Filter/Select only after certain number of characters are entered

[Philip]

I previously used the Telerik MVC combobox control so that it only returns results when at least 3 characters have been entered. I was able to specify this in my controller by simple checking the text string that was passed in the ajax request.

With the KendoUI combobox, I cannot figure out how the text is being passed and what to check for in my controller to see if at least 3 characters have been entered.

Can you provide any assistance with this? Thanks.

UPDATE:

So I found by looking at the AutoComplete control, that I can set the ComboBox to not retrieve results until at least 3 characters are entered by using minLength: 3

I still have the issue on the controller side, however, that I don't want to bring back the entire list...I only want to bring back results that contain the text entered. What do I need to include on the controller side to get the text entered in the ComboBox?

Thanks!

[Philip]

I tried this in my transport

transport: {

    read: "/Reporting/Client-Reports/_test",

    data: {

        text: function () {

            var ac = $("#test").data("kendoComboBox");

            return ac.value();

        },

        maxRows: 10

    }

}

and then in my controller

public ActionResult _test(string text)

{

    List<Client> clients = new List<Client>();

 

    clients = _clientreportsService.GetClients(text).ToList();

 

    return Json(new SelectList(clients, "ClientId", "ClientName"), JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);

}

the _clientreportsService.GetClients(text).ToList(); is what retrieves the results filtered on the "text" parameter


from what I can tell with this though, "text" is not being passed to the controller.

[Petyo]

Hi Philip,

By default, the filtering sends filters request parameter which contains the needed information. You can read more about the parameters passed to the server in our documentation.

In addition to that, you can simplify the passed information using the parameterMap function of the transport: 

transport: {
    read: ...,
    parameterMap: function(options)  {
        if (options.filter) {
            return "text=" + options.filter.filters[0].value;
        }
    }
},

Regards,
Petyo
the Telerik team

[Philip]

Thanks Petyo...that solution works great.

[Joao]

I managed autobind to work with this modification:

                parameterMap: function(options) {
                      if (options.filter) {
                        return "text=" + options.filter.filters[0].value; 
                      }
                      else
                      {
                        return "text=" + $("#test").val();
                      }
                    }

[Ryan Lege]

How do we do this with ODATA? I want to use startswith