How do I insert a django form in twitter-bootstrap modal window?

Houman picture Houman · Jun 30, 2012 · Viewed 49.1k times · Source

Someone has asked the exact same question in April, without any answer. But since he provided too little information; the question was abandoned.

I have the same problem. Within a main_page.html I have this line:

<a href="/contact/edit/{{ item.id }}" title="Edit">edit</a>

Once you click there, the edit template shall appear inside a twitter bootstrap modal.

url.py

(r'^contact/edit/(?P<contact_id>\d+)/$', contact_view),

view.py

def contact_view(request, contact_id=None):
    profile = request.user.get_profile()
    if contact_id is None:
        contact = Contact(company=profile.company)
        template_title = _(u'Add Contact')
    else:
        contact = get_object_or_404(profile.company.contact_set.all(), pk=contact_id)
        template_title = _(u'Edit Contact')
    if request.POST:
        if request.POST.get('cancel', None):
            return HttpResponseRedirect('/')
        form = ContactsForm(profile.company, request.POST, instance=contact)
        if form.is_valid():
            contact = form.save()
            return HttpResponseRedirect('/')
    else:
        form = ContactsForm(instance=contact, company=profile.company)
    variables = RequestContext(request, {'form':form, 'template_title': template_title})
    return render_to_response("contact.html", variables)

This is usually how the contact.html would look like:

        <form class="well" method="post" action=".">
            {% csrf_token %}
            {{form.as_p}}
            <input class="btn btn-primary" type="submit" value="Save" />
            <input name="cancel" class="btn" type="submit" value="Cancel"/>
        </form>

I could put that inside a <div class="modal-body">. But then how do I open the modal from view?

Answer

Josh Smeaton picture Josh Smeaton · Jun 30, 2012

Unless you need to use the contact form outside of the modal, this should work for you. If you do need to use it elsewhere, maintain two versions (one modal, one not). Also, a tip - give django-crispy-forms a lookover - it helps you render forms with twitter-bootstrap classes.

contact.html:

<div class="modal hide" id="contactModal">
<form class="well" method="post" action="/contact/edit/{{ item.id }}">
  <div class="modal-header">
    <button type="button" class="close" data-dismiss="modal">×</button>
    <h3>Editing Contact</h3>
  </div>
  <div class="modal-body">
       {% csrf_token %}
       {{form.as_p}}
  </div>
  <div class="modal-footer">
       <input class="btn btn-primary" type="submit" value="Save" />
       <input name="cancel" class="btn" type="submit" value="Cancel"/>
  </div>
</form>
</div>

main_page.html

<html>
...

<a data-toggle="modal" href="#contactModal">Edit Contact</a>

{% include "contact.html" %}

...
</html>

Edit:

Ok, so now that I know that you have potentially multiple forms, it's probably a bad idea to render each form hidden within the html. You probably want to go to an ajax-y version, and load each form on demand. I'm assuming here that on form submit, the whole page will reload. If you want to asynchronously submit the form, there are answers elsewhere.

We'll start by re-defining the contact.html fragment. It should render within a modal, and contain all the markup necessary to play nice with the modal. The contact view that you have originally is fine - except that if the form is invalid, you'll end up rendering the contact.html and nothing else.

<form class="well contact-form" method="post" action="/contact/edit/{{ item.id }}">
  <div class="modal-header">
    <button type="button" class="close" data-dismiss="modal">×</button>
    <h3>Editing Contact</h3>
  </div>
  <div class="modal-body">
       {% csrf_token %}
       {{form.as_p}} <!-- {{form|crispy}} if you use django-crispy-forms -->
  </div>
  <div class="modal-footer">
       <input class="btn btn-primary" type="submit" value="Save" />
       <input name="cancel" class="btn" type="submit" value="Cancel"/>
  </div>
</form>

And now, your main_page.html:

<html>
.. snip ..

<a class="contact" href="#" data-form="/contact/edit/{{ item.id }}" title="Edit">edit</a>
<a class="contact" href="#" data-form="/contact/edit/{{ item.id }}" title="Edit">edit</a>
<a class="contact" href="#" data-form="/contact/edit/{{ item.id }}" title="Edit">edit</a>

<div class="modal hide" id="contactModal">
</div>

<script>
    $(".contact").click(function(ev) { // for each edit contact url
        ev.preventDefault(); // prevent navigation
        var url = $(this).data("form"); // get the contact form url
        $("#contactModal").load(url, function() { // load the url into the modal
            $(this).modal('show'); // display the modal on url load
        });
        return false; // prevent the click propagation
    });

    $('.contact-form').live('submit', function() {
        $.ajax({ 
            type: $(this).attr('method'), 
            url: this.action, 
            data: $(this).serialize(),
            context: this,
            success: function(data, status) {
                $('#contactModal').html(data);
            }
        });
        return false;
    });
</script>

.. snip ..
</html>

This is all untested, but it should give you a good place to start/iterate from.