JavaScript Duh Moment of the Day – 8/1/2007

When, oh when, will I remember that other form fields don’t enforce the readOnly attribute like text fields do in JavaScript?  I’ve done this before with a list field.  I’ve done it before with checkboxes.  I think I’ve even fallen victim with radio buttons.  And yet, everytime I want to dynamically lock down a field, I forge straight down that path:

document.FormName.DropDownList1.readOnly = true;

Grr.  As soon as I pull up the form and see the editable fields, I know exactly what the issue is.  Nonetheless, each time I do it, my frustration with this particular forgetfulness compounds.  By golly, one day I will get this right the first time!

P.S. In case you are wondering, you can disable the field (at least for IE 6, IE 7 and FireFox 2.0.0.6):

document.FormName.DropDownList1.disabled=true;