Character count on fields via Maxlength integration (D7)

Lets make this a general task of displaying the character count on all fields.

There are modules out there already like http://drupal.org/project/cck_count and http://drupal.org/project/maxlength. I would suggest we make it possible to integrate with these modules, but not do anything too much on our own.

If not possible with another module, then allowing an external library to optionally integrate would be nice as well:

• http://spyrestudios.com/building-a-live-textarea-character-count-limit-w...
• http://cssglobe.com/jquery-plugin-simplest-twitterlike-dynamic-character...
• http://tympanus.net/codrops/2009/11/08/jmaxinput-twitter-like-textarea/
• https://github.com/dtisgodsson/jquery-character-counter
• https://github.com/aaronrussell/jquery-simply-countable
• https://github.com/Kevinlearynet/jQuery-Character-Count
• http://tpgblog.com/2010/03/23/noblecount-jquery-character-count-plugin/
• http://blog.shawnc.org/2012/jquery-character-counter-that-works-with-twi...
• https://github.com/commadelimited/textCounter.js

Also this needs to account for tokens which could result in any number of characters. So it would be easy to be confusing for users since a string like 'Test title for [node:title]' while displayed as 27 characters, could easily be way more than that in reality.

May I ask whether there has been any integration with cck_count or maxlength modules?

Reducing this to Minor priority as it's not something I'm going to do for 1.0.

That said, if someone wants to put together a patch that integrates with another module, I'll definitely consider it :)

I have a question about form alter. I'm trying to add maxlength js to the description field using form alter. But no matter what form id I use it doesn't show description or abstract (only title). Is there another way of doing it?

I created a patch that adds this behaviour. I used the maxlength module for this.

I'm not going to apply this as-is, but I think Maxlength would be a great module to support, if they add character count support in the API (#2329441: Unlimited field, just a character count).

@DamienMcKenna,

That was also the part I didn't like. I'll try to provide a patch on the issue of the Maxlength module.

Created a new patch. After installing patch #2 in #2329441: Unlimited field, just a character count this worked for me.

@JeroenT: I don't want to add a max count on fields that don't need it or have questionable standards (e.g. "description" has value up through ~300 characters), but I would like to try enabling MaxLength's character count on all text fields.

Hi, this patch combined with the maxlength one works fine. Thanks!

Added related isue

I agree--I think hard coding a restriction to 150 characters is too restrictive. Would it be possible to make the value configurable?

Any character counts should be tied to the functionality that will be added in #2309017: Automatically trim meta tag lengths (D7).

Lets see if #2329441: Unlimited field, just a character count is committed first, then we can use it.

A follow-up on
https://www.drupal.org/project/metatag/issues/1918738

The Modul max length offers the the given features without being too restricted.

So an integration would help

https://www.drupal.org/project/maxlength

We have support in the module for allowing meta tags to have a maximum length, so let's leverage that on the form output.

I think this should be handled by adding the maxlength values to the form output when the module's settings are configured to limit the individual tag. There's some WIP in the earlier patches that just needs to be refined so the form elements are added in a generic way.

How about something like this? It provides integration with Maxlength, but provides an option to disable it if it proves to not be worth it.

Some minor logic refinements.

Committed. Thank you all.