Jquery-ui sortable doesn't work on touch devices based on Android or IOS

Question

Is there any fix to make Jquery-ui sortable work on touch devices based on Android or IOS?

Answer 1

The other answer is great but unfortunately it will only work on iOS devices.

Also there was is a breakage caused by later versions of jquery.ui that meant that _touchEnd events were not correctly resetting an internal flag (mouseHandled) in mouse.ui and this was causing exceptions.

Both of these problems should now be fixed with this code.

/*
 * Content-Type:text/javascript
 *
 * A bridge between iPad and iPhone touch events and jquery draggable, 
 * sortable etc. mouse interactions.
 * @author Oleg Slobodskoi  
 * 
 * modified by John Hardy to use with any touch device
 * fixed breakage caused by jquery.ui so that mouseHandled internal flag is reset 
 * before each touchStart event
 * 
 */
(function( $ ) {

    $.support.touch = typeof Touch === 'object';

    if (!$.support.touch) {
        return;
    }

    var proto =  $.ui.mouse.prototype,
    _mouseInit = proto._mouseInit;

    $.extend( proto, {
        _mouseInit: function() {
            this.element
            .bind( "touchstart." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchStart" ) );
            _mouseInit.apply( this, arguments );
        },

        _touchStart: function( event ) {
            if ( event.originalEvent.targetTouches.length != 1 ) {
                return false;
            }

            this.element
            .bind( "touchmove." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchMove" ) )
            .bind( "touchend." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchEnd" ) );

            this._modifyEvent( event );

            $( document ).trigger($.Event("mouseup")); //reset mouseHandled flag in ui.mouse
            this._mouseDown( event );

            return false;           
        },

        _touchMove: function( event ) {
            this._modifyEvent( event );
            this._mouseMove( event );   
        },

        _touchEnd: function( event ) {
            this.element
            .unbind( "touchmove." + this.widgetName )
            .unbind( "touchend." + this.widgetName );
            this._mouseUp( event ); 
        },

        _modifyEvent: function( event ) {
            event.which = 1;
            var target = event.originalEvent.targetTouches[0];
            event.pageX = target.clientX;
            event.pageY = target.clientY;
        }

    });

})( jQuery );

Answer 2

I finally found a solution that works with drag handles.

1. Go to this page.
2. In Downloads, grab the "altfix" version, which only applies touch handling to the elements you specify.
3. Add a script tag for the downloaded JS file.
4. Add touch handling for your drag handles in your document ready handler; e.g. $('.handle').addTouch()

Answer 3

I suggest jQuery UI Touch Punch. I've tested it on iOS 5 and Android 2.3 and it works great on both.

Answer 4

This worked a lot better for me than the selected answer, so I hope this helps other people:

http://code.google.com/p/rsslounge/source/browse/trunk/public/javascript/addtouch.js?r=115.

The other code behaves weird, when you drag an element the potential dropping position is very far from were it should be.

Answer 5

I'm using this snippet below in conjunction with jquery-sortable which does allow the drag sort to happen on my iPhone. I am having a problem after I finish the first sort however as any scrolling on the list at all is detected as a drag.

EDIT - see here as well http://bugs.jqueryui.com/ticket/4143 EDIT 2 - I was able to get this working if I use the entire row as the handle. It also fixed a problem I was having where the offset was incorrect after scrolling.

/*
 * A bridge between iPad and iPhone touch events and jquery draggable, sortable etc. mouse interactions.
 * @author Oleg Slobodskoi  
 */
/iPad|iPhone/.test( navigator.userAgent ) && (function( $ ) {

    var proto =  $.ui.mouse.prototype,
        _mouseInit = proto._mouseInit;

    $.extend( proto, {
        _mouseInit: function() {
            this.element
                .bind( "touchstart." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchStart" ) );

            _mouseInit.apply( this, arguments );
        },

        _touchStart: function( event ) {
            if ( event.originalEvent.targetTouches.length != 1 ) {
                return false;
            }

            this.element
                .bind( "touchmove." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchMove" ) )
                .bind( "touchend." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchEnd" ) );

            this._modifyEvent( event );

            this._mouseDown( event );

            return false;           
        },

        _touchMove: function( event ) {
            this._modifyEvent( event );
            this._mouseMove( event );   
        },

        _touchEnd: function( event ) {
            this.element
                .unbind( "touchmove." + this.widgetName )
                .unbind( "touchend." + this.widgetName );
            this._mouseUp( event ); 
        },

        _modifyEvent: function( event ) {
            event.which = 1;
            var target = event.originalEvent.targetTouches[0];
            event.pageX = target.clientX;
            event.pageY = target.clientY;
        }

    });

})( jQuery );

Answer 6

is this meant to replace the mouse.ui js code or to be called after that javascript is loaded? I am unable to get it to work for me on an Android tablet.

EDIT for anyone finding this in the future - got this to work for a Samsung Galaxy Android tablet with the following code:

    /iPad|iPhone|Android/.test( navigator.userAgent ) && (function( $ ) {

var proto =  $.ui.mouse.prototype,
_mouseInit = proto._mouseInit;

$.extend( proto, {
    _mouseInit: function() {
        this.element
        .bind( "touchstart." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchStart" ) );
        _mouseInit.apply( this, arguments );
    },

    _touchStart: function( event ) {
        /* if ( event.originalEvent.targetTouches.length != 1 ) {
            return false;
        } */

        this.element
        .bind( "touchmove." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchMove" ) )
        .bind( "touchend." + this.widgetName, $.proxy( this, "_touchEnd" ) );

        this._modifyEvent( event );

        $( document ).trigger($.Event("mouseup")); //reset mouseHandled flag in ui.mouse
        this._mouseDown( event );

        //return false;           
    },

    _touchMove: function( event ) {
        this._modifyEvent( event );
        this._mouseMove( event );   
    },

    _touchEnd: function( event ) {
        this.element
        .unbind( "touchmove." + this.widgetName )
        .unbind( "touchend." + this.widgetName );
        this._mouseUp( event ); 
    },

    _modifyEvent: function( event ) {
        event.which = 1;
        var target = event.originalEvent.targetTouches[0];
        event.pageX = target.clientX;
        event.pageY = target.clientY;
    }

});

})( jQuery );