Do I require a from to submit input type=image for a jQuery type form submission

Question

Hello,

I have two images, that I am using their value to insert into a db table. Do I Require a form or can I do without one.

<form name="form1" id="form1" method="post" action="save.php"><input type="image" src="images/test.png" border="0" id="star_image" value="<? echo $some_value; ?>" /></form>

<form name="form2" id="form2" method="post" action="save.php"><input type="image" src="images/test1.png" border="0" id="star_image1" value="<? echo $some_value1; ?>1" /></form

Would the above trigger the below jQuery code

$(document).ready(function(){

$('#form1').ajaxForm({});
$('#form2').ajaxForm({});

});

-----------------------------save.php--

insert into table (field) values('value')

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.
.
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And I want to submit the form using jQuery only

Thanks Jean

Answer 1

You either need a form or you need to fake it with JavaScript.

Faking it with JavaScript is more effort and violates rule 2, so effectively, yes, you need a form.

That said, input type="image" creates a server side image map. It is designed to submit co-ordinates. Don't trust that its value will be submitted. If you really want to use an image input as a regular submit button, then check that its name.x is submitted (and this requires giving them unique names).

hmm, I see you don't have names at all at present. You must have a name before an input can be a successful control.

Finally, for input type="image" the alt attribute is mandatory (although not expressed in a machine readable way in the DTD so a validator won't pick it up).

Answer 2

If you use jquery (and ajax), you don't need any form, nor values for controls, just send the parameters to your server-side script. But if you are using form to be submitted, then no, you can not submit images, common practice is to use hidden input fields instead.

Answer 3

If you rely on javascript, then NO, you don't need a <form>, since you'll probably bind the element to post a request with XHR, but for accessibility purposes, you should wrap it with a <form> element, to get it to work without javascript.

By the way, don't use a form is NOT recommended by the W3C, and your page will not validate for the reason explained above.