Simple jQuery Examples with Code and Demos

Recently, I wrote a beginner’s guide to using and understanding jQuery for Digital Ocean. I found the official jQuery documentation difficult to understand, especially for beginners who only know HTML and CSS. My intent was to make a simple, easy to follow tutorial to introduce the concept of jQuery.

When I first started learning, I would often want to do something simple and common with jQuery, but when I searched I’d find code samples that were very complicated or confusing. Below, I’ve compiled a few examples, with and without CSS styling, for a some common jQuery tasks: accordions, tabs, popups, dropdowns, and navigation that changes when you scroll to an ID. The non-stylized examples will only have the CSS required to make the demo function.

If you don’t know how to use jQuery at all, please read the Introduction to jQuery article first. The embedded demos might not display perfectly on a mobile device, so it’s better to view this post on desktop, or open the demos separately.

#javascript #jquery

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TS-mockito: Mocking Library for TypeScript

TS-mockito

Mocking library for TypeScript inspired by http://mockito.org/

1.x to 2.x migration guide

1.x to 2.x migration guide

Main features

• Strongly typed
• IDE autocomplete
• Mock creation (mock) (also abstract classes) #example
• Spying on real objects (spy) #example
• Changing mock behavior (when) via:
  • thenReturn - return value #example
  • thenThrow - throw an error #example
  • thenCall - call custom method #example
  • thenResolve - resolve promise #example
  • thenReject - rejects promise #example
• Checking if methods were called with given arguments (verify)
  • anything, notNull, anyString, anyOfClass etc. - for more flexible comparision
  • once, twice, times, atLeast etc. - allows call count verification #example
  • calledBefore, calledAfter - allows call order verification #example
• Resetting mock (reset, resetCalls) #example, #example
• Capturing arguments passed to method (capture) #example
• Recording multiple behaviors #example
• Readable error messages (ex. 'Expected "convertNumberToString(strictEqual(3))" to be called 2 time(s). But has been called 1 time(s).')

Installation

npm install ts-mockito --save-dev

Usage

Basics

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// Getting instance from mock
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// Using instance in source code
foo.getBar(3);
foo.getBar(5);

// Explicit, readable verification
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(3)).called();
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(anything())).called();

Stubbing method calls

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// stub method before execution
when(mockedFoo.getBar(3)).thenReturn('three');

// Getting instance
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// prints three
console.log(foo.getBar(3));

// prints null, because "getBar(999)" was not stubbed
console.log(foo.getBar(999));

Stubbing getter value

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// stub getter before execution
when(mockedFoo.sampleGetter).thenReturn('three');

// Getting instance
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// prints three
console.log(foo.sampleGetter);

Stubbing property values that have no getters

Syntax is the same as with getter values.

Please note, that stubbing properties that don't have getters only works if Proxy object is available (ES6).

Call count verification

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// Getting instance
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// Some calls
foo.getBar(1);
foo.getBar(2);
foo.getBar(2);
foo.getBar(3);

// Call count verification
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).once();               // was called with arg === 1 only once
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(2)).twice();              // was called with arg === 2 exactly two times
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(between(2, 3))).thrice(); // was called with arg between 2-3 exactly three times
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(anyNumber()).times(4);    // was called with any number arg exactly four times
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(2)).atLeast(2);           // was called with arg === 2 min two times
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(anything())).atMost(4);   // was called with any argument max four times
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(4)).never();              // was never called with arg === 4

Call order verification

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);
let mockedBar:Bar = mock(Bar);

// Getting instance
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);
let bar:Bar = instance(mockedBar);

// Some calls
foo.getBar(1);
bar.getFoo(2);

// Call order verification
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).calledBefore(mockedBar.getFoo(2));    // foo.getBar(1) has been called before bar.getFoo(2)
verify(mockedBar.getFoo(2)).calledAfter(mockedFoo.getBar(1));    // bar.getFoo(2) has been called before foo.getBar(1)
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).calledBefore(mockedBar.getFoo(999999));    // throws error (mockedBar.getFoo(999999) has never been called)

Throwing errors

let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

when(mockedFoo.getBar(10)).thenThrow(new Error('fatal error'));

let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);
try {
    foo.getBar(10);
} catch (error:Error) {
    console.log(error.message); // 'fatal error'
}

Custom function

You can also stub method with your own implementation

let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

when(mockedFoo.sumTwoNumbers(anyNumber(), anyNumber())).thenCall((arg1:number, arg2:number) => {
    return arg1 * arg2; 
});

