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Why is there a difference in text length with backspace or delete (in TinyMCE)

In my TinyMCE.init method, I have a setup function like this one :
setup: function(ed){
ed.onKeyUp.add(function(ed, e){
var count = ed.getBody().innerText.length;
var key = e.keyCode || e.charCode;
console.log(count);
console.log(ed.getBody().innerText);
});
}
If my textarea is empty, when I press Backspace (key = 8), count equals 0.
When I press Delete (key = 46), count equals 1.
In both cases, console.log(ed.getBody().innerText); returns an empty string.
I want to use this to count (and limit) the size of my TinyMCE.
Does anyone can illuminate me about that strange difference ?

Delete is character code 127 in the ASCII-Table. The delete char is written into the textinput and therefore counts to the length of it, but is not displayed, because control characters dont get displayed.
This is indeed strange behaviour, because actually the delete character should not be written into the text field, but it seems like it does

Allow use special commands on input validating

I have a little problem with validating an input field.
Here is my validation code:
_validateInput: function(e) {
var value = e.currentTarget.value;
var key = e.which || e.keyCode;
var re = /[^0-9\.]/gi;
if (re.test(value + String.fromCharCode(key))) {
return value;
} else {
return value + String.fromCharCode(key);
}
},
The logic is the next. If user input non-digital characters, the function return current value of the input, without the last symbol.
If user type digit or dot, function return current input value + entered number.
What is my problem:
1) It not allows user to enter dot.
2) String.fromCharCode for dot character returns "¾" symbol.
3) Special symbols like backspace, tab, etc... doesn`t work.
4) Commands like Ctrl+V, Ctrl+A also does not work
Could someone help me to solve this problems? What is wrong with my RegEx?
Thanks!
P.S. Function fired on the keydown event

Unless you need to support older browsers listen for oninput instead of onkeydown and a lot of the processing will have been done for you.
http://www.w3schools.com/jsref/event_oninput.asp
This event is similar to the onchange event. The difference is that the oninput event occurs immediately after the value of an element has changed, while onchange occurs when the element loses focus, after the content has been changed. The other difference is that the onchange event also works on <keygen> and <select> elements.
Whenever oninput is triggered then check the value in the text area is valid and if it isn't then correct it. This will also let you check for multiple dots being entered (if you need to do that). For example 231.21.23 is not a valid number.

javascript (jquery) numeric input: keyCode for '3' and '#' are the same

I need to set up an <input type="text" /> so that it will accept only numeric chars, backspace, delete, enter, tabs and arrows.
There's a lot of exemple around there, i started with something similar to this:
function isNumericKeyCode (keyCode){
return ( (keyCode >= 48 && keyCode <= 57) //standard keyboard
||(keyCode >= 96 && keyCode <= 105)) //Numpad
}
$('#myTextBox').keydown(function(e){
var handled = true;
var keyCode = e.keyCode;
switch(keyCode){
//Enter and arrows
case 13:
case 37:
case 38:
case 39:
case 40:
doSomethingSpecialsWithThesesKeys();
break;
default:
handled = false;
break;
}
if ( !handled
&& keyCode !== 8 //backspace
&& keyCode !== 9 //tab
&& keyCode !== 46 //del
&& !isNumericKeyCode(keyCode)){
handled = true;
}
return handled;
});
All that worked perfectly until I hit the "#" key. In my french canadian keyboard, the "#" has his own key (no shift implied) that returns keyCode 51, the same as the number "3".
I think that in US keyboard, the "#" is obtained by pressing shift+3, that may be why they have the same keycode.
Now I realize that I have to handle the shift and alt keys too, but that's another story.
It works differently with the jquery keypress event, which offer the charCode property, but I did not used it at first because of what the documentation says :
as the keypress event isn't covered by any official specification, the
actual behavior encountered when using it may differ across browsers,
browser versions, and platforms.
Also, I would need a workaround in that case to handle tabs, arrows and other special keys since they don't provide a charCode.
So the question is :
is there a way to allow only some specifics chars using the keydown event? And that, in a way that will work independently of the keyboard layout?
As a side quest : Which browsers may be problematics with the keypress event? I mean, currently I don't really care if my website does not support IE6. I am targetting recent browsers.
Edit
As someone pointed out in the comments, this method does not allow user to "ctrl+v" a number in the input. In my particular case this is really not a requirement to be able to paste a number. But this popped something in my head, the user still can right-clic > copy some text in the input, and in that case that could be anything. The more I think of it, the more it seems to me that I will need the keydown event to handle tabs and arrows, and another event to handle the input itself.
Edit2
A lot of beautiful answers here, but the award goes to mrtsherman for the use of input and propertychange events. I will use a combination of this answer for the numeric validation, plus the keyCode event as before for the special use of arrows, tabs and enter keys.

