Very often while registering on a website ,you will notice that they usually have a username or email address availability check. This ensures that 2 users do not have the same username or email address. Some websites prefer to make this availability check when a user fill in all the details in the form and press submit while some other websites do a live username / Email Address Availability check when the “username” textbox loses focus. Personally, I would prefer to let the user know if a particular username is available while filling the registration form rather than after submitting the registration form.
Below are some screenshots from the most popular websites ( gmail.com , yahoo.com and hotmail.com ) that have email address verification before the user submits the form .
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Email address verification at Hotmail
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Email address verification at Yahoo Mail
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Email address verification at gmail.com
What will you learn in this tutorial ?
This tutorial teaches you how to do a live username availability check using Jquery. The ajax request is triggered when the “username” textbox loses focus. A loading image is added next to the textbox during this asynchronous request . After it has completed, an icon will replace the loading image based on whether the username is available or not.3//*
Credits
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Username is not Available
HTML/CSS Form Design
The code snippet below contains the code that makes up the form design .
02 | font-family : Arial , Helvetica , sans-serif |
10 | background : transparent url ( 'bg.jpg' ) no-repeat ; |
02 | < form action = "user_check.html" method = "get" > |
04 | < label for = "username" >Username :</ label > |
05 | < input type = "text" name = "username" id = "username" /> |
06 | < span id = "availability_status" ></ span > </ div > |
08 | < label for = "full_name" >Full Name :</ label > |
09 | < input type = "text" name = "full_name" id = "full_name" /> |
12 | < label for = "email" >Email :</ label > |
13 | < input type = "text" name = "email" id = "email" /> |
16 | < input name = "submit" type = "submit" value = "submit" id = "submit_btn" /> |
The Database Design
For the sake of simplicity ,i will not include the php database connection code here . You can download the full source code from the link provided above.
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Database Structure
Jquery Code
This section contains the jquery Code that handles the Ajax request when the textbox loses focus .Based on the server response , the appropriate icon is appended to the with id=”availability_status” .Almost every line of codes in commented below .
01 | $(document).ready( function () |
03 | $( "#username" ).change( function () |
06 | var username = $( "#username" ).val(); |
07 | if (username.length > 3) |
09 | $( "#availability_status" ).html( ' Checking availability...' ); |
14 | url: "ajax_check_username.php" , |
15 | data: "username=" + username, |
16 | success: function (server_response){ |
18 | $( "#availability_status" ).ajaxComplete( function (event, request){ |
20 | if (server_response == '0' ) |
22 | $( "#availability_status" ).html( ' Available ' ); |
25 | else if (server_response == '1' ) |
27 | $( "#availability_status" ).html( ' Not Available ' ); |
39 | $( "#availability_status" ).html( 'Username too short' ); |
PHP Code
As you have probably noticed , the file “ajax_check_username.php” is called via ajax and the username is passed to the server . The code below query our database to check if the username is already in our database or not . It will either return the value “0″ or “1″ .
01 | include ( 'database_connection.php' ); |
04 | if (isset( $_POST [ 'username' ])) |
06 | $username = mysql_real_escape_string( $_POST [ 'username' ]); |
08 | $check_for_username = mysql_query( "SELECT userid FROM member WHERE username='$username'" ); |
11 | if (mysql_num_rows( $check_for_username )) |
That’s all Folks ! Got a Comment ? Criticism?Share it with us below !