How can I make all child elements within a div uneditable?

Question

How can I make all child elements within a div uneditable?

Is there a way to make an entire div and all of its child elements uneditable without individually setting each one to readonly? This div contains a lot of dynamic content and I need a simple solution to prevent editing. If I set the parent div to readonly, will all the child elements automatically follow suit?

Providing some background, the reason for this is to prevent a text field within the div from triggering the mobile keyboard to pop up. My goal is to ensure that the entire web app remains uneditable, thus avoiding any unwanted behavior.

javascript html css

Answer 1

Answer №1

To prevent the on-screen keyboard from popping up, you can apply the readonly attribute to all input and textarea elements within a specified wrapper. This will allow the elements to be focused on but not allow any input values to be entered.

In cases where the keyboard appears due to the autofocus attribute or an earlier executed script, changing the inputs to readonly after they have already received focus may not resolve the issue. In such scenarios, you can check for focus and redirect it elsewhere within the wrapper to effectively close the keyboard.

const wrapper = document.getElementById("wrapper");

wrapper.querySelectorAll("input, textarea").forEach(element => element.setAttribute("readonly", ""));

// Set focus on the wrapper if the active element is inside it, to reset any open on-screen keyboard
if (wrapper.contains(document.activeElement)) {
  wrapper.focus();
}

<div id="wrapper" tabindex="-1">
  <form>
    <p>
      <label>Text input
  <input type="text" value="Lorem ipsum">
  </label>
    </p>
    <p>
      <label>Email input
  <input type="email" value="<a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection" class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="8ffbeafcfbcfeaf7eee2ffe3eaa1ece0e2">[email protected]</a>" autofocus>
  </label>
    </p>
    <p>
      <label>Select input
  <select>
    <option>Option 1</option>
    <option selected>Option 2</option>
  </select>
  </label>
    </p>
    <p><a href="#">A link</a></p>
  </form>
</div>

Answer 2

To prevent the on-screen keyboard from popping up, you can apply the readonly attribute to all input and textarea elements within a specified wrapper. This will allow the elements to be focused on but not allow any input values to be entered.

In cases where the keyboard appears due to the autofocus attribute or an earlier executed script, changing the inputs to readonly after they have already received focus may not resolve the issue. In such scenarios, you can check for focus and redirect it elsewhere within the wrapper to effectively close the keyboard.

const wrapper = document.getElementById("wrapper");

wrapper.querySelectorAll("input, textarea").forEach(element => element.setAttribute("readonly", ""));

// Set focus on the wrapper if the active element is inside it, to reset any open on-screen keyboard
if (wrapper.contains(document.activeElement)) {
  wrapper.focus();
}

<div id="wrapper" tabindex="-1">
  <form>
    <p>
      <label>Text input
  <input type="text" value="Lorem ipsum">
  </label>
    </p>
    <p>
      <label>Email input
  <input type="email" value="<a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection" class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="8ffbeafcfbcfeaf7eee2ffe3eaa1ece0e2">[email protected]</a>" autofocus>
  </label>
    </p>
    <p>
      <label>Select input
  <select>
    <option>Option 1</option>
    <option selected>Option 2</option>
  </select>
  </label>
    </p>
    <p><a href="#">A link</a></p>
  </form>
</div>

Answer 3

Answer №2

If you want to make text unselectable but still allow pointer events, you can use user-select: none;. This is different from pointer-events: none;:

p {
  user-select: none;
}

p:hover {
  color: purple;
}

<div>
  <p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus nulla risus, eleifend a dolor eu, rutrum sagittis ex. Donec sit amet odio sollicitudin, dictum lectus vel, pretium ipsum. Vestibulum ante ipsum primis in faucibus orci luctus et ultrices
    posuere cubilia curae; Nam volutpat sodales ornare. Sed elementum dapibus neque a varius. Quisque ultrices imperdiet ante, quis posuere leo mattis eu. Ut sollicitudin turpis non urna tempor volutpat. Nam sed lorem a risus consectetur aliquet. Cras
    non erat semper, molestie dui id, pharetra metus. Aenean aliquet tortor sapien, non efficitur libero suscipit non. Phasellus condimentum, justo vel pulvinar maximus, mauris ipsum aliquet enim, vitae porttitor orci massa sit amet eros. Nulla ultrices
    purus sed nibh fringilla, sit amet ultrices justo malesuada. Donec accumsan vel ante ut sollicitudin. Nulla faucibus ante quis sem vestibulum, vitae gravida tortor lobortis.</p>
</div>

Answer 4

If you want to make text unselectable but still allow pointer events, you can use user-select: none;. This is different from pointer-events: none;:

p {
  user-select: none;
}

p:hover {
  color: purple;
}

<div>
  <p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus nulla risus, eleifend a dolor eu, rutrum sagittis ex. Donec sit amet odio sollicitudin, dictum lectus vel, pretium ipsum. Vestibulum ante ipsum primis in faucibus orci luctus et ultrices
    posuere cubilia curae; Nam volutpat sodales ornare. Sed elementum dapibus neque a varius. Quisque ultrices imperdiet ante, quis posuere leo mattis eu. Ut sollicitudin turpis non urna tempor volutpat. Nam sed lorem a risus consectetur aliquet. Cras
    non erat semper, molestie dui id, pharetra metus. Aenean aliquet tortor sapien, non efficitur libero suscipit non. Phasellus condimentum, justo vel pulvinar maximus, mauris ipsum aliquet enim, vitae porttitor orci massa sit amet eros. Nulla ultrices
    purus sed nibh fringilla, sit amet ultrices justo malesuada. Donec accumsan vel ante ut sollicitudin. Nulla faucibus ante quis sem vestibulum, vitae gravida tortor lobortis.</p>
</div>

How can I make all child elements within a div uneditable?

Answer №1

Answer №2

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