// prints '50' because we've changed sum method implementation to multiply!
console.log(foo.sumTwoNumbers(5, 10));

Resolving / rejecting promises

You can also stub method to resolve / reject promise

let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

when(mockedFoo.fetchData("a")).thenResolve({id: "a", value: "Hello world"});
when(mockedFoo.fetchData("b")).thenReject(new Error("b does not exist"));

Resetting mock calls

You can reset just mock call counter

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// Getting instance
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// Some calls
foo.getBar(1);
foo.getBar(1);
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).twice();      // getBar with arg "1" has been called twice

// Reset mock
resetCalls(mockedFoo);

// Call count verification
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).never();      // has never been called after reset

You can also reset calls of multiple mocks at once resetCalls(firstMock, secondMock, thirdMock)

Resetting mock

Or reset mock call counter with all stubs

// Creating mock
let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);
when(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).thenReturn("one").

// Getting instance
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// Some calls
console.log(foo.getBar(1));               // "one" - as defined in stub
console.log(foo.getBar(1));               // "one" - as defined in stub
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).twice();      // getBar with arg "1" has been called twice

// Reset mock
reset(mockedFoo);

// Call count verification
verify(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).never();      // has never been called after reset
console.log(foo.getBar(1));               // null - previously added stub has been removed

You can also reset multiple mocks at once reset(firstMock, secondMock, thirdMock)

Capturing method arguments

let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);
let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

// Call method
foo.sumTwoNumbers(1, 2);

// Check first arg captor values
const [firstArg, secondArg] = capture(mockedFoo.sumTwoNumbers).last();
console.log(firstArg);    // prints 1
console.log(secondArg);    // prints 2

You can also get other calls using first(), second(), byCallIndex(3) and more...

Recording multiple behaviors

You can set multiple returning values for same matching values

const mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

when(mockedFoo.getBar(anyNumber())).thenReturn('one').thenReturn('two').thenReturn('three');

const foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // one
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // two
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // three
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // three - last defined behavior will be repeated infinitely

Another example with specific values

let mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

when(mockedFoo.getBar(1)).thenReturn('one').thenReturn('another one');
when(mockedFoo.getBar(2)).thenReturn('two');

let foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // one
console.log(foo.getBar(2));    // two
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // another one
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // another one - this is last defined behavior for arg '1' so it will be repeated
console.log(foo.getBar(2));    // two
console.log(foo.getBar(2));    // two - this is last defined behavior for arg '2' so it will be repeated

Short notation:

const mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// You can specify return values as multiple thenReturn args
when(mockedFoo.getBar(anyNumber())).thenReturn('one', 'two', 'three');

const foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);

console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // one
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // two
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // three
console.log(foo.getBar(1));    // three - last defined behavior will be repeated infinity

Possible errors:

const mockedFoo:Foo = mock(Foo);

// When multiple matchers, matches same result:
when(mockedFoo.getBar(anyNumber())).thenReturn('one');
when(mockedFoo.getBar(3)).thenReturn('one');

const foo:Foo = instance(mockedFoo);
foo.getBar(3); // MultipleMatchersMatchSameStubError will be thrown, two matchers match same method call

Mocking interfaces

You can mock interfaces too, just instead of passing type to mock function, set mock function generic type Mocking interfaces requires Proxy implementation

let mockedFoo:Foo = mock<FooInterface>(); // instead of mock(FooInterface)
const foo: SampleGeneric<FooInterface> = instance(mockedFoo);

Mocking types

You can mock abstract classes

const mockedFoo: SampleAbstractClass = mock(SampleAbstractClass);
const foo: SampleAbstractClass = instance(mockedFoo);

You can also mock generic classes, but note that generic type is just needed by mock type definition

const mockedFoo: SampleGeneric<SampleInterface> = mock(SampleGeneric);
const foo: SampleGeneric<SampleInterface> = instance(mockedFoo);

Spying on real objects

You can partially mock an existing instance:

const foo: Foo = new Foo();
const spiedFoo = spy(foo);

when(spiedFoo.getBar(3)).thenReturn('one');

console.log(foo.getBar(3)); // 'one'
console.log(foo.getBaz()); // call to a real method

You can spy on plain objects too:

const foo = { bar: () => 42 };
const spiedFoo = spy(foo);

foo.bar();

console.log(capture(spiedFoo.bar).last()); // [42] 

