Lead:  Liav Nadler  

Issues to cover

• Inputs

  • Default values

  • Field dependencies

  • Mandatory indicators

• Validations

  • Invalid values

  • Blank mandatory fields

  • Leaving the page without saving

• Grouping fields

• Form-level elements

  • Status tags

  • Messages

• Action buttons

  • Top for form-level

  • Bottom for widget-level, sticky

  • Distances between buttons (if more than 2)

• Guidance

  • Form instructions

  • Field help

• Autosave

• Preventing users from selecting labels

Description

A form is a collection of inputsinput fields, allowing users to enter data that is then sent to a further processing. store, retrieve, and update data.

Forms may appear in workspaces, wizards or dialog popups, filter panes and cards.

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Basic Flow

• There are two basic form types:

  • Configuration forms - allowing users to change predefined settings (e.g. service level indicators).

  • Creation forms - allowing users to create new entities (e.g. employee evaluations). In this case, most of the fields in the form will be blank by default.

Some forms consists of both configuration and creation elements.

• The user can fill in the fields in any order before saving or applying the form.

• While filling out the form
  After filling in a form, clicking the Save button (in configuration pages) or the main button in dialogs triggers a validation (see below).

Usage & Behavior

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either in the main workspace or within other containers, such as Dialog popups, Popovers,Wizards,Filter panes, Details panes and Cards.

In a workspace	In a Dialog popup
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Usage & Behavior

Structure

A form consists of two areas:

• the input area and the action area.The input area may contain Input area, containing any set of components, input fields including text Text fields, text areas, dropdown Drop-down menus, checkboxes Checkboxes, radio buttons, date pickers, time pickers etc.

• Related inputs can be grouped together under a single title. For example, we may find Email and Phone fields under the title Contact Information.

• The action area usually consists of two buttons: Save for submitting the form and Cancel for resetting the form or closing the popup (see interactions below).

• In case the form takes the entire area of a workspace, the action area will appear at the top of the page. In any other case, it will appear at the bottom of the container and will stick to the bottom. The Radio buttons etc.

• the Action area, which consists of:

  • a submit button, such as Save, Create, or Edit.

  • a Cancel button.

  • additional actions, where needed.

The Input Area

• For specific form elements, browse the Components section in LUX.

• Where possible, field labels will appear above the input field.

• Where relevant, a red mandatory indicator (*) will be shown to the right of the label.

  • Where a majority of fields are mandatory, a message will appear above the form indicating that all fields are mandatory unless otherwise specified.

• Where relevant, a help icon will appear next to the label (aligned to the right side of the field, if possible).

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The Action Area

• The action area will always be visible (i.e., stick to the top or bottom).

• Action buttons will be aligned to the right.

• Where the action area appears at the bottom of the main workspace, it will be separated by a horizontal line.

Placement and

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Forms may appear in workspaces, widgets, wizards or dialog popups.

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positioning

In most cases, the action area will appear below the form.

• Within the main workspace, where the form does not exceed the height of the container,

  • the action area will appear

  at the top of the page, opposite to the page title.If the form takes only part of the workspace (e.g., inside a dialog or a widget), the action area will appear at

  • beneath the last form field.

• Within the main workspace where the form reaches the bottom of the container, and within Popups and other modals:

  • the action area will stick to the bottom of the container.

  In this case, the action area will also be sticky, to allow users scrolling along the form, without hiding the action buttons.

Fields

• Field labels will appear on top of the inputs (e.g., a text field or a set of radio buttons).

• On mandatory fields, the mandatory icon will be shown next to the label.

• Where relevant, a help icons will appear next to the label.

• In some cases, two or more fields are dependent. In this case, selecting a value for the dependent fields will not be possible until there is a value on the main field.

• In configuration forms it is common the most or all fields have default values.

States

• Forms can have 3 states:

  • Idle - this is the default for creation forms. Exiting the form without changing anything will not add that entity.

  • Dirty state - a form switches to this state after making changes to the idle form.

  • Saved - after clicking the Save button.

• When first opening a configuration form it is defined as saved. Updating any of the fields, switches it to dirty state.

Interaction

• Forms has no intrinsic interactions. For component-specific interactions see the documentation of that component.

Validations and errors

• There are two types of validations related to forms: field validation and form validation.

Field Validation

• This category includes all validations that are related to specific inputs, including text fields, text areas, sets of checkboxes, date and time pickers, etc.

• The most common input-level errors are:

  • Invalid data, including invalid characters, invalid format and out-of-range values.

  • Missing mandatory, where a required field was left blank.

• Field validations for invalid characters or invalid format occurs while typing (“onkeydown”).

• Field validations for out of range data or missing mandatory occurs when a field looses focus (“onblur”).

• When invalid data or missing mandatory field was detected, the field changes its status to error.

• In some cases, the entered value is valid, but may call for a special attention (for example: a very large value). In this case, the field will change its status to warning, but will not prevent the form from being submitted.

• For more information, please refer to LUX Field Validation page.

Form Validation

• A form cannot be saved / submitted if one or more of its fields are in error state.

• Here is a typical saving flow:

  • When first entering a form, the Save button is disabled.

