would the process still be the same if the listbox were pre-populated from a database? what i intended was to add items to the listbox but behind the scenes (XHR) it is being saved to the db (INSERT INTO…) and queried back (SELECT…WHERE) to be displayed in the list as a new item.

i understand the onchange() events that trigger sending of data to and from the db but i don’t know how to append (DOM traversal/javascript code) the values that was just added from the textbox to the current dropdown list.

Thank you.

http://www.dougv.com/blog/2007/01/15/dynamically-populating-a-listbox-from-a-textbox-via-javascript-dom/

FYI, if you click on the JavaScript tag to the right, you will get just about everything I’ve written on DOM manipulation, and I doubt there’s anything you’d want to do that I have not demonstrated in some way.

thanks

You are getting the state codes instead of state names as a result because the values of the parent select list are the state codes, not the state names. If you want to use state names, those need to be the values of your parent select list. And if you want to use full state names as the parent values, then you need to make three changes to the script as provided.

First, you need to change the PHP that creates the parent list to use the value of the state column as the values of the parent select list’s options:

while($row = mysql_fetch_array($rs)) {
	//create separator every five records
	if($i % 5 == 0) {
		echo "<option value=\"\">--------------------</option>\n";
	}
	echo "<option>$row[state]</option>\n";
	$i++;
}

Next, you need to replace the regular expression in the citylist.php “helper” script that checks for proper state code, with one that will ensure the statecode variable at least isn’t an injection attack:

if(!preg_match('/[A-Za-z]{4,20}/', $_GET['statecode'])) {

Finally, you need to amend the query in citylist.php to select child records by the value of the state column:

if(!$rs = mysql_query("SELECT DISTINCT city FROM php_zip_code_distance WHERE state = '$_GET[statecode]' AND TRIM(city) != '' ORDER BY city LIMIT 80")) {
	$output = "alert('Error getting city list from database');\n";
}

Those three changes will allow you to capture the full name of the state from the parent select list when you post it to a PHP page.

I’m glad you’ve found this script useful. If you’d like to send a donation for this, simply remit any amount you like via PayPal to paypal@dougv.com.

What I get in my browser:
http://localhost/test/ajax/jquery/ResultsAdv.php?state=AL&city=Moody&Submit=Submit

How can I instead pass on the state (full state name “Alabama” not AL) and city values. Did I do something wrong or is this how it was supposed to be?

Do you have a paypal donations page?

Thank you,

Brian

My goal is to have Dealership names and addresses get displayed once a City gets selected from the dropdown list.

Thanks again,
Brian