Thanks

• Szczepan Faber (https://www.linkedin.com/in/szczepiq)
• Sebastian Konkol (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sebastiankonkol)
• Clickmeeting (http://clickmeeting.com)
• Michał Stocki (https://github.com/michalstocki)
• Łukasz Bendykowski (https://github.com/viman)
• Andrey Ermakov (https://github.com/dreef3)
• Markus Ende (https://github.com/Markus-Ende)
• Thomas Hilzendegen (https://github.com/thomashilzendegen)
• Johan Blumenberg (https://github.com/johanblumenberg)

---

Download Details:

Author: NagRock
Source Code: https://github.com/NagRock/ts-mockito 
License: MIT license

#typescript #testing #mock 

How to Use Hotwire Rails

Introduction

We are back with another exciting and much-talked-about Rails tutorial on how to use Hotwire with the Rails application. This Hotwire Rails tutorial is an alternate method for building modern web applications that consume a pinch of JavaScript.

Rails 7 Hotwire is the default front-end framework shipped with Rails 7 after it was launched. It is used to represent HTML over the wire in the Rails application. Previously, we used to add a hotwire-rails gem in our gem file and then run rails hotwire: install. However, with the introduction of Rails 7, the gem got deprecated. Now, we use turbo-rails and stimulus rails directly, which work as Hotwire’s SPA-like page accelerator and Hotwire’s modest JavaScript framework.

What is Hotwire?

Hotwire is a package of different frameworks that help to build applications. It simplifies the developer’s work for writing web pages without the need to write JavaScript, and instead sending HTML code over the wire.

Introduction to The Hotwire Framework:

1. Turbo:

It uses simplified techniques to build web applications while decreasing the usage of JavaScript in the application. Turbo offers numerous handling methods for the HTML data sent over the wire and displaying the application’s data without actually loading the entire page. It helps to maintain the simplicity of web applications without destroying the single-page application experience by using the below techniques:

Turbo Frames: Turbo Frames help to load the different sections of our markup without any dependency as it divides the page into different contexts separately called frames and updates these frames individually.
Turbo Drive: Every link doesn’t have to make the entire page reload when clicked. Only the HTML contained within the tag will be displayed.
Turbo Streams: To add real-time features to the application, this technique is used. It helps to bring real-time data to the application using CRUD actions.

2. Stimulus

It represents the JavaScript framework, which is required when JS is a requirement in the application. The interaction with the HTML is possible with the help of a stimulus, as the controllers that help those interactions are written by a stimulus.

3. Strada

Not much information is available about Strada as it has not been officially released yet. However, it works with native applications, and by using HTML bridge attributes, interaction is made possible between web applications and native apps.

Simple diagrammatic representation of Hotwire Stack:

Prerequisites For Hotwire Rails Tutorial

As we are implementing the Ruby on Rails Hotwire tutorial, make sure about the following installations before you can get started.

• Ruby on Rails
• Hotwire gem
• PostgreSQL/SQLite (choose any one database)
• Turbo Rails
• Stimulus.js

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Create a new Rails Project

Find the following commands to create a rails application.

mkdir ~/projects/railshotwire
cd ~/projects/railshotwire
echo "source 'https://rubygems.org'" > Gemfile
echo "gem 'rails', '~> 7.0.0'" >> Gemfile
bundle install  
bundle exec rails new . --force -d=postgresql

Now create some files for the project, up till now no usage of Rails Hotwire can be seen.
Fire the following command in your terminal.

• For creating a default controller for the application

echo "class HomeController < ApplicationController" > app/controllers/home_controller.rb
echo "end" >> app/controllers/home_controller.rb

• For creating another controller for the application

echo "class OtherController < ApplicationController" > app/controllers/other_controller.rb
echo "end" >> app/controllers/home_controller.rb

• For creating routes for the application

echo "Rails.application.routes.draw do" > config/routes.rb
echo '  get "home/index"' >> config/routes.rb
echo '  get "other/index"' >> config/routes.rb
echo '  root to: "home#index"' >> config/routes.rb
echo 'end' >> config/routes.rb

• For creating a default view for the application

mkdir app/views/home
echo '<h1>This is Rails Hotwire homepage</h1>' > app/views/home/index.html.erb
echo '<div><%= link_to "Enter to other page", other_index_path %></div>' >> app/views/home/index.html.erb

• For creating another view for the application

mkdir app/views/other
echo '<h1>This is Another page</h1>' > app/views/other/index.html.erb
echo '<div><%= link_to "Enter to home page", root_path %></div>' >> app/views/other/index.html.erb

• For creating a database and schema.rb file for the application

bin/rails db:create
bin/rails db:migrate

• For checking the application run bin/rails s and open your browser, your running application will have the below view.

