Tuesday 29 May 2012

Stunning popup window control using jquery



Introduction
Today I am going to demonstrate a stunning popup window control  for web developers. I thought there were plenty of such controls available on the internet but still I need to create my own as I need to develop such controls with little efforts.
Background
This popup control is extremely easy to implement, all you need to do is include the jQuery libraries (1, 2, 3 )and our jQuery Popup library file braviPopUp.js at the top of your HTML page, as well as a small amount of jQuery code.   
This Popup control is a floating window that contains a title bar and a content area for the popup page to be shown in the dialog. The dialog window can be moved, resized and closed with the 'x' icon by default.
If the content length exceeds the maximum height, a scrollbar will automatically appear.You can set width and height of the control. There is a limit for minimum width and height. 
braviPopUp method defined in the braviPopUp.js takes four perameters
  • title of the page
  • source URL  
  • width 
  • height   
To show the popup page content there is a Iframe inside the floating div that is used to show the popup control. This div is appended in the Bodyof the page with some css settings so that it can be centered.
Using the code 
Method defined in the braviPopUp.js is named braviPopUp and it takes four arguments title, url, width, height. I created raw html containg the main div with the title bar, close button, content area iFrame. When call the  braviPopUp  method it will append this html into page body with some css setting to center the control in the web page.
the jQuery code: 

(function ($) {
    $.braviPopUp = function (title, src, width, height) {
        //Destroy if exist
        $('#dv_move').remove();
        //create hte popup html
        var html = '<div class="main" id="dv_move" style="width:' + width + 'px; height:' + height + 'px;">';
        html += '  <div class="title">';
        html += '    <span id="title_left">' + title + '</span> <span class="close">';
        html += ' <img id="img_close" src="images/close.png" width="25" height="23" onclick="CloseDialog();"></span></div>';
        html += ' <div id="dv_no_move">';
        html += '<div id="dv_load"><img src="images/circular.gif"/></div>';
        html += ' <iframe id="url" scrolling="auto" src="' + src + '"  style="border:none;" width="100%" height="100%"></iframe>';
        html += ' </div>';
        html += ' </div>';

        //add to body
        $('body').append(html);
        //enable dragable
        $('#dv_move').draggable();
        //enable resizeable
        $("#dv_move").resizable({
            minWidth: 300,
            minHeight: 100,
            maxHeight: 768,
            maxWidth: 1024
        });

        $("#dv_no_move").mousedown(function () {
            return false;
        });
        $("#title_left").mousedown(function () {
            return false;
        });
        $("#img_close").mousedown(function () {
            return false;
        });
        //change close icon image on hover
        $("#img_close").mouseover(function () {
            $(this).attr("src"'images/close2.png');
        });
        $("#img_close").mouseout(function () {
            $(this).attr("src"'images/close.png');
        });

        setTimeout("$('#dv_load').hide();"1500);
    };
})(jQuery);


Control's close method
To call the close method from the poup page use parent.CloseDialog(); 

function CloseDialog() {
    $('#dv_move').fadeOut('slow');
    setTimeout("$('#dv_move').remove();"4000);
}


Here I am removing the HTML so that it will be completely destroy.
After all magic of appending the control to page body css is very important part of this control. positions and looks of all div, span are managed by css. Also  there are few images like the title bar image, close button icon etc
CSS: 

.main
{
    position: absolute;
    top: 25%;
    left: 30%;
    margin-left: -70px;
    background: url(../images/title.png) no-repeat;
    -moz-border-radius: 15px;
    border-radius: 15px;
    border: 3px solid gray;
    padding: 0;
    border: 1px dashed silver;
    background-color: #aacc74;
}
#dv_no_move
{
    padding: 2px -40px -50px 2px;
    height: 90%;
    width: 100%;
}
.close
{
    float: right;
    cursor: pointer;
    margin-top: 3px;
}
.close:hover
{
    margin-top: 5px;
}
.title
{
    cursor: move;
    width: 98%;
    height: 20px;
    font-size: 14;
    font-weight: 900;
    color: #fff;
}
#title_left
{
    padding: 4px 0 3px 9px;
    float: left;
    cursor: default;
}

#dv_load
{
    position: fixed;
    left: 50%;
    top: 50%;
    margin-left: -100px;
    margin: 0 auto;
}


Usage:
Using jQuery ready method I register the button click event and call the popup window.

