Adding an attribute to the <input> tag for a django ModelForm field

Question

I have a django model that I'm displaying as a form using a ModelForm. The defaults work very well for me for the most part.

However, I would like my html <input ...> tags to have one additional attribute, namely I would like to include a placeholder attribute, like the following:

<input placeholder="{{field.label}}" ... />

What is the easiest way to add this attribute to my html? As far as I can tell it appears I need to implement my own filter to output the field, but this seems like overkill when all i want to do is leave everything alone but add one additional attribute.

Lunik · Accepted Answer · 2019-07-03 18:50:42Z

34

See the documentation

class AuthorForm(ModelForm):
    class Meta:
        model = Author
        widgets = {
            'name': TextInput(attrs={'placeholder': 'name'}),
        }

You could always create your own widget that derives from TextInput and includes the placeholder attribute, and use the widgets dictionary to simply map fields to your new widget without specifying the placeholder attribute for every field.

edited Jul 3, 2019 at 18:50

Lunik

3101 silver badge12 bronze badges

answered Dec 3, 2010 at 10:01

Josh Smeaton

48.8k24 gold badges137 silver badges166 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

1 Comment

Anupam Over a year ago

from django.forms import TextInput

Mark · Accepted Answer · 2014-06-01 19:19:47Z

20

Personally I prefer to use this method:

def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
    super(MyForm, self).__init__(*args, **kwargs)
    self.fields['email'].widget.attrs['placeholder'] = self.fields['email'].label or '[email protected]'

It required more code if you don't have __init__ yet, but you don't need to specify the widget.

answered Jun 1, 2014 at 19:19

Mark

20.2k10 gold badges113 silver badges137 bronze badges

Comments

David · Accepted Answer · 2023-06-21 11:03:25Z

Here is a reusable mixin for Form classes based on @Mark's method

from django.core.exceptions import ImproperlyConfigured

class PlaceholderMixin():
    def placeholder_setup(self):
        if not hasattr(self.Meta, 'placeholders'):
            raise ImproperlyConfigured('Meta class must have a placeholders dict')
        for field, placeholder in self.Meta.placeholders.items():
            self.fields[field].widget.attrs['placeholder'] = placeholder

To use it, add it to a Form class and define placeholders in the Meta class:

class MyForm(forms.ModelForm, PlaceholderMixin):
    class Meta:
        model = MyModel
        fields = [ 'name', 'description', 'choices' ]
        placeholders = {
            'name': 'your name',
            'description': 'describe yourself'
        }
        
    def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
        super().__init__(*args, **kwargs)
        self.placeholder_setup()

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Adding an attribute to the <input> tag for a django ModelForm field

3 Answers 3

1 Comment

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

3 Answers 3

1 Comment

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related