Re: Javascript - sequence of events

bboyle18 (AT) gmail (DOT) com said the following on 6/4/2006 3:13 PM:

Hi,

I am working with a table sorting script which can be found here
http://www.workingwith.me.uk/article..._table_sorting
This script works very nicely, but when there is a large amount of data
to sort e.g > 200 then there is a slight delay in the table sort. To
cater for this I want to provide some feedback to the user to inform
them that the sort function is processing. My idea is to add a
"sorting...." message to the top right of the page, much the same as
the 'loading' message in gmail.
To do this I am dynamically creating a div element and adding it to the
document.body
I do this as part of the onclick event that triggers the table sort.

My problem is, eventhough I create and append the 'sorting...' element
at the start of the onclick event (before the sorting is done), the
element only gets added after the sorting is complete?

I cant seem to get the 'sorting..' element to be added to the page
while the sorting is in progress. Does javascript execute things in a
sequence that prevents me adding my element to the page?
Interestingly, I can execute a javascript alert and this gets displayed
before the sorting begins.....why would
document.body.appendChild(myDiv) not?
Hopefully someone has come across this before and can help. I've added
my HTML and javascript below.

<FAQENTRY>
Why doesn't the display get updated when doing time intensive calculations?
</FAQENTRY>


It is a very well known about issue where the UA doesn't get updated
visibly until the function executes. The alert causes a delay so the
display gets updated.

The solution? Call a setTimeout to a second function.

function dummyFunction(){
//create the message here
window.setTimeout(realFunction,60)
}

function realFunction(){
//sort the table

//remove the message when sorting is finished.
}

--
Randy
comp.lang.javascript FAQ - http://jibbering.com/faq & newsgroup weekly
Javascript Best Practices - http://www.JavascriptToolbox.com/bestpractices/

That worked great thanks. I had to changed the JS around a bit, but the
setTimeout worked perfectly.

Thanks,

Chris

That worked thanks. I had to change my JS slightly but the setTimeout
worked perfectly.

Thanks,

Chris