How about something like this. This should cover cut/paste and also rmb content. We monitor the textbox for any change in content. Then we use a regex to filter out characters based on a whitelist. This won't handle non-character key, but I think that is okay.
The \d flag says that only digits should be accepted.
http://jsfiddle.net/UXeva/1
$('#myTextBox').bind('input propertychange', function() {
var text = $(this).val();
if (isNaN(text)) {
$(this).val(text.replace(/[^\d]/gi, ''));
}
});
We bind to two events here. input for FireFox and propertychange for other browsers.

If older browsers are'nt an issue, the number input type should cover this.
<input type="number" />
If not you could use the isNaN javascript function
$("#number1").on('keyup', function() {
var myval = $(this).val();
if (isNaN(myval)) {
alert('numbers only!');
}
});
Personally I would do some regex filtering with a check to see if the value has changed, that will allow any character that does not change the value, like tabs, enter and arrows. With a regex you could also add or remove any character, or you could use \d for digits only or as below, [0-9]. Up to you really what your exact needs are?
var P;
$("#number2").on('keyup', function() {
var V = $(this).val();
if (V != P) {
$(this).val(V.replace(/[^0-9]/g,''));
}
P=V;
});
They could also be combined to something like this:
$("#number3").on('keyup', function() {
var V = $(this).val();
if (isNaN(V)) {
$(this).val(V.replace(/[^0-9]/g,''));
}
});
Here's a FIDDLE to test them out!

Why not do something like this? It uses a combination of the keyup() event and isNaN(). It'll work whether the user types with the keyboard or pastes a number.
The way it works is, as soon as the text changes, it will check if the value is a number. If not, it will trim the input until it is a number. So, if you enter 25s or 25ss, you will be left with 25.
This will work with ctrl+v paste as well. It won't work with right-click paste and for that reason, I have disabled right-clicking only on the textbox.
Live Demo
The Jquery
$(document).ready(function(){
$('#number').keyup(function(){
var input = this.value;
while (isNaN(input))
{
input = input.substring(0,input.length-1);
$('#number').val(input);
}
});
$('#number').bind("contextmenu",function(e){
return false;
});
});

jQuery also provides a shiftkey boolean on the event object:
$('#myTextBox').keydown(function(e){
if(e.keyCode === 51 && !e.shiftKey){
// '3' key pressed while shift was **not** held down (not '#')
}
});
EDIT I reread your question and changed the code above for !shiftkey

jQuery - How to restrict input values for text box

I want to restrict input in TextBox to be either 'Y' or 'N' (any case).
How can this be done in jQuery.

I'm pretty sure that if keydown returns false, then the input is not allowed. You can do this by grabbing the key code from the event object. This doesn't prevent doing things like copy/pasting a value into the text box, though. So a better option would be a select or radio button if you want to restrict the user's input.
$("#some-selector").bind("keydown", function (e) {
return e.keyCode == 89 || e.keyCode == 78
});

As you said this does not take care of the case of copy/paste a better alternative would be to attach a change event handler and then check if its an allowed char else flag an error
$("some-selector").change( function () {
var textBoxVal=$(this).val();
if(textBoxVal!=='y' || textBoxVal!=='n')
alert("Error");
});
Note:alerts jsut an example- add a different style to the textbox or however u r handling error on ur page.

How to capture a backspace on the onkeydown event

I have a function that is triggered by the onkeydown event of a textbox. How can I tell if the user has hit either the backspace key or the del key?

