What is the best way to ensure that my placeholder text remains permanent and properly formatted?

Question

What is the best way to ensure that my placeholder text remains permanent and properly formatted?

Looking to create a basic typing test app using HTML, CSS and JS. My goal is to have placeholder text displayed in the input box so users know what to type as they type. Misalignments between the placeholder text and user input will indicate mistakes. After hours of trial and error, I've developed two subpar solutions:

    <div id='test' class="placeholder" data-value="This appears in the box!">
    <textarea id="typed" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15></div>

CSS:

    .placeholder
    {
        position: relative;
    }

    .placeholder::after
    {
        position: absolute;
        left: 2px;
        top: 2px;
        content: attr(data-value);
        pointer-events: none;
        opacity: 0.6;
        text-align: left;
    }

While this method works well, it struggles with handling newlines properly. Various attempts like \u000A, \x0A, \r\n haven't yielded success.

Option two involves utilizing the placeholder attribute:

    <textarea placeholder="line1
    line2" id="typed" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15></textarea>

This approach displays the text correctly but it disappears when users begin typing.

Anyone aware of how to keep standard placeholder text visible permanently or any other workaround for correct formatting?

javascript html css

Answer 1

Answer №1

Instead of resorting to data attributes or placeholder text for this task, I recommend avoiding them altogether. Implementing line breaks and ensuring cross-browser compatibility may prove challenging if you take that approach. Have you considered using two absolutely positioned textareas stacked on top of each other? The lower textarea can contain the required user input text and remain disabled, while the upper one could have a transparent background, allowing the text below to be visible. Below is a simple concept of how this setup could appear:

textarea {
  position: absolute;
  font-size: 20px;
}

#type {
  color: red;
}

#typed {
  background: none;
  z-index: 10;
}

<div id='test' class="placeholder">
  <textarea id="typed" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15></textarea>
  <textarea id="type" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15 disabled>
    This is the text you need to type.
    You can include as many lines as necessary.
  </textarea>
</div>

JSFiddle

Answer 2

Instead of resorting to data attributes or placeholder text for this task, I recommend avoiding them altogether. Implementing line breaks and ensuring cross-browser compatibility may prove challenging if you take that approach. Have you considered using two absolutely positioned textareas stacked on top of each other? The lower textarea can contain the required user input text and remain disabled, while the upper one could have a transparent background, allowing the text below to be visible. Below is a simple concept of how this setup could appear:

textarea {
  position: absolute;
  font-size: 20px;
}

#type {
  color: red;
}

#typed {
  background: none;
  z-index: 10;
}

<div id='test' class="placeholder">
  <textarea id="typed" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15></textarea>
  <textarea id="type" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15 disabled>
    This is the text you need to type.
    You can include as many lines as necessary.
  </textarea>
</div>

JSFiddle

Answer 3

Answer №2

Check out this example.

You were almost there! I simply grouped them together in a container.

The div and text textarea are positioned absolutely and share the same font properties. The placeholder is adjusted to accommodate the 1px border and 2px padding on a textarea. These are default values, so if you modify them, be sure to update the placeholder positioning accordingly.

.container {
    position: relative;
}
textarea
{
    position: absolute;
    top: 0px;
    left: 0px;
}

.placeholder
{
    position: absolute;
    left: 3px;
    top: 3px;
    content: attr(data-value);
    pointer-events: none;
    z-index: 1;
    opacity: 0.6;
    text-align: left;
}

textarea,
.placeholder {
    font-family: arial;
    font-size: 16px;
}

As you can see below, the placeholder div includes a line break with <br />. Keep in mind that HTML handles line breaks differently than plain text, so make adjustments in your comparison code:

<div class='container'>
    <div id='test' class="placeholder">This text appears<br /> in the box</div>
    <textarea id="typed" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15></textarea>
</div>

Answer 4

Check out this example.

You were almost there! I simply grouped them together in a container.

The div and text textarea are positioned absolutely and share the same font properties. The placeholder is adjusted to accommodate the 1px border and 2px padding on a textarea. These are default values, so if you modify them, be sure to update the placeholder positioning accordingly.

.container {
    position: relative;
}
textarea
{
    position: absolute;
    top: 0px;
    left: 0px;
}

.placeholder
{
    position: absolute;
    left: 3px;
    top: 3px;
    content: attr(data-value);
    pointer-events: none;
    z-index: 1;
    opacity: 0.6;
    text-align: left;
}

textarea,
.placeholder {
    font-family: arial;
    font-size: 16px;
}

As you can see below, the placeholder div includes a line break with <br />. Keep in mind that HTML handles line breaks differently than plain text, so make adjustments in your comparison code:

<div class='container'>
    <div id='test' class="placeholder">This text appears<br /> in the box</div>
    <textarea id="typed" name="typed" cols=50 rows=15></textarea>
</div>

What is the best way to ensure that my placeholder text remains permanent and properly formatted?

Answer №1

Answer №2

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