How can I initially hide columns in a p:dataTable with p:columnToggler

Question

I'm using PrimeFaces v.5 with this version a new component is released that ColumnToggler , when view is rendered, refreshed all checkbox are checked as a default operation.

What I need to do is;

• to uncheck some columns when I initialize the view,
• make p:columnToggler remember checked and unchecked options when a refresh operation occurs on p:dataTable

Answer 1

In Primefaces 5.2 you can set the p:column visible attribute to false

<p:column ... visible="false">

You can ofcourse use EL in the visible attribute by colum index (reordering becomes more difficult)

<p:column ... visible="#{visibilityModel.visibleList[1]}">

It hides the column at the beginning depending on the return value and you can show/hide the column through the columnToggler checkbox

By using the ajax toggle event

<p:ajax event="toggle" listener="#{viewBean.onToggle}" />

You can update the state of the visibilityModel server side

public void onToggle(ToggleEvent e) {
    list.set((Integer) e.getData(), e.getVisibility() == Visibility.VISIBLE);
}

See this PrimeFaces blog entry for full example to actually keep/store the state of the visibility server side so it can be reused later

Answer 2

The best solution depends on the PrimeFaces version you are using.

PrimeFaces >= 5.2

See the other answer in this question .

workaround for < 5.2

You need to solve the first problem manually by overriding Primefaces' own ColumnToggler.prototype.render() function

first add styleClass="not-show-at-start" to your column that you want to insvisibe at start to access in javascript render() function;

<!--This column will not be shown at start-->
<p:column headerText="Cloumn to hide initially" width="70" styleClass="not-show-at-start">
    <h:outputText value="#{entityVar.nmProcessOwner}" />
</p:column>

<!--This column will be shown at start-->
<p:column headerText="Column to show initially" width="70">
     <h:outputText value="#{entityVar.nmProcessOwner}" />
</p:column>

secondy create a javascript file and paste code below in it, this function will re assign render function of ColumnToggler

PrimeFaces.widget.ColumnToggler.prototype.render = function() {
    //variable for creating id referance for each checkbox in ColumnToggler
    var id=0;
    this.columns = this.thead.find("> tr > th:visible:not(.ui-static-column)");
    this.panel = $("<div></div>").attr("id", this.cfg.id).addClass("ui-columntoggler ui-widget ui-widget-content ui-shadow ui-corner-all").append('<ul class="ui-columntoggler-items"></ul').appendTo(document.body);
    this.itemContainer = this.panel.children("ul");
    for (var a = 0; a < this.columns.length; a++) {
        id++;
        var b = this.columns.eq(a);
        $('<li class="ui-columntoggler-item"><div class="ui-chkbox ui-widget"><div id="cb'+id /*creating id for each checkbox for accessing later*/+'" class="ui-chkbox-box ui-widget ui-corner-all ui-state-default ui-state-active"><span class="ui-chkbox-icon ui-icon ui-icon-check"></span></div></div><label>' + b.children(".ui-column-title").text() + "</label></li>").data("column", b.attr("id")).appendTo(this.itemContainer);
        
        //access clumns using class reference(not-show-at-start) created in jsf page
        if(b.hasClass( "not-show-at-start")){
            //access checkbox using id attribute created above and uncheck it
            //this will hide columns that have "not-show-at-start" class
            this.uncheck($('#cb'+id));
        }
    }
    
    this.hide();
}

Answer 3

An alternative solution could be to set directly the checkbox you want to uncheck after you load the page. It's a less elegant solution but it works. I did it this way:

<h:body onload="javascript: $('.ui-chkbox-box')[18].click();">

By this way, after loading the page, javascript hide the column referenced by chechbox number 18 but the checkbox is still present on the columnToggler for the user to check it and show the column again if he wants to.

Greetings

Answer 4

Complementing Damián answer:

$(function() {
   $('.ui-columntoggler-items .ui-chkbox .ui-chkbox-box').click();
});

This will do the job, clicking the columntoggler chkbox after page load..

@Edit

You should set as toggleable="false" the columns you don't want to hide (always displayed)

Reason: if you use the javascript method to "override" primefaces toggler, sometimes the datatable column shown can be displayed wrong in the layout (out of the table size, for an example, like happened with me), that's why i decided to use the method described above..