Try this:
document.addEventListener("keydown", KeyCheck); //or however you are calling your method
function KeyCheck(event)
{
var KeyID = event.keyCode;
switch(KeyID)
{
case 8:
alert("backspace");
break;
case 46:
alert("delete");
break;
default:
break;
}
}

event.key === "Backspace" or "Delete"
More recent and much cleaner: use event.key. No more arbitrary number codes!
input.addEventListener('keydown', function(event) {
const key = event.key; // const {key} = event; ES6+
if (key === "Backspace" || key === "Delete") {
return false;
}
});
Mozilla Docs
Supported Browsers

Nowadays, code to do this should look something like:
document.getElementById('foo').addEventListener('keydown', function (event) {
if (event.keyCode == 8) {
console.log('BACKSPACE was pressed');
// Call event.preventDefault() to stop the character before the cursor
// from being deleted. Remove this line if you don't want to do that.
event.preventDefault();
}
if (event.keyCode == 46) {
console.log('DELETE was pressed');
// Call event.preventDefault() to stop the character after the cursor
// from being deleted. Remove this line if you don't want to do that.
event.preventDefault();
}
});
although in the future, once they are broadly supported in browsers, you may want to use the .key or .code attributes of the KeyboardEvent instead of the deprecated .keyCode.
Details worth knowing:
Calling event.preventDefault() in the handler of a keydown event will prevent the default effects of the keypress. When pressing a character, this stops it from being typed into the active text field. When pressing backspace or delete in a text field, it prevents a character from being deleted. When pressing backspace without an active text field, in a browser like Chrome where backspace takes you back to the previous page, it prevents that behaviour (as long as you catch the event by adding your event listener to document instead of a text field).
Documentation on how the value of the keyCode attribute is determined can be found in section B.2.1 How to determine keyCode for keydown and keyup events in the W3's UI Events Specification. In particular, the codes for Backspace and Delete are listed in B.2.3 Fixed virtual key codes.
There is an effort underway to deprecate the .keyCode attribute in favour of .key and .code. The W3 describe the .keyCode property as "legacy", and MDN as "deprecated".
One benefit of the change to .key and .code is having more powerful and programmer-friendly handling of non-ASCII keys - see the specification that lists all the possible key values, which are human-readable strings like "Backspace" and "Delete" and include values for everything from modifier keys specific to Japanese keyboards to obscure media keys. Another, which is highly relevant to this question, is distinguishing between the meaning of a modified keypress and the physical key that was pressed.
On small Mac keyboards, there is no Delete key, only a Backspace key. However, pressing Fn+Backspace is equivalent to pressing Delete on a normal keyboard - that is, it deletes the character after the text cursor instead of the one before it. Depending upon your use case, in code you might want to handle a press of Backspace with Fn held down as either Backspace or Delete. That's why the new key model lets you choose.
The .key attribute gives you the meaning of the keypress, so Fn+Backspace will yield the string "Delete". The .code attribute gives you the physical key, so Fn+Backspace will still yield the string "Backspace".
Unfortunately, as of writing this answer, they're only supported in 18% of browsers, so if you need broad compatibility you're stuck with the "legacy" .keyCode attribute for the time being. But if you're a reader from the future, or if you're targeting a specific platform and know it supports the new interface, then you could write code that looked something like this:
document.getElementById('foo').addEventListener('keydown', function (event) {
if (event.code == 'Delete') {
console.log('The physical key pressed was the DELETE key');
}
if (event.code == 'Backspace') {
console.log('The physical key pressed was the BACKSPACE key');
}
if (event.key == 'Delete') {
console.log('The keypress meant the same as pressing DELETE');
// This can happen for one of two reasons:
// 1. The user pressed the DELETE key
// 2. The user pressed FN+BACKSPACE on a small Mac keyboard where
// FN+BACKSPACE deletes the character in front of the text cursor,
// instead of the one behind it.
}
if (event.key == 'Backspace') {
console.log('The keypress meant the same as pressing BACKSPACE');
}
});

In your function check for the keycode 8 (backspace) or 46 (delete)
Keycode information
Keycode list

not sure if it works outside of firefox:
callback (event){
if (event.keyCode === event.DOM_VK_BACK_SPACE || event.keyCode === event.DOM_VK_DELETE)
// do something
}
}
if not, replace event.DOM_VK_BACK_SPACE with 8 and event.DOM_VK_DELETE with 46 or define them as constant (for better readability)