How to preload <options> and <select> with Jquery-option-tree plugin - php

Question

I am using Jquery-option-tree plugin on a standalone website not based on Wordpress as in example 7 on the demo page, except that I am not passing a .txt file but a PHP page is generating the array of < options > to be passed to the plugin.
http://kotowicz.net/jquery-option-tree/demo/demo.html
This perfectly works: so let's say that the user wants to select a category for a new product, the plugin suits the purpose generating a nice: " Food -> fruit -> apples " upon user clicks. (see demo page ex. 7)
What instead if a product already exists with its categories assigned? I want to show it to the user when he edit that product, preloading the tree.
I have the ids path coming from database, so it would just be a matter of having the plugin to run without the user interact, using the value I pass. I saw this question: jQuery simulate click event on select option
and tried to simulate user' click with this (and other) methods with no luck.
$('#select')
.val(value)
.trigger('click');
Here the call to the function:
$(function() {
var options = {
empty_value: '',
set_value_on: 'each',
indexed: true, // the data in tree is indexed by values (ids), not by labels
on_each_change: '/js/jquery-option-tree/get-subtree.php', // this file will be called with 'id' parameter, JSON data must be returned
choose: function(level) {
return 'Choose level ' + level;
},
loading_image: '/js/jquery-option-tree/ajax-load.gif',
show_multiple: 10, // if true - will set the size to show all options
choose: ''
};
$.getJSON('/js/jquery-option-tree/get-subtree.php', function(tree) { // initialize the tree by loading the file first
$('input[name=parent_category_id]').optionTree(tree, options);
});
});
Here you can see the plugin:
https://code.google.com/p/jquery-option-tree/

Answer 1

I don't know that plugin, but looking at the examples there seems to be one that fits your need; Example 6 - AJAX lazy loading & setting value on each level change.
This would, in theory, just require some config options:
preselect: {'demo6': ['220','226']}, // array of default values - if on any level option value will be in this list, it will be selected
preselect_only_once: true, // prevent auto selecting whole branch when user maniputales one of branch levels
get_parent_value_if_empty: true,
attr: "id" // we'll use input id instead of name
If this doesn't fit you need though, you could initiate it from an event, like change, keyup, etc.
$(document).on('change', '#select', function() {
$('#nextSelect').val($(this).val());
})
$(document).on('change', '#nextSelect', function() {
$('#finalInput').val($(this).val());
})

Answer 2

Yes, you are right Mackan ! I saw that "preselect" option but I was initially unable to use it transferring the path from database to javascript, I ended up with my "newbie" solution to match the syntax:
preselect: {'parent_category_id': [0,'2','22']},
PHP
$category_path comes from DB query and is like "0,2,76,140,"
$path = explode(',', $category_path);
$preselect="";
foreach ($path as $value) {
$int = (int)$value;
if ($int != 0) $preselect.= "'". $int ."',";
else $preselect.= $int.","; // have to do this as ZERO in my case has to be without apostrophes ''
}
$preselect = "{'parent_category_id':[".$preselect."]}"
JS
var presel= <?php echo($preselect); ?>;
var options = {
preselect: (presel),
}
Any suggestion for a better code ?
Thanks a lot !!