Did you ever need to “catch” a key event? I did! Using the type-ahead feature i wanted to fill some fields depending on the selected value from the type-ahead field.
Now I used the “onBlur” event first. But that would require the user to move the focus away from the field with type-ahead.
I was looking for a solution where immediately after hitting <enter> the fields below would be filled.
Turns out this is pretty easy:
use two onKeyPress event handlers: one client-side, one server-side:
client-side:
if (thisEvent.keyCode==13) {
return true;
}else{
return false;
}
server-side:
call whatever functionality you need! in our case it’s a bean populating dependant fields
the client-side piece of code checks for <enter> and calls the server-side functionality only on <enter>