In this post I would like to talk about a few configuration items in the Dynamic Actions that could make reduce your need to code basic interactions even further.
Selection Type: jQuery Selector and Javascript Expression
- Do you have multiple elements that need the same action?
- Are your page’s elements not accessible by the items, buttons, regions or columns selection type?
- Does your page region have plain HTML and you want it to use Dynamic Actions?
If you said yes, then I highly suggest you take a look below:
jQuery Selector:
The easiest of the 2. You just need to add the selector that will capture the element(s) you need.
You don’t know how to use a selector? Here are a few tips
- If your apex item has a static ID with the value element-x , you can write #element-x (yes, hashtag include)
- If you want create a global action that will do or check something, you can write just body
Selecting elements is a powerful tool and to understand them better, I recommend reading more about it in https://learn.jquery.com/using-jquery-core/selecting-elements/.
JavaScript Expression:
Alright, let’s say that your search criteria is so complex that selectors won’t do it. Or maybe you have to validate something in the elements beforehand. If that is the case you can fallback to the JavaScript Expression which allow you to grab DOM elements, apply logic and return processed items to be selected.
Event Scope
The event scope is an awesome tool that allow us to do dynamic binding, which, to the best of my knowledge remove the need for adding event directly into the HTML code because it continues to work even after Pagination, Refresh adding new items, etc…
I am 99% sure that this comes from the jQuery ‘on’ event with delegate. Anyways, here are some tips
- By selecting it, the Static Container (jQuery Selector) will become available. Please make sure it is an HTML element that DOES NOT get updates with AJAX. Usually you are safe with regions (give them a static id) and in the last case the <main> or <body> tags. But always try the region first
- IMPORTANT: In the ‘when’ section, if you are using a jQuery Selector as well, make it not including the container itself.
Client-side vs Server-side Conditions
I’ve seen this with many clients, they are not the same!!!! The only thing they have in common is the name.
Client-side Condition: Is the equivalent of adding an IF clause to you Dynamic Action this allows you to better leverage the low code side of APEX. When adding a condition, you can redirect to the TRUE or FALSE actions.
Server-side Condition: The server-side condition does the same thing to DAs that it does for other components, if true the server will render/send it to the user’s machine, otherwise it won’t. There no true and false and the actions won’t work because the Dynamic Action doesn’t exist to be bound to the element.
Conclusion
As you can see, with APEX you probably don’t need to add external JavaScript or bind events directly on the HTML tag which helps to keep your low code also clean from mundane taks.