[RESOLVED] For <textarea>: variable # of rows and/or columns so scroll bars aren't shown?

sherry

Hello.

For <textarea>, is there a routine that determines the # of rows to make it so that the scroll bars aren't shown for a given # of columns, e.g. 80?

If this routine doesn't already exist, does someone know a way to do this?

The text is coming from a variable that changes according to various inputs.

Thanks.

benracer

You can do this ...

<textarea name="myname" cols="50" rows="5" class="cssclass" id="idclass">Initial Value</textarea>

NogDog

Assume $text has the text to be displayed:

<textarea name="example" cols="<?php echo strlen($text); ?>"><?php
echo $text; ?></textarea>

sherry

Thanks folks.

Any solution for determining # of rows for say, cols=80 e.g. counting carriage returns and line breaks <p> and <br> and within each, divide # of characters by # of cols? Maybe using something like nl2br() or other?

Thanks again.

NogDog

Sorry...had a brain cramp and I was thinking columns instead of rows.

Question: are you using this textarea as a form input, or just as a way to display text?

sherry

That's okay, NogDog.

I'm using it to display text only from <pre> tags.

I actually don't need to include the <p> tag, just the <br /> that would be used as the carriage return at the end of that line if generated by nl2br().

Is there a function that will convert just the <br> or <br /> tag to its '<br>' equivalent and leave the other tags alone or should str_replace() be used? I would only want to convert those generated from nl2br() so not to include those in the raw code.

Then maybe use a regex or other to locate each of those equivalent tags which represents a line and then put each find into an array then count($array) or create a loop and a count var and 'do while' it finds another and use the final value of the counter var? I would then add the lines computed from the line lengths > 80 to the total. Just a thought.

Hope this is clear, if not let me know and I'll try again.

I welcome any and all suggestions.

Thanks.

NogDog

You could make your own nl2br-type function:

preg_replace('/\r?\n/', "&lt;br /&gt;\n", $text);

However, I think I'm still fuzzy on the "big picture" as to where the text is coming from and how exactly you need it output, but hopefully that will help.

sherry

Thanks NogDog, this does help.

I have the output created from different sources of code. Now, all I need to do is create a routine that increments a counter every time it finds either the <br> or I may choose to count the unconverted <br /> tag.

Can you suggest a function that can count, say, all of the <br /> tags (or <br> equivalents) contained in a $var?

Thanks again.

NogDog

Sounds like a job for [man]substr_count/man.

sherry

I think you're right, NogDog.

As usual, thank you!

I will mark this resolved.

Weedpacket

If it's only for display then a <textarea> doesn't seem necessary.
Why not a <div>? Then it would expand by however much is necessary to contain its content.

sherry

Thanks for your reply, Weedpacket.

I was doing it this way because the <pre> tag was producing LONG lines beyond the table tag width param therefore, I was trying to find a bandaid solution to wrap the text. If there is a way to get the <div> tag or some other method to accomplish this, I would love to use it.

Thanks.

NogDog

You could use the [man]wordwrap[/man] function, e.g.:

echo "<pre>" . htmlentities(wordwrap($text, 80, "\n")) . "</pre>\n";

sherry

Thanks NogDog.

I like that, but in this case, I want the browser to 'echo' the results of the <pre> tag in its browser interpretation of the finished code vs. htmlentities format.

Is there another way to do this other than what has been presented in this thread thus far?

Thanks.

NogDog

Do you mean something like...

<div style='white-space:pre;font-family:monospace'><?php
echo wordwrap($text, 80, "\n");
?></div>

sherry

Kinda NogDog, but the

style='white-space:pre;'

attribute is not recognized by IE, et. al. which is why I was trying to bandaid a solution.

Thanks.

NogDog

sherry wrote:
Kinda NogDog, but the
style='white-space:pre;'
attribute is not recognized by IE, et. al. which is why I was trying to bandaid a solution.

Thanks.

white-space:pre is, in fact, recognized by IE. However, that is about the only non-default value for white-space that it recognizes.

sherry

Thanks NogDog.

I probably should re-phrase my statement about IE and the

white-space:pre

param.

Although IE converts characters like <, >, ', &, etc., it doesn't maintain the 'look' as written e.g. interpreting the newlines and preserving indentation. The results of the <pre> is collapsed into a single paragraph whereas in Firefox, the look as written is preserved.

Thanks.

NogDog

Works OK for me in IE7. I don't currently have IE6 anywhere to see what it does, though.

NogDog

Ahah! It works OK in IE as long as it is not in "quirks mode". Make sure your page begins with a fully qualified doctype declaration, so that IE is no longer in Microsoft-compliant mode but is instead in almost-W3C-standards mode.