step 3, your $c->stash->{form} is the one
> created
> by the FormConfig action - in which case it's the same form used for
> step 1.
> It won't validate the submitted parameters, because it doesn't know
> about any of the fields you generated in step 2.
> What you need to do is again generate the same form as step 2, and
> use
> that to validate the submitted parameters.
> Something like this:
>
>
> sub form1 : Path : FormConfig {
>     my ( $self, $c ) = @_;
>
>     my $form = $self->stash->{form};
>
>     if ( $form->submitted_and_valid ) {
>         $c->stash->{loan_type} = $form->param_value('loan_type');
>
>         $c->detach('form2');
>     }
> }
>
> sub form2 : Path : FormMethod('_build_form2') {
>     my ( $self, $c ) = @_;
>
>     my $form = $self->stash->{form};
>
>     if ( $form->submitted_and_valid ) {
>         # save to database
>     }
>     elsif ( $c->stash->{loan_type} ) {
>         # save loan-type value to hidden field
>         $form->get_field('load_type')->default(
> $c->stash->{loan_type} );
>     }
> }
>
> sub _build_form2 {
>     my ( $self, $c ) = @_;
>
>     # return hash-ref based on $c->req->params->{loan_type}
>     # automatically gets passed to $form->populate
> }
>
> Although I haven't yet thought about how to handle auto-generated
> forms, there's also HTML-FormFu-MultiForm and the appropriate
> MultiForm* catalyst actions. These are all still in svn, but do
> work.
>
> Carl
>
> _______________________________________________
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> http://www.mail-archive.com/catalyst@.../
> Dev site: http://dev.catalyst.perl.org/
>
>
>

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[Tomas Doran]

On 3 Jul 2008, at 09:05, Carl Franks wrote:
>
> I'm guessing that in step 3, your $c->stash->{form} is the one created
> by the FormConfig action - in which case it's the same form used for
> step 1.
> It won't validate the submitted parameters, because it doesn't know
> about any of the fields you generated in step 2.
> What you need to do is again generate the same form as step 2, and use
> that to validate the submitted parameters.
>

I'd disagree. At each step, you want to validate where you got so  
far, and if that validation goes well, move on - otherwise, move back...

For non-trivial things such as this, I'd be looking at  
Class::Workflow, which does all of this and more, and you can persist  
your workflow state in DBIx::C...

Cheers
t0m


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[Carl Franks]

2008/7/4 Tomas Doran <bobtfish@...>:

>
> On 3 Jul 2008, at 09:05, Carl Franks wrote:
>>
>> I'm guessing that in step 3, your $c->stash->{form} is the one created
>> by the FormConfig action - in which case it's the same form used for
>> step 1.
>> It won't validate the submitted parameters, because it doesn't know
>> about any of the fields you generated in step 2.
>> What you need to do is again generate the same form as step 2, and use
>> that to validate the submitted parameters.
>>
>
> I'd disagree. At each step, you want to validate where you got so far, and
> if that validation goes well, move on - otherwise, move back...

I think there's been either a lacking in my explanation, or a lacking
in your interpretation - if you follow my posted code, it does exactly
what you describe.

Display form 1
 -> if valid goto form 2
 -> if not valid redisplay form 1
Display form 2
 -> if valid, use the data
 -> if not valid, redisplay form 2

This is exactly what HTML::FormFu::MultiForm does, but makes it more
simple, as you can do it all within a single Catalyst action - it also
encrypts previous form's data within a hidden field, so you don't need
to revalidate earlier data.

The bit I suspect the OP was getting wrong, was trying to validate
form 2's submission, using form 1.

However, rather than suggest a new module - to get the job done I
suggested what I hoped would only be a minor code change (based on
typical formfu usage, as the OP didn't give any code).

