drag-drop

drag-drop

HTML5 drag & drop for humans

Demo

In case you didn't know, the HTML5 drag and drop API is a total disaster! This is an attempt to make the API usable by mere mortals.

This module works in the browser with browserify and it's used by WebTorrent!

Note: If you're not using browserify, then use the included standalone file dragdrop.bundle.js. This exports a DragDrop function on window.

features

• simple API
• adds a drag class to the drop target on hover, for easy styling!
• optionally, get the file(s) as a Buffer (see buffer)

install

npm install drag-drop

usage

var dragDrop = require('drag-drop')

dragDrop('#dropTarget', function (files, pos) {
  console.log('Here are the dropped files', files)
  console.log('Dropped at coordinates', pos.x, pos.y)
})

Another handy thing this does is add a drag class to the drop target when the user is dragging a file over the drop target. Useful for styling the drop target to make it obvious that this is a drop target!

complete example

var dragDrop = require('drag-drop')

// You can pass in a DOM node or a selector string!
dragDrop('#dropTarget', function (files) {
  console.log('Here are the dropped files', files)

  // `files` is an Array!
  files.forEach(function (file) {
    console.log(file.name)
    console.log(file.size)
    console.log(file.type)
    console.log(file.lastModifiedData)
    console.log(file.fullPath)

    // convert the file to a Buffer that we can use!
    var reader = new FileReader()
    reader.addEventListener('load', function (e) {
      // e.target.result is an ArrayBuffer
      var arr = new Uint8Array(e.target.result)
      var buffer = new Buffer(arr)

      // do something with the buffer!
    })
    reader.addEventListener('error', function (err) {
      console.error('FileReader error' + err)
    })
    reader.readAsArrayBuffer(file)
  })
})

get files as buffers

If you prefer to access file data as Buffers, then just require drag-drop like this:

var dragDrop = require('drag-drop/buffer')

dragDrop('#dropTarget', function (files) {
  files.forEach(function (file) {
    // file is actually a buffer!
    console.log(file.readUInt32LE(0))
    console.log(file.toJSON())
    console.log(file.toString('hex')) // etc...

    // but it still has all the normal file properties!
    console.log(file.name)
    console.log(file.size)
    console.log(file.type)
    console.log(file.lastModifiedDate)
  })
}

remove listeners

To stop listening for drag & drop events and remove the event listeners, just use the remove function returned by the dragDrop function.

var dragDrop = require('drag-drop')

var remove = dragDrop('#dropTarget', function (files, pos) {
  console.log('Here are the dropped files', files)
  console.log('Dropped at coordinates', pos.x, pos.y)
})

// ... at some point in the future, stop listening for drag & drop events
remove()

detect dragover and dragleave events

Instead of passing just an ondrop function as the second argument, instead pass an object with all the events you want to listen for:

var dragDrop = require('drag-drop')

dragDrop('#dropTarget', {
  onDrop: function (files, pos) {
    console.log('Here are the dropped files', files)
    console.log('Dropped at coordinates', pos.x, pos.y)
  },
  onDragOver: function () {},
  onDragLeave: function () {}
})

a note about file:// urls

Don't run your app from file://. For security reasons, browsers do not allow you to run your app from file://. In fact, many of the powerful storage APIs throw errors if you run the app locally from file://.

Instead, start a local server and visit your site at http://localhost:port.

license

MIT. Copyright (c) Feross Aboukhadijeh.