<%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeFile="Default.aspx.cs" Inherits="_Default" %>

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head runat="server">
    <script type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.3.2/jquery.min.js"></script>
    <script type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.7.2/jquery-ui.js"></script>
    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.7.1/themes/base/jquery-ui.css" />
    <script src="jquery/braviPopup.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <link href="css/braviStyle.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
    <title>braviPopUp</title>
    <script type="text/javascript">
        $(document).ready(function () {
            $('#btnTest').click(function () {
                $.braviPopUp('testing title!''popup.aspx'600400);
            });
        });       
    </script>
</head>
<body>
    <form id="form1" runat="server">
    <input type="button" id="btnTest" value="Click Me!" />
    </form>
</body>
</html>


Screenshot 

History 
This is an idea from my early post jQuery alert control. Now it has become a popup window control. 

Thursday 17 May 2012


Strong Password Validation

Introduction

Today I am going to demonstrate a validation trick for a strong password. We often need a strong password as it is became a standard of web to have Passwords very strong so that nobody can guess it easily. It will be very useful for any registration form.

Background 

In this tip I used  jQuery.ajax  method to call the Validation Method on server side. The idea behind this is to avoid post back and also it is very light and quick. People who are new to jquery please go through this link
 In this example on the login page there are two input fields User Name and password, our focus in on the Password  filed. The validation trick will look for the input by user. Password must use a combination of these:
  • I.Atleast 1 upper case letters (A – Z)
  • II.Lower case letters (a – z)
  • III.Atleast 1 number (0 – 9)
  • IV.Atleast 1 non-alphanumeric symbol (e.g. @ ‘$%£!’) 

Using the code

When you are using  jQuery.ajax  then on the server side the there must be a WebMethod. Using jquery I captured the Click event of the Register button and call the WebMethod using jQuery.ajax  by passing the Password field value as perameter 



    <script type="text/javascript">
        $(document).ready(function () {
            //on Button click event
            $('#btnSubmit').click(function () {
                validate($('#txtPassword').val());
            });
        });
        var error = "Password must use a combination of  these:<br />I.Atleast 1 upper case letters (A – Z)<br />II.Lower case letters (a – z)<br />III.Atleast 1 number (0 – 9)<br />IV.Atleast 1 non-alphanumeric symbol (e.g. @ ‘$%£!’)";
        function validate(val) {
            $('#TDStatus').html('');
            $.ajax({
                type: "POST",
                url:"Login.aspx/ValidatePassword",
                data: "{'password':'" + val + "'}",
                contentType: "application/json; charset=utf-8",
                dataType: "json",
                success: function (msg) {
                    if (msg.d.length > 0) {
                        if (msg.d == "success") {
                            $('#TDStatus').html('Congratulations! Your password is strong.');
                        }
                        else if (msg.d == "fail") {
                            $('#TDStatus').html(error);
                        }
                    }
                },
                async: false,
                error: function (xhr, status, error) {
                    //alert(xhr.statusText);
                    $('#TDStatus').html('<center>Error occured!</center>');
                }
            });
        }
    </script>


On the Serverside there is a WebMethod that will check the password field for the required validations. If it passes all four constraints then it will return success other wise it will return fail.



[WebMethod]
    public static string ValidatePassword(string password)
    {
        string strResult = "fail";
        try
        {
            bool result = false;
            bool isDigit = false;
            bool isLetter = false;
            bool isLowerChar = false;
            bool isUpperChar = false;
            bool isNonAlpha = false;

            foreach (char c in password)
            {
                if (char.IsDigit(c))
                    isDigit = true;
                if (char.IsLetter(c))
                {
                    isLetter = true;
                    if (char.IsLower(c))
                        isLowerChar = true;
                    if (char.IsUpper(c))
                        isUpperChar = true;
                }
                Match m = Regex.Match(c.ToString(), @"\W|_");
                if (m.Success)
                    isNonAlpha = true;
            }
            if (isDigit && isLetter && isLowerChar && isUpperChar && isNonAlpha)
                result = true;
            if (result)
                strResult = "success";
        }
        catch
        {
            strResult = "fail";
        }
        return strResult;
    }

History 
First release on 17 May, 2012.