Cheers,
Carl

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[Carl Franks]

2008/7/4  <kakimoto@...>:
> Hello Carl,
>  Thanks for that. Sounds good but a few questions to ask.
>
> 1) I have read through the Actions section in
> http://search.cpan.org/~zarquon/Catalyst-Manual-5.7012/lib/Catalyst/Manual/Intro.pod#Actions
> and yet I couldn't really find anything that describes what the third
> argument in
> "sub form2 : Path : FormMethod('_build_form2')" means. In that, I meant,
> "FormMethod('_build_form2')".

I'll provide brief answers - if you want, repost to the formfu mailing
list [1] so we don't waste the good Catalyst folk's time.

When you referred to `$form->stash->{form}` I perhaps wrongly guessed
you were using Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu and the FormConfig
action.

FormMethod is documented in Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu [2]

In a nutshell, FormMethod('_build_form') does this:

    my $form = HTML::FormFu->new;
    $form->populate(
        $controller->_build_form($c)
    );
    $form->process( $c->request );
    $c->stash->{form} = $form;

> 2) From sub build_form_2, you mentioned that
>>     # return hash-ref based on $c->req->params->{loan_type}
>>     # automatically gets passed to $form->populate
>
> Is it possible for me to:
>  a) load_config_file() of a certain file which I define (for example,
> "home_loans.yml")
>  b) and return  the form object that has just runned load_config_file
> (as per the step above)?

Something like this would work:

sub _build_form {
    my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

    my $value = $c->req->param->{loan_type}
        or die "loan_type required";

    my $file;

    if ( $value eq 'foo' ) {
        $file = 'foo.yml';
    }
    elsif ( $value eq 'bar' ) {
        $file = 'bar.yml';
    }
    else {
        die "invalid loan_type";
    }

    $file = $c->path_to('root', 'forms', $file);

    return {
        load_config_file => "$file",
    };
}


[1] http://lists.scsys.co.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/html-formfu
[2] http://search.cpan.org/~cfranks/Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu-0.03000/lib/Catalyst/Controller/HTML/FormFu.pm#SYNOPSIS

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[kakimoto]

Hi, carl,

 thanks for the help!!
the doco you passed to me on was really good.. Thanks


Nevertheless, I could only find
Catalyst::Controller::FormBuilder::MultiForm.
 You mentioned there's  HTML::FormFu::MultiForm. I have seen
"Catalyst::Controller::HTML::FormFu::Action::MultiForm" but can't seem
to read up on it cause there's no link to it in
http://search.cpan.org/~cfranks/Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu-0.03000/.


Yes, I know we could use perhaps another module to handle forms with
multiple steps but I think HTML::FormFu is cool and would love to build
my application with it.   Would be great if you could shed some light here.


thank you.





Quoting Carl
Franks <fireartist@...>:

> 2008/7/4 Tomas Doran <bobtfish@...>:
> >
> > On 3 Jul 2008, at 09:05, Carl Franks wrote:
> >>
> >> I'm guessing that in step 3, your $c->stash->{form} is the one
> created
> >> by the FormConfig action - in which case it's the same form used
> for
> >> step 1.
> >> It won't validate the submitted parameters, because it doesn't
> know
> >> about any of the fields you generated in step 2.
> >> What you need to do is again generate the same form as step 2, and
> use
> >> that to validate the submitted parameters.
> >>
> >
> > I'd disagree. At each step, you want to validate where you got so
> far, and
> > if that validation goes well, move on - otherwise, move back...
>
> I think there's been either a lacking in my explanation, or a
> lacking
> in your interpretation - if you follow my posted code, it does
> exactly
> what you describe.
>
> Display form 1
>  -> if valid goto form 2
>  -> if not valid redisplay form 1
> Display form 2
>  -> if valid, use the data
>  -> if not valid, redisplay form 2
>
> This is exactly what HTML::FormFu::MultiForm does, but makes it more
> simple, as you can do it all within a single Catalyst action - it
> also
> encrypts previous form's data within a hidden field, so you don't
> need
> to revalidate earlier data.

