Instant Example

To see django-dataforms in action, download the source, then go into the example folder and run ./manage.py runserver. Now visit your server and you'll see the dynamically created form. You can also see the data needed to create this form in the administration interface.

This is a single dynamic form which will create Answers in the database when you submit the form.

Creating your own custom database-driven forms

Add the transaction middleware

To maintain data integrity, you'll need to add the transaction middleware to your settings.py. This will put all queries from each request into a single transaction—so if something goes wrong, all DB changes from the entire request will not be committed.

MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
	# ...
	'django.middleware.transaction.TransactionMiddleware',	
)

Import static files

Copy example/static/scripts/jquery.adminmenusort.js and example/static/scripts/bindings.js to a subdirectory of your MEDIA_URL named scripts. So, for example, if your MEDIA_URL was /static, then you should copy the file to the folder that serves /static/scripts/jquery.adminmenusort.js

Create your form definition

Now, create the definition of your form using the Django admin, creating a dataform and associating the correct fields and choices to fields.

WRITEME

Bindings

Django-dataforms has built-in support for field bindings (If the user checks "yes" on a field, show another field or fields.) The bindings just need to be defined in the admin when creating your form definition.

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Use the form on a page

In a view, you simply have to call create_form and pass the submission string

from dataforms.forms import create_form

def view_function(request):
	form = create_form(request=request, form='personal-information', submission="myForm")
	
	if request.method == "POST":
		if form.is_valid():
			form.save()

Let's look at the arguments to create_form:

• request is the standard view request object, used so that create_form can know when the user has submitted POST data so we can repopulate the form and perform validation.
• form is the slug of a DataForm object
• submission is a create-on-use submission name. Meaning, it does not need to exist the first time that create_form is called. Once the user submits the form, a Submission object will be created in the background, and this name will be the slug of the Submission object. This is the reference name for how create_form is able to repopulate a form from a specific previous submission. A submission slug can be anything you want, which allows you to have multiple submissions from one form definition (because each submission slug is unique).

If form.save() is called on a bound form object (a form that is already tied to a Submission), the submitted data will be overwritten in the database allowing for easy editing of previously submitted form data.