  • On updating a field, the Save button becomes enabled.

  • In case of a field error the Save button becomes disabled. An additional form-level indication may appear. Only after the error was resolved, the Save button is enabled again.

  • After clicking the Save button:

    • it becomes disabled again,

    • a toast message may appear, indicating that the form was saved.

• This flow is also relevant when the form is in a dialog popup. In this case, the cancel button is always enabled.

Saving “dirty data” in local storage

• In case a single Save button applies to multiple areas (tabs, master items in a master-detail layout, etc.), updated values will be saved in a local storage even before clicking the Save button.

• In this case, if the user updated a value in the first area, navigated to another area and went back to the first area, all updated values will remain intact.

Edge case: navigating to another area of the form while some fields has errors

• In case the user tries to navigate to another area of the form, while the current area has errors, a message popup will appear, allowing him to either continue, while loosing all the updated data, or cancel.

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Edge case: exiting an updated form

• In case the user tries to navigate away from a form after updating one or more fields, a message popup will appear, allowing her to either save and exit, exit without saving, or cancel.

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Best practices

Use when:

• Values have a distinct order.

• There is a default value.

• There are at least three possible values.

Don’t use:

• When?

General

• In case of large number of fields, group related fields together, providing a clear title to each group.

• Make sure that label texts are not selectable.

• Make sure there is a natural tab order between fields.

  • the form above will have a scrollbar.

In some cases, where a form uses the entire workspace and is shown across multiple containers, the action area may appear at the top of the workspace.

Main workspace - less than two thirds height	Main workspace - more than two thirds height	Popup	Entire workspace - form across multiple containers
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States

Forms have two possible states:

The Cancel button is always enabled in all states.

Interaction

The submit button

• Clicking the submit button sends the data for further processing. (For error handling see Validations and errors below).

• In the main workspace, if the form was submitted successfully a success Toast will appear.

  • If the form was triggered from a parent page, the user will automatically be return to that page.

• For forms inside containers, refer to the corresponding pattern documentation. For example:

  • clicking the submit button in a Dialog popup closes it.

  • clicking the Apply button on a Filter pane applies the filter and disables the button.

The Cancel button

• Clicking Cancel on a form with unsaved changes may trigger a warning message, where necessary.

• In the main workspace clicking Cancel will return to user to the parent page, without saving the data.

• For forms inside containers, refer to the corresponding pattern documentation. For example:

  • clicking Cancel will close Popups and Popovers.

  • clicking Cancel may close the Filter pane, depending on the pin state.

Validations and errors

Validation triggers

There are two types of validation which may affect a form:

Type	Trigger events	Examples	Notes
Client-side validation	Moving focus away from a field. Clicking the submit button on the form.	Invalid values. Invalid formats. Blank mandatory fields.	Client-side issues are either resolved immediately (for example, on deleting an invalid character) or when the field loses focus.
Server-side validation	Clicking the submit button (or Next button in Wizards). Clicking the Save button of an Inline input.	When logical problems are detected, e.g. trying to create an object with a name that already exists.	In some cases, a Dialog popup may appear with additional instructions required to complete the action. When validation takes more than a few seconds, a Progress indicator will appear in a modal. Image Added

Presentation of errors and warnings

Errors and warnings are shown:

• against individual form fields - see Field validation for more information.

• as a message in the action area - see details below.

While the form contains an error, the submit button will be disabled.

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A dedicated message will appear to the left of the action area. It will include:

• a status icon. If both errors and warnings are present, an error icon will be used.

• descriptive text including a link, and showing the total number of errors and warnings.

Error message	Warning message
Image Added Short form, where necessary: Image Added	Image Added Short form, where necessary: Image Added

Clicking the link opens a Popover, containing additional information. The popover includes:

• general introductory text describing the number of issues and how to resolve them.

• a list of issues, with errors appearing before warnings. Each issue will show:

  • an error or warning status icon.

  • a description of the issue and how to resolve it.

  • a Resolve or Review link, where relevant. Clicking the link closes the popover and sets the focus on the corresponding form field. The form may auto-scroll where necessary.

Examples

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Leaving an incomplete form

When the user navigates away from a form in the Edited state (after updating one or more fields), or while there are errors on the form:

• a Message popup will appear. See Common messages repository for appropriate message text.

• the user will choose to either keep editing the form or leave and discard changes.

In case of unsaved changed	In case of form errors
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Best practices

Use for:

• Creating or updating entities, such as users, roles, and channels.

• Configuration, such as service-level indicators or storage retention periods.

General

• Form fields should be arranged in one column. Closely related fields (e.g. First name and Last name) may appear side by side.

• Collections of related fields should be grouped into sections. For example, fields such as Email and Phone may be grouped under a Contact Information section.

Examples in different containers

Main workspace	Widget	Wizard	Details pane
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Accessibility compliance

Unless otherwise specified, see our general compliance information in Fundamentals - Accessibilitytext highlight when using a keyboard + using arrows when in edit mode (left, up or home to set the insertion point at the beginning; right, down or end to set it at the end).

Design

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Zeplin link

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Screen thumbnail

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Code

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