HTML form submission with no submit button
Question
I've got a form like this:
<html>
<body>
<form onSubmit="alert('Just got submitted');">
<p>
Hello: <input class="field" type="text"/><br/>
Goodbye: <input class="field" type="text"/><br/>
</p>
</form>
</body>
</html>
which in one browser submits happily on user pressing enter from one of the fields, and in another browser, doesn't. Oddly, if I remove the second field, it works in both.
My question is really - is it okay to have a form with no explicit submit element? I really like this behaviour.
6 answers
solution1
6 2009-03-03 23:10:08
Having no explicit submit is poor user experience. Your typical end user has, over the past decade, learned a set of principles for website form interaction. Namely, you can tab between fields, you can select lots of checkboxes, and you have a click a button to actually submit your data.
I've tried developing forms in the past that automatically update with JavaScript, and I got countless complaints from users. They wanted a button or they didn't believe it was working. So in that particular case, I kept the form working as it originally had, but added a submit button that really didn't do anything. They were happy.
These days I just build out my forms with normal submit buttons. Not only do users expect it, but it allows for much cleaner progressive enhancement between non-JS enabled browsers.
solution2
2 2009-03-03 23:11:21
It's certainly more than possible to have a form with no submit element, especially if you use JavaScript events to submit the form. I highly suggest you use the onkeypress event to detect the "enter" key being pressed rather than depending on the browser to just accept the "enter" key if you make a form with no submits, to make it cross-browser compatible.
However, I think it's bad form to leave out a submit button of some sort. (It doesn't necessarily have to be an input of type "submit", could be "button" or an image you click.) It's just a standard to have forms that people fill out submitt via a button, and you're taking that away, which could confuse many users who are used to a button. It definitely violates the principles of Don't Make Me Think by presenting an alternate form to the norm.
solution3
1 2009-03-03 23:10:53
It's not a good idea. You point out the reason yourself - it doesn't work in all browsers. Also, it's not what people expect, so it may confuse people.
solution4
0 2009-03-03 23:33:14
It depends on what you mean with "ok".
If you mean valid (x)html, well it's no problem at all, but on the user side, it's a usability issue. But it also depends on the target audience of your website. If its for tech savvy people, then it's ok.
You could create an input button like this:
<input type="button" onclick("doSomething()") />
The doSomething() would be a function in Javascript that would send your form data to a server-side script. This way you wouldn't have a submit behavior.
solution5
0 2009-04-11 04:15:35
Submitting a form on 'Enter' with jQuery?
Also, I'd leave the button in the form, but hide it with javascript ($('#submit').hide()). It means that if the user has disabled script or f.ex. uses some other device, he'll see the default way to submit the form.
solution6
-1 2009-03-03 23:33:52
If you want to have two buttons which generate two different behavior when submit. what you can so is something like that:
or you can put the form submit inside function1() or function2()
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