Detecting Newline Character On User's Input (web2py)

I have the following table: db.define_table('comm', Field('post','reference post', readable=False, writable=False), Field('body','text', requires=IS

Solution 1:

Assuming you are referring to the subsequent display of the user input in a view, you could use a <pre> tag: http://www.w3schools.com/tags/tag_pre.asp. However, you might need some CSS to get the font/styling you like (by default, the browser will use alternative styling with a fixed-width font).

You could also replace the newlines with <br> tags:

{{=XML(record.body.replace('\n', '<br>'), sanitize=True, permitted_tags=['br/'])}}

Because the text now contains <br> HTML tags, it is necessary to wrap it in XML() to prevent web2py from escaping the HTML -- but you also want to sanitize the text and allow only<br> tags to prevent malicious code from being executed.

Solution 2:

Use pre tag to display the content in which you want to detect newline character.

<pre>

The HTML pre element (or HTML Preformatted Text) represents preformatted text. Text within this element is typically displayed in a non-proportional ("monospace") font exactly as it is laid out in the file. Whitespace inside this element is displayed as typed.

{{for post in comments:}}
    <pre>{{=post.body}}</pre>
{{pass}}