Additionally, you can clone the code and browse through the project. Here’s the source code of the repository: Rails 7 Hotwire application

Now, let’s see how Hotwire Rails can work its magic with various Turbo techniques.

Hotwire Rails: Turbo Drive

Go to your localhost:3000 on your web browser and right-click on the Inspect and open a Network tab of the DevTools of the browser.

Now click on go to another page link that appears on the home page to redirect from the home page to another page. In our Network tab, we can see that this action of navigation is achieved via XHR. It appears only the part inside HTML is reloaded, here neither the CSS is reloaded nor the JS is reloaded when the navigation action is performed.

By performing this action we can see that Turbo Drive helps to represent the HTML response without loading the full page and only follows redirect and reindeer HTML responses which helps to make the application faster to access.

Hotwire Rails: Turbo Frame

This technique helps to divide the current page into different sections called frames that can be updated separately independently when new data is added from the server.
Below we discuss the different use cases of Turbo frame like inline edition, sorting, searching, and filtering of data.

Let’s perform some practical actions to see the example of these use cases.

Make changes in the app/controllers/home_controller.rb file

#CODE

class HomeController < ApplicationController
   def turbo_frame_form
   end
   
   def turbo_frame submit
      extracted_anynumber = params[:any][:anynumber]
      render :turbo_frame_form, status: :ok, locals: {anynumber: extracted_anynumber,      comment: 'turbo_frame_submit ok' }
   end
end

Add app/views/home/turbo_frame_form.html.erb file to the application and add this content inside the file.

#CODE

<section>

    <%= turbo_frame_tag 'anyframe' do %>
            
      <div>
          <h2>Frame view</h2>
          <%= form_with scope: :any, url: turbo_frame_submit_path, local: true do |form| %>
              <%= form.label :anynumber, 'Type an integer (odd or even)', 'class' => 'my-0  d-inline'  %>
              <%= form.text_field :anynumber, type: 'number', 'required' => 'true', 'value' => "#{local_assigns[:anynumber] || 0}",  'aria-describedby' => 'anynumber' %>
              <%= form.submit 'Submit this number', 'id' => 'submit-number' %>
          <% end %>
      </div>
      <div>
        <h2>Data of the view</h2>
        <pre style="font-size: .7rem;"><%= JSON.pretty_generate(local_assigns) %></pre> 
      </div>
      
    <% end %>

</section>

Make some adjustments in routes.rb

#CODE

Rails.application.routes.draw do
  get 'home/index'
  get 'other/index'

  get '/home/turbo_frame_form' => 'home#turbo_frame_form', as: 'turbo_frame_form'
  post '/home/turbo_frame_submit' => 'home#turbo_frame_submit', as: 'turbo_frame_submit'


  root to: "home#index"
end

• Next step is to change homepage view in app/views/home/index.html.erb

#CODE

<h1>This is Rails Hotwire home page</h1>
<div><%= link_to "Enter to other page", other_index_path %></div>

<%= turbo_frame_tag 'anyframe' do %>        
  <div>
      <h2>Home view</h2>
      <%= form_with scope: :any, url: turbo_frame_submit_path, local: true do |form| %>
          <%= form.label :anynumber, 'Type an integer (odd or even)', 'class' => 'my-0  d-inline'  %>
          <%= form.text_field :anynumber, type: 'number', 'required' => 'true', 'value' => "#{local_assigns[:anynumber] || 0}",  'aria-describedby' => 'anynumber' %>
          <%= form.submit 'Submit this number', 'id' => 'submit-number' %>
      <% end %>
  <div>
<% end %>

After making all the changes, restart the rails server and refresh the browser, the default view will appear on the browser.

Now in the field enter any digit, after entering the digit click on submit button, and as the submit button is clicked we can see the Turbo Frame in action in the below screen, we can observe that the frame part changed, the first title and first link didn’t move.

Hotwire Rails: Turbo Streams

Turbo Streams deliver page updates over WebSocket, SSE or in response to form submissions by only using HTML and a series of CRUD-like operations, you are free to say that either

• Update the piece of HTML while responding to all the other actions like the post, put, patch, and delete except the GET action.
• Transmit a change to all users, without reloading the browser page.

