Module JS¶

Any valid javascript is acceptable. In addition, there’s a global ‘js’ object hoisted into context which exposes the JSonSails API.

Access to UFiles & UValues¶

UFiles and UValues are managed through a subset of the JSonSails API called the UFile API

// from the Module JS
js.ufile.<alias>.*

Access to SFiles¶

SFiles and SValues are managed through a subset of the JSonSails API called the SFile API

// from the Module JS
js.sfile.<alias>.*

Access to JSLibs¶

The following are both valid methods of accessing a JSLib which has been included into a module.

// available in the module JS tab namespace
js.jslib.<alias>.*

Node attributes¶

Node attributes can be handy to communicate between nodes, or use the node ID to scope a DOM search. Access to node is managed through a subset of the JSonSails API called the Node API

// from the Module JS
js.node.*

js.node.dom.querySelector(*) is particularly useful for handling DOM search, and should be used especially when a refernce to the module will be taken later. This search pattern will ensure the search scope is limited to the specific reference and not all similiar references on a page. Here are some examples of how to use this kind of dom search:

// finding by class (recommended)
var next_button = js.node.dom.querySelector('.next')
var prev_button = js.node.dom.querySelector('.prev')
var submit_button = js.node.dom.querySelector('.submit')
var page_indicator = js.node.dom.querySelector('.page-count')
// setting
js.node.dom.querySelector('h2').textContent = js.config.question
js.node.dom.querySelector('input').value = js.ufile.answer.value

Finding by ID is not recommended b/c browser implementation is generally not reliable since it sometimes assumes IDs are unique and uses the old global search method which results in an unscoped result.

Logging¶

The Logging API is used to send logging data to the server, which is stored in a single table called the ELog table, which stores log event data. We extended the Google Analytics interface to allow for more information to be pushed, like the user id, and an extra json field. The GA logging has the benefit of providing many useful views of the resource usage, while the JSonSails log table, when exported for analysis can provide much more detailed individual user data.

Note

GA integration is not completed but the logging interface will allow the same logging calls to send logs to a GA account as well.

ELog Table
Column	Type	Source
id	integer	automatic
mwhen	timestamp with time zone	automatic
url	text	automatic
category	text	elog => GA
action	text	elog => GA
label	text	elog => GA
value	integer	elog => GA
json	text	json
who	character varying(30)	automatic

Note

When a module does not require authentication then the IP address will be placed in the “who” column”

Loading from CDN¶

Script tags in the HTML will not load Javascript from a CDN b/c the module is rendered after the page has been loaded. Therefore, to load an external Javascript file you should do it in the JS code, and wait for the script to finish loading before trying to use it. This can be abstracted into a JSLib for convenience.