I have a view that has a <table> element in it that I want to update via ajax, so that the view is not refreshed. The number of rows I have will be variable, expanding and contracting, and each row is an element in an array of hashes for each cell in the row.
How do you typically do something like this in RoR? All the examples I see are for the Scriptaculus kinds of things (autocompete, etc) but what about something like this. How would you begin to tackle it? Thanks, Janna B
easiest option:
put the whole table (or table row depending on your needs) into a partial and then replace the table (or rows) with a new instance of the partial.
there are various ways to trigger an ajax request - again, this depends on your needs
checkout: link_to_remote: http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActionView/Helpers/PrototypeHelper.html#M001930 observe_field: http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActionView/Helpers/PrototypeHelper.html#M001939 observe_form: http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActionView/Helpers/PrototypeHelper.html#M001940
If the controller action deals with more than one format (eg. html and js) then you should use the respond_to method.
Otherwise,
def my_ajax_action @content = # new content for your table replace "id_of_table", render(:partial => "partial_name", :locals => {:content => @content } ) end
Hope that helps?
Gavin