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[Carl Franks]

2008/7/6  <kakimoto@...>:
>
> Nevertheless, I could only find
> Catalyst::Controller::FormBuilder::MultiForm.
>  You mentioned there's  HTML::FormFu::MultiForm. I have seen
> "Catalyst::Controller::HTML::FormFu::Action::MultiForm" but can't seem
> to read up on it cause there's no link to it in
> http://search.cpan.org/~cfranks/Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu-0.03000/.

Hi,

The multiform module hasn't been released to cpan yet - you need to
check it out from the subversion repository.
You can find it, and the Cat-controller, in the 2 project folders:
http://html-formfu.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/HTML-FormFu
http://html-formfu.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu

The reason it hasn't been released yet, is because the file upload
handling needs a bit more work - other than that, it works fine, and
I'm using it in a live application.

Carl

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[Octavian Rasnita-2]

From: "Carl Franks" <fireartist@...>

> The multiform module hasn't been released to cpan yet - you need to
> check it out from the subversion repository.
> You can find it, and the Cat-controller, in the 2 project folders:
> http://html-formfu.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/HTML-FormFu
> http://html-formfu.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/Catalyst-Controller-HTML-FormFu
>
> The reason it hasn't been released yet, is because the file upload
> handling needs a bit more work - other than that, it works fine, and
> I'm using it in a live application.
>
> Carl

Will HTML::FormFu work under Windows?

Octavian


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[Carl Franks]

2008/7/6 Octavian Rasnita <orasnita@...>:
>
> Will HTML::FormFu work under Windows?

Yes!

The reason I haven't released the MultiForm work to cpan yet, is
because I've had trouble getting the tests to run under windows - but
that's more an issue with how I was testing, rather than the actual
code.

Other than that though, I've got HTML-FormFu and all it's dependencies
installed using VanillaPerl on WinXP.

Carl

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[Octavian Rasnita-2]

From: "Carl Franks" <fireartist@...>
>> Will HTML::FormFu work under Windows?
>
> Yes!

This is great!

> The reason I haven't released the MultiForm work to cpan yet, is
> because I've had trouble getting the tests to run under windows - but
> that's more an issue with how I was testing, rather than the actual
> code.
>
> Other than that though, I've got HTML-FormFu and all it's dependencies
> installed using VanillaPerl on WinXP.
>
> Carl

I have also installed it, but I needed to install DateTime and
DateTime::Format::Strptime using ppm, because with cpan it gave some errors.

Octavian


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[Carl Franks]

2008/7/6 Octavian Rasnita <orasnita@...>:
>
> I have also installed it, but I needed to install DateTime and
> DateTime::Format::Strptime using ppm, because with cpan it gave some errors.

Okay, when I get the time, I'll try installing on a fresh perl
install, and see what happens.

I can remember hitting some missing prereq-dependency recently, but
can't find any relevant RT bugs on any of the DateTime* modules we use
- my bad for not following it up at the time!

Carl

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[kakimoto]

hi
 I was pretty successful in keeping things simple.

 I figured I d' keep all steps that needed a form to be generated (ie
for data entry) to "sub create".

Then, at the very end when I am done getting all the data (from forms
shown on the webpage), I would then
redirect/forward/detach to another method, "sub save_complete_listing".

sub create :Local  :FormMethod('_get_dynamic_form') {
    my ($self, $c) = @_;

    # Set the template
    my $effective_template = 'listings/create.tt2';
    $c->stash->{template} = $effective_template;
    my $loanType = lc($c->request->param('loanType'));

    my $step = $c->flash->{step};
    $c->log->debug("Current operation: $step");

    if (defined($step) and $step =~ m/\w+/)
    {
        my $form_submission_success = $c->stash->{'form'}->submitted();
        if ($form_submission_success) {

            if ($step eq 'first_step')
            {
               ....


             # now, set the next step.
              $c->flash->{'step'} = 'second_step';
           }
           elsif ($step eq 'second_step')
           {
             ....