This transmit can be represented by a simple example.

• Make changes in app/controllers/other_controller.rb file of rails application

#CODE

class OtherController < ApplicationController

  def post_something
    respond_to do |format|
      format.turbo_stream {  }
    end
  end

   end

Add the below line in routes.rb file of the application

#CODE

post '/other/post_something' => 'other#post_something', as: 'post_something'

Superb! Rails will now attempt to locate the app/views/other/post_something.turbo_stream.erb template at any moment the ‘/other/post_something’ endpoint is reached.

For this, we need to add app/views/other/post_something.turbo_stream.erb template in the rails application.

#CODE

<turbo-stream action="append" target="messages">
  <template>
    <div id="message_1">This changes the existing message!</div>
  </template>
</turbo-stream>

This states that the response will try to append the template of the turbo frame with ID “messages”.

Now change the index.html.erb file in app/views/other paths with the below content.

#CODE

<h1>This is Another page</h1>
<div><%= link_to "Enter to home page", root_path %></div>

<div style="margin-top: 3rem;">
  <%= form_with scope: :any, url: post_something_path do |form| %>
      <%= form.submit 'Post any message %>
  <% end %>
  <turbo-frame id="messages">
    <div>An empty message</div>
  </turbo-frame>
</div>

• After making all the changes, restart the rails server and refresh the browser, and go to the other page.

• Once the above screen appears, click on the Post any message button

This action shows that after submitting the response, the Turbo Streams help the developer to append the message, without reloading the page.

Another use case we can test is that rather than appending the message, the developer replaces the message. For that, we need to change the content of app/views/other/post_something.turbo_stream.erb template file and change the value of the action attribute from append to replace and check the changes in the browser.

#CODE

<turbo-stream action="replace" target="messages">
  <template>
    <div id="message_1">This changes the existing message!</div>
  </template>
</turbo-stream>

When we click on Post any message button, the message that appear below that button will get replaced with the message that is mentioned in the app/views/other/post_something.turbo_stream.erb template

Stimulus

There are some cases in an application where JS is needed, therefore to cover those scenarios we require Hotwire JS tool. Hotwire has a JS tool because in some scenarios Turbo-* tools are not sufficient. But as we know that Hotwire is used to reduce the usage of JS in an application, Stimulus considers HTML as the single source of truth. Consider the case where we have to give elements on a page some JavaScript attributes, such as data controller, data-action, and data target. For that, a stimulus controller that can access elements and receive events based on those characteristics will be created.

Make a change in app/views/other/index.html.erb template file in rails application

#CODE

<h1>This is Another page</h1>
<div><%= link_to "Enter to home page", root_path %></div>

<div style="margin-top: 2rem;">
  <%= form_with scope: :any, url: post_something_path do |form| %>
      <%= form.submit 'Post something' %>
  <% end %>
  <turbo-frame id="messages">
    <div>An empty message</div>
  </turbo-frame>
</div>

<div style="margin-top: 2rem;">
  <h2>Stimulus</h2>  
  <div data-controller="hello">
    <input data-hello-target="name" type="text">
    <button data-action="click->hello#greet">
      Greet
    </button>
    <span data-hello-target="output">
    </span>
  </div>
</div>

Make changes in the hello_controller.js in path app/JavaScript/controllers and add a stimulus controller in the file, which helps to bring the HTML into life.

#CODE

import { Controller } from "@hotwired/stimulus"

export default class extends Controller {
  static targets = [ "name", "output" ]

  greet() {
    this.outputTarget.textContent =
      `Hello, ${this.nameTarget.value}!`
  }
}

Go to your browser after making the changes in the code and click on Enter to other page link which will navigate to the localhost:3000/other/index page there you can see the changes implemented by the stimulus controller that is designed to augment your HTML with just enough behavior to make it more responsive.

With just a little bit of work, Turbo and Stimulus together offer a complete answer for applications that are quick and compelling.

Using Rails 7 Hotwire helps to load the pages at a faster speed and allows you to render templates on the server, where you have access to your whole domain model. It is a productive development experience in ROR, without compromising any of the speed or responsiveness associated with SPA.

Conclusion

We hope you were satisfied with our Rails Hotwire tutorial. Write to us at service@bacancy.com for any query that you want to resolve, or if you want us to share a tutorial on your query.

