YUI3 Datatable - row formatting and selection

Question

I have an example working here - http://jsfiddle.net/BM3kX/5

It has a piece of JSON consumed by a YUI DataTable. I have a few queries regarding the same.

1. The JSON has a 'imageURI' attribute from which I need to render an image [16x16] along with the 'showName' attribute in the same cell. Also, the table can have multiple rows so as the images that should be rendered on each row efficiently.

2. When I click on a row, the table should alert me of the selected record. But there is a twist here - I need the data exactly as the JSON which is used to render it. (I should get even the 'type' attribute even if I'm not using it anywhere in my table.)

How can I meet the above requirements? Any solutions or possibilities?

Answer 1

1) There is not much you can do there. I assume the images are different for each of the records so there is not a lot to optimize except sending the images in the proper size instead of having the client resize them. If the images were some sort of icons representing status, I would recommend you sent the status coded somehow and let the browser decide on how to represent it, but if they are pictures of the people, you'll just have to let the browser deal with them the best it can.

2) It is easy to reconstitute the original data out of the model for the clicked row. You don't need to keep a copy of the JSON for that row, you can turn it into JSON whenever you want (after all, model has a toJSON method to make that easy). The model for each record in a table can hold more information than that shown in the table. The column property tells the datatable what to show, the datasource what it stores. Use getRecord to reach the underlying model and JSON-encode that. If the type was there originally, it will still be there even if you don't show it.