Javascript: Why doesn't my array of arrays work?

Bes · 11 Feb 2009 at 11:28

Hi,

I am trying to create an array of arrays in Javascript to hold data on a set of data from a form of an unknown size. This is what I have so far:

PHP:

   <script>
  $(document).ready(function(){
	var formTypes=new Array("GlobCol","CoOrd");
	var fTWrapper=new Array();
	for ( var i=0, len=formTypes.length; i<len; ++i ){
  	var input= $("input[name^=" + formTypes[i] + "]");
  	var multipleValues = $("input[name^=" + formTypes[i] + "]").val();
		var values=new Array();
		for (x=1; x<=input.length; x++)
		{
   		values[x]=$("input[name^=" + formTypes[i] + x + "]").val();
		}    
	
	 fTWrapper[i]=values;
		$("div").text("For the field type"+ formTypes[i] +" jQuery found.."+ input.length +"."+fTWrapper[1]+" and " +x+ " elements in the array. Last Testing.." + values[5]);
		
	}
  });
  </script>

This works perfectly, except if I replace ftWrapper[1] in the last line with ftWrapper[1][1], I get no output and a script error (At the moment I get the contents of Values seperated with commas)... I have no idea why.

Can anyone tell me where I am going wrong please?

Thanks

Blackstar_solar · 11 Feb 2009 at 17:38

Javascript doesn't support two dimension arrays. I have implemented a solution before but I can't seem to find it atm.

I'll do some digging on my work pc tomorrow.

Sic · 11 Feb 2009 at 17:58

JSON?

brainchylde · 11 Feb 2009 at 18:45

You have a syntax error in your outer for loop.. replace

for ( var i=0, len=formTypes.length; i<len; ++i ){

with

var len=formTypes.length
for ( var i=0; i<len; ++i ){

OR

for(var i=0; i<formTypes.length; ++i) {

should also work.

Sic · 11 Feb 2009 at 18:53

shouldn't that be i++ ?

brainchylde · 11 Feb 2009 at 19:16

it doesn't really matter in this instance.

brainchylde · 11 Feb 2009 at 19:32

One question for OP. Why the use of $?

And - if I understand what you are trying to do, why are you not using associative arrays?

Sic · 11 Feb 2009 at 22:07

brainchylde said:
it doesn't really matter in this instance.

Yeah, I wasn't sure - I never used it that way.

brainchylde said:
One question for OP. Why the use of $?

$ is a jquery function in this instance.

P5yt3k · 12 Feb 2009 at 11:18

Sic said:
$ is a jquery function in this instance.

I think he means that there are times when it's used for no reason eg:

Code:

var input= $("input[name^=" + formTypes[i] + "]");

could just as easily be:

Code:

var input= "input[name^=" + formTypes[i] + "]";

Using jQuery on a string is for creating DOM elements or using CSS to select an existing DOM element... just putting in a regular string doesn't really do anything, and in theory I'd have built jQuery to fail if the syntax didn't validate as html or css, but I think it probably just silently does nothing and leaves it as a string.

Blackstar_solar said:
Javascript doesn't support two dimension arrays. I have implemented a solution before but I can't seem to find it atm.

I'll do some digging on my work pc tomorrow.

Yeah, the way I was taught to do it is to do arrays full of arrays, full of arrays, etc etc.

Bes · 16 Feb 2009 at 11:15

Hey guys, sorry been away for a few days... thanks for the hints I will look at this again tonight

Bes · 21 Feb 2009 at 12:39

brainchylde said:
You have a syntax error in your outer for loop.. replace

with

OR

should also work.

THanks I tried this, only the second suggestion worked, but I still can't get a 2D array to work properly

Thanks

Bes · 21 Feb 2009 at 16:08

The funny thing is that is it printing out all of the elements of the values array as ftwrapper[1] or ftwrapper[0], but it simply is not picking out an individual element.