 
             # now, set the next step.
              $c->flash->{'step'} = 'third_step';

           }
           elsif ($step eq 'third_step')
           {
             ....

 
             # now, we have acquired all data we need from steps one and
two.
             # we do a redirect/forward/detach to save the values.
Should go to 'sub save_complete_listing'

             $c->detach/ $c->res->forward/$c->redirect   # all failed.
           }


 A few questions:

1) What is the difference between Detach, forward and redirect?? I read
through the docos and they are under explained.
   Refered to
http://search.cpan.org/~mramberg/Catalyst-Runtime-5.7014/lib/Catalyst.pm#___top

    Correct me if i am wrong:
    a) $c->forward - control will be passed to whatever target it is
defined with. Once the target is finished with execution, control will
go back to where it was "forwarded" from

   b) $c->detach - same as forward BUT control does not go back to where
it was "detached" from.

   c) $c->res->redirect - someone please give me an idea cause my
initial thoughts was that it should resemble forward

2. When we do a $c->forward/$c->detach/$c->res->redirect,  would
     a) $c still be defined??
     b) $c->stash contents still be defined??
     c) $c->flash contents still be defined??

  For stash and flash, I noticed they got wiped off. Particularly,
$c->stash/flash->{'form'}.
To be extra safe, before the $c->forward/$c->detach/$c->res->redirect,
I even explicitly did a "$c->flash->{'form'} = $c->stash->{'form'}" and
 yet the values have dissappeared.


 Please help.

Thanks

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[Bill Moseley]

On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 11:13:34PM +1000, kakimoto@... wrote:

> hi
>  I was pretty successful in keeping things simple.
>
>
> sub create :Local  :FormMethod('_get_dynamic_form') {
>     my ($self, $c) = @_;
>
>     # Set the template
>     my $effective_template = 'listings/create.tt2';
>     $c->stash->{template} = $effective_template;
>     my $loanType = lc($c->request->param('loanType'));
>
>     my $step = $c->flash->{step};
>     $c->log->debug("Current operation: $step");
>
>     if (defined($step) and $step =~ m/\w+/)
>     {
>         my $form_submission_success = $c->stash->{'form'}->submitted();
>         if ($form_submission_success) {
>
>             if ($step eq 'first_step')
>             {
>                ....
>
>
>              # now, set the next step.
>               $c->flash->{'step'} = 'second_step';
>            }
>            elsif ($step eq 'second_step')
>            {
>              ....
>
>  
>              # now, set the next step.
>               $c->flash->{'step'} = 'third_step';
>
>            }
>            elsif ($step eq 'third_step')
>            {
>              ....
>
>  
>              # now, we have acquired all data we need from steps one and
> two.
>              # we do a redirect/forward/detach to save the values.
> Should go to 'sub save_complete_listing'
>
>              $c->detach/ $c->res->forward/$c->redirect   # all failed.
>            }

Have not been following that closely, but that looks complicated.
I would do something like this with Form::Processor:

    sub first_step : Local {
        my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

        return $c->post_redirect( 'second_step' )
            if $c->update_from_form;
    }


    sub second_step : Local {
        my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

        return $c->redirect( 'first_step' )
            unless $c->session->{first_step};

        return $c->post_redirect( 'third_step' )
            if $c->update_from_form;

    }


    sub third_step : Local {
        my ( $self, $c ) = @_;

        return $c->redirect( 'second_step' )
            unless $c->session->{second_step};

        return $c->post_redirect( '/home', 'Thanks for your order' )
            if $c->update_from_form:
    }

My forms are classes, thus each form class knows to save their data in the
session (except third_step which writes all the form data).  They also
know how to pre-populate the form from a previous submission (for
example, if someone goes from form three back to form one.

update_from_form() knows the form class from the action name, and
$c->redirect and $c->post_redirect are simple short-cut methods to
build the redirect and localize any messages that end up in flash.


--
Bill Moseley
moseley@...
Sent from my iMutt


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