sara2005 has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Dear Monks,

I running out of ideas to create a pull down by reading a data structure ( Array of Hashes ) and would appreciate some help/ ideas from fellow monks.

Data Structure: 

 my @AoH = (
        {
            Lead     => "fred",
            Friend   => "barney",
            Son      => "",
            No        => "1",
        },
        {
            Lead     => "george",
            Wife     => "jane",
            Son      => "elroy|sam|bobby",
            No       => "2",
        }
  );

[download]

In the present form, I am able to display the 'Sons' in the input text field but I want to have a pulldown menu if an array element has more than one name in the 'Son' field . For example, the 2nd element in the array of hashses has "elroy|sam|bobby", which I would lke to have as a pulldown.

Thanks

The code: 

#! /usr/bin/perl -wT 
use strict;
use warnings;
use CGI qw/:standard :delete_all :escapeHTML :html3 :all/;
use HTML::Template; 

# Get the data as array of hashes 
my $show_vars = get_data( ); 

print header;
my $template = HTML::Template->new( filename => 'temp.tmpl' );
$template->param(  show_vars => $show_vars );
print $template->output();

# subroutine to create the data structure
sub get_data{

 my @AoH = (
        {
            Lead     => "fred",
            Friend   => "barney",
        Son      => "",
        No        => "1",
        },
        {
            Lead     => "george",
            Wife     => "jane",
            Son      => "elroy|sam|bobby",
        No       => "2",
        }
  );
  
  return ( \@AoH );
}

[download]

Template file : 

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<title>Example</title>
</head>

<body>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" align="center" >

<tmpl_loop name="show_vars"> 

<tr><td><hr /></td></tr>

<tr valign="top" align="center">
<td ><a><tmpl_var name="Lead"></a>
</td> </tr>

<tr><td><br /></td></tr>

<tr><td >
<a>Son: </a><input type="text" name="<tmpl_var name="No">_<tmpl_var na
+me="Son">" 
value="<tmpl_var name="Son">" />
</td> 
</tr>

<tr><td><br /></td></tr>
<tr><td><hr /></td></tr>

<!-- Commented to hide from display
<tr><td >
<a>Friend: </a><input type="text" name="<tmpl_var name="No">_<tmpl_var
+ name="Friend">" value="" />
</td> </tr>

<tr><td >
<a>Wife: </a><input type="text" name="<tmpl_var name="No">_<tmpl_var n
+ame="Wife">" value="" />
</td></tr>
-->

</tmpl_loop> 

</table>
</body>
</html>

[download]

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Pull down menu using HTML::Template
by bradcathey (Prior) on Jan 31, 2007 at 03:08 UTC

    Well, for starters, you are not structuring your data efficiently. You might take a lesson from the database concept of normalization. In a nutshell, when you are trying to represent more than one value in a variable (in this case, "sons") you should be seeing a red flag, or in Perlish terms, more hashes.

    You are probably looking at a loop within a loop, using a more complete structure of an AoHoAoH's (think that's right), the outer loop being the "adults" and the inner loop being the "sons." Also, H::T requires a reference to an AoH for loops. Oh, and one more thing, your keys should be the same in each element of the array--below I show both Wife and Friend in each. Otherwise there's no way for the loop to differentiate between the two in the HTML (no logic available unless you are using H::T::Expr)

    my $AoH = [
            {
               'Lead'    => 'fred',
               'Wife'    => 'wilma',
               'Friend'  => 'barney',
               'Son'     => [
                              { 'name' => 'mike'},
                              { 'name' => 'jon' },
                              { 'name' => 'bill'}
                            ],
               'No'      => '1',
            },
            {
               'Lead'    => 'george',
               'Wife'    => 'jane',
               'Friend'  => 'sam',
               'Son'     => [
                              { 'name' => 'elroy'},
                              { 'name' => 'sam' },
                              { 'name' => 'bobby'}
                            ],
               'No'      => '1',
            }
         ];

HTML:
<tmpl_loop parents>
   <tmpl_var Lead>
   <tmpl_var Wife>
   <tmpl_var Friend>
   <tmpl_loop Son>       
      <select>
         <option value="<tmpl_var Name>"><tmpl_var Name></option>
      </select>
   </tmpl_loop>
</tmpl_loop>

    [download]

    Anyway, see the HTML::Template docs for all the glorious details.


    —Brad
    "The important work of moving the world forward does not wait to be done by perfect men." George Eliot
[reply]
[d/l]

      Works fine!!!

      I modified the code to create the data structure as suggested in your example.

      Thanks a lot.

[reply]
Re: Pull down menu using HTML::Template
by jesuashok (Curate) on Jan 31, 2007 at 02:26 UTC
    I am able to display the 'Sons' in the input text field but I want to have a pulldown menu if an array element has more than one name in the 'Son' field

    Whether the array has single/multiple/none elements, directly you can create a pulldown menu instead of having a text box.
[reply]

      Can you explain how that can be done?

[reply]

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