For more such solutions on RoR, check out our Ruby on Rails Tutorials. We will always strive to amaze you and cater to your needs.

Original article source at: https://www.bacancytechnology.com/

#rails #ruby 

jQuery Simple Textarea Character Counter | jQuery Character Count

Keywords:
textarea character count javascript
count characters in textarea jquery
remaining character count javascript
jquery count remaining characters
limit character input in the textarea including count

#jquery #jquery simple #jquery character #coding

PHP jQuery Ajax Post Form Data Example

PHP jquery ajax POST request with MySQL. In this tutorial, you will learn how to create and submit a simple form in PHP using jQuery ajax post request. And how to submit a form data into MySQL database without the whole page refresh or reload. And also you will learn how to show an error message to the user if the user does not fill any form field.

And this tutorial also guide on how to send data to MySQL database using AJAX + jQuery + PHP without reloading the whole page and show a client-side validation error message if it has an error in the form.

PHP jQuery AJAX POST Form Data In Into MySQL DB Example

Just follow the few below steps and easily create and submit ajax form in PHP and MySQL with client-side validation.

• Create Database And Table
• Create a Database Connection File
• Create An Ajax POST Form in PHP
• Create An Ajax Data Store File

https://www.tutsmake.com/php-jquery-ajax-post-tutorial-example/

#jquery ajax serialize form data example #submit form using ajax in php example #save form data using ajax in php #how to insert form data using ajax in php #php jquery ajax form submit example #jquery ajax and jquery post form submit example with php

Static Code Analysis: What It Is? How to Use It?

Static code analysis refers to the technique of approximating the runtime behavior of a program. In other words, it is the process of predicting the output of a program without actually executing it.

Lately, however, the term “Static Code Analysis” is more commonly used to refer to one of the applications of this technique rather than the technique itself — program comprehension — understanding the program and detecting issues in it (anything from syntax errors to type mismatches, performance hogs likely bugs, security loopholes, etc.). This is the usage we’d be referring to throughout this post.

“The refinement of techniques for the prompt discovery of error serves as well as any other as a hallmark of what we mean by science.”

• J. Robert Oppenheimer

Outline

We cover a lot of ground in this post. The aim is to build an understanding of static code analysis and to equip you with the basic theory, and the right tools so that you can write analyzers on your own.

We start our journey with laying down the essential parts of the pipeline which a compiler follows to understand what a piece of code does. We learn where to tap points in this pipeline to plug in our analyzers and extract meaningful information. In the latter half, we get our feet wet, and write four such static analyzers, completely from scratch, in Python.

Note that although the ideas here are discussed in light of Python, static code analyzers across all programming languages are carved out along similar lines. We chose Python because of the availability of an easy to use ast module, and wide adoption of the language itself.

How does it all work?

Before a computer can finally “understand” and execute a piece of code, it goes through a series of complicated transformations:

As you can see in the diagram (go ahead, zoom it!), the static analyzers feed on the output of these stages. To be able to better understand the static analysis techniques, let’s look at each of these steps in some more detail:

Scanning

The first thing that a compiler does when trying to understand a piece of code is to break it down into smaller chunks, also known as tokens. Tokens are akin to what words are in a language.

A token might consist of either a single character, like (, or literals (like integers, strings, e.g., 7, Bob, etc.), or reserved keywords of that language (e.g, def in Python). Characters which do not contribute towards the semantics of a program, like trailing whitespace, comments, etc. are often discarded by the scanner.

Python provides the tokenize module in its standard library to let you play around with tokens:

Python

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import io

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import tokenize

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code = b"color = input('Enter your favourite color: ')"

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for token in tokenize.tokenize(io.BytesIO(code).readline):

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    print(token)

Python

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TokenInfo(type=62 (ENCODING),  string='utf-8')

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TokenInfo(type=1  (NAME),      string='color')

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TokenInfo(type=54 (OP),        string='=')

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TokenInfo(type=1  (NAME),      string='input')

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TokenInfo(type=54 (OP),        string='(')

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TokenInfo(type=3  (STRING),    string="'Enter your favourite color: '")

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TokenInfo(type=54 (OP),        string=')')

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TokenInfo(type=4  (NEWLINE),   string='')

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TokenInfo(type=0  (ENDMARKER), string='')

(Note that for the sake of readability, I’ve omitted a few columns from the result above — metadata like starting index, ending index, a copy of the line on which a token occurs, etc.)

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