dqu123/suggest.js

Javascript autocorrect library built using jQuery.

suggest.js

Javascript autocorrect library built using jQuery.
Check out /example for a quick demo of suggest.js!

Use cases:

• Dynamic dictionary search: Get definitions of words or search for words by definition.
• Translation dictionary: Translate words, viewing definitions before choosing a suggestion.
• Django ORM Schema Analysis
  • Configure help_text and verbose_name of fields into complex dictionary
  • Map from common names to database column names to facilitate easier queries
  • For example the Young Stellar Object Coral (YSOC) uses this module to map from names such as Spitzer to specific database names such as S3p6.

Dictionary format

// Simple dictionary
{'word': 'definition', ...} 
// Simple dictionary with arrays
{'word': ['def1', 'def2'], ...} 
// Complex/Translation dictionary
{'word': {'value': 'translated text', 
                         'help_text': 'definition text'},  ...  }   
// Complex dictionary with arrays 
{'word': [ {'value': 'text',  'help_text': 'text'},
           {'value': 'text', 'help_text': 'text'} ],  ... } 

API

/**
 * Make user_input have suggestions appear in suggest_div.
 *
 * @param {string} user_input -- $(selector) for input to add suggestions.
 * @param {string} suggest_div -- $(selector) where suggestions will go.
 * @param {string} delimiter -- Delimiter to tokenize words with.
 *     (Default is ' '.)
 *
 * @effect -- Adds suggest event handler to all appropriate inputs in
 *     $(user_input).
 */
suggest.add(user_input, suggest_div, delimiter);

/**
 * Adds a dictionary to suggestion dictionary.
 *
 * @param {Object} new_dict -- Object representing suggestion dictionary.
 *
 * @effect -- Adds the new_dict's key/value pairs to the current dictionary,
 *     overriding keys that appear in both dictionaries.
 */
suggest.updateDict(new_dict);

/**
 * Sets the suggestion dictionary, replacing the old one.
 *
 * @param {Object} new_dict -- Object representing suggestion dictionary.
 *
 * @effect -- Erases the current dictionary, and sets dict to the given
 *     dictionary.
 */
suggest.setDict(new_dict);

/**
 * Returns suggestion dictionary.
 *
 * @return {Object} -- Suggestion dictionary (Note this is a reference,
 *     not a copy, so any changes to the returned dictionary
 *     will be made to the suggest dictionary).
 */
suggest.getDict();

suggest.js's Issues

Module Logic

Currently, the module set-up is not very elegant. (Not checking for environment, etc.)

TODO

• Check jQuery dependency and complain if not defined.
  • Possibly consider dropping jQuery dependency (for those legacy coders) ... if we get bored I suppose.
  • Alternatively, we can also consider converting this to a jQuery plugin if it is preferred. (A matter of whether supporting jQuery selector syntax is desired).
• Make it so you can suggest.init() to set up API instances with different dictionaries
  • Alternatively, store a dictionary of dictionaries, and let suggest.add() have an option to pick which dictionary to configure with.

Security

I don't think there should be any security vulnerabilities from using this with a static dictionary,
or internally defined dictionary (making a searchable schema dictionary). However, there is the possibility for XSS right now if you let users define dictionary terms.

TODO

• Escape html