Bootstrap Multiselect

Bootstrap Multiselect is a JQuery based plugin to provide an intuitive user interface for using select inputs with the multiple attribute present. Instead of a select a bootstrap button will be shown as dropdown menu containing the single options as checkboxes.

Note: The option names may have changed due to the latest updates.

Demos

A demo of different configurations can be found here.

For Knockout JS integration see some examples here.

Configuration Options

buttonClass

Define the appearance of the button using classes. See the Bootstrap documentation for more information.

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('.multiselect').multiselect({
		buttonClass: 'btn btn-small'
	});
});

buttonWidth

The width of the dropdown button.

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('.multiselect').multiselect({
		buttonWidth: 'auto', // Default
	});
});

The width can be defined using all formats accepted by CSS:

100px
50%
auto

If the width is defined using CSS the option should be set to false.

buttonText

Defining the text of the button. Must be a function returning a string. All currently selected options and the select are passed as parameter.

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('.multiselect').multiselect({
		buttonText: function(options, select) {
			if (options.length == 0) {
				return 'None selected <b class="caret"></b>';
			}
			else if (options.length > 3) {
				return options.length + ' selected <b class="caret"></b>';
			}
			else {
				var selected = '';
				options.each(function() {
					selected += $(this).text() + ', ';
				});
				return selected.substr(0, selected.length -2) + ' <b class="caret"></b>';
			}
		},
	});
});

buttonContainer

The used container holding both the dropdown button and the dropdown menu.

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('.multiselect').multiselect({
		buttonContainer: '<span class="dropdown" />',
	});
});

selectedClass

The class applied to the parent <li> of selected items. Default: active.

dropRight

Define if the menu should drop to the right of the button or not, by adding pull-right class to <ul class="dropdown-menu">. Default is false.

includeSelectAllOption

Define if a <option value="select-all-option"> Select all</option> should be appended at the beginning of the options list. When this item is clicked, it will check/uncheck other items. This only works when multiple="multiple" is enabled. Default is false.

selectAllText

Defines the label of the select all option.

selectAllValue

The value by which the select all option is identified.

enableFiltering

Define if a text input should be created to filter results. Note that 'select all' option will select all FILTERED options. Default is false.

filterPlaceholder

Define the placeholder for the text input above. Note that 'select all' option will select all FILTERED options. Default is false.

filterBehavior

Defines on which information the filtering is based: on the text of the options, the values or both. So possible options are: text, value, both

onChange

Assign an event handler to the change event:

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('.multiselect').multiselect({
		onChange:function(element, checked){
			alert('Change event invoked!');
			console.log(element);
		}
	});
});

maxHeight

Define the maximum height property of the dropdown list. If the maximum height of the option list is exceeded a scrollbar will be displayed.

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('.multiselect').multiselect({
		// Or false for no maximum height.
		maxHeight: 400,
	});
});

Methods

.multiselect('destroy')

This method will destroy - unbind - the plugin on the given element(s).

.multiselect('refresh')

Refresh the selected elements depending on the selected options within the select.

.multiselect('rebuild')

Rebuilds the whole dropdown menu. Selected options will still be selected.

.multiselect('select', value)

Selects an option by its value.

.multiselect('deselect', value)

Deselects an option by its value.

Additional Styling

Additional Styling can be done using the following classes:

.multiselect {
	text-align: left;
}
.multiselect b.caret {
	float: right;
}
.multiselect-group {
	font-weight: bold;
	text-decoration: underline;
}
.multiselect-all label {
	font-weight: bold;
}
.multiselect-search {
	color: red;
}

Usage via Data Attributes

To hook up the control via data attributes, add the data-role="multiselect" attribute to your <select>. All selects with that attribute will be automatically wired up on jQuery load.

Knockout JS Support

Thanks to Devristo and Luis Rudge this plugin supports Knockout JS. For further discussion see the pull requests.

Define select input

Note the multiselect: true binding!

<select multiple="multiple" data-bind="options: items, selectedOptions: selectedItems, multiselect: multiSelectInitOptions"></select>

Apply Knockout view model

As usual.

Notes

You have to declare your 'multiselect' binding handler AFTER your 'options' binding handler.

Thanks to @robwesterlund for the hint :)

@robwesterlund - @luisrudge The reason is that the multiselect plugin works on the option elements which are in the DOM. However, if you place your bindingHandler before the options bindingHandler, there won't be any option elements in the DOM when you call the multiselect plugin.

License

Copyright 2012, 2013 David Stutz

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.