Javascript Drag and drop for touch devices [closed]

Question

You can use the Jquery UI for drag and drop with an additional library that translates mouse events into touch which is what you need, the library I recommend is https://github.com/furf/jquery-ui-touch-punch, with this your drag and drop from Jquery UI should work on touch devises

or you can use this code which I am using, it also converts mouse events into touch and it works like magic.

function touchHandler(event) {
    var touch = event.changedTouches[0];

    var simulatedEvent = document.createEvent("MouseEvent");
        simulatedEvent.initMouseEvent({
        touchstart: "mousedown",
        touchmove: "mousemove",
        touchend: "mouseup"
    }[event.type], true, true, window, 1,
        touch.screenX, touch.screenY,
        touch.clientX, touch.clientY, false,
        false, false, false, 0, null);

    touch.target.dispatchEvent(simulatedEvent);
    event.preventDefault();
}

function init() {
    document.addEventListener("touchstart", touchHandler, true);
    document.addEventListener("touchmove", touchHandler, true);
    document.addEventListener("touchend", touchHandler, true);
    document.addEventListener("touchcancel", touchHandler, true);
}

And in your document.ready just call the init() function

code found from Here

For anyone looking to use this and keep the 'click' functionality (as John Landheer mentions in his comment), you can do it with just a couple of modifications:

Add a couple of globals:

var clickms = 100;
var lastTouchDown = -1;

Then modify the switch statement from the original to this:

var d = new Date();
switch(event.type)
{
    case "touchstart": type = "mousedown"; lastTouchDown = d.getTime(); break;
    case "touchmove": type="mousemove"; lastTouchDown = -1; break;        
    case "touchend": if(lastTouchDown > -1 && (d.getTime() - lastTouchDown) < clickms){lastTouchDown = -1; type="click"; break;} type="mouseup"; break;
    default: return;
}

You may want to adjust 'clickms' to your tastes. Basically it's just watching for a 'touchstart' followed quickly by a 'touchend' to simulate a click.

Thanks for the above codes! - I tried several options and this was the ticket. I had problems in that preventDefault was preventing scrolling on the ipad - I am now testing for draggable items and it works great so far.

if (event.target.id == 'draggable_item' ) {
    event.preventDefault();
}

I had the same solution as gregpress answer, but my draggable items used a class instead of an id. It seems to work.

var $target = $(event.target);  
if( $target.hasClass('draggable') ) {  
    event.preventDefault();  
}

Old thread I know.......

Problem with the answer of @ryuutatsuo is that it blocks also any input or other element that has to react on 'clicks' (for example inputs), so i wrote this solution. This solution made it possible to use any existing drag and drop library that is based upon mousedown, mousemove and mouseup events on any touch device (or cumputer). This is also a cross-browser solution.

I have tested in on several devices and it works fast (in combination with the drag and drop feature of ThreeDubMedia (see also http://threedubmedia.com/code/event/drag)). It is a jQuery solution so you can use it only with jQuery libs. I have used jQuery 1.5.1 for it because some newer functions don't work properly with IE9 and above (not tested with newer versions of jQuery).

Before you add any drag or drop operation to an event you have to call this function first:

simulateTouchEvents(<object>);

You can also block all components/children for input or to speed up event handling by using the following syntax:

simulateTouchEvents(<object>, true); // ignore events on childs

Here is the code i wrote. I used some nice tricks to speed up evaluating things (see code).

function simulateTouchEvents(oo,bIgnoreChilds)
{
 if( !$(oo)[0] )
  { return false; }

 if( !window.__touchTypes )
 {
   window.__touchTypes  = {touchstart:'mousedown',touchmove:'mousemove',touchend:'mouseup'};
   window.__touchInputs = {INPUT:1,TEXTAREA:1,SELECT:1,OPTION:1,'input':1,'textarea':1,'select':1,'option':1};
 }

$(oo).bind('touchstart touchmove touchend', function(ev)
{
    var bSame = (ev.target == this);
    if( bIgnoreChilds && !bSame )
     { return; }

    var b = (!bSame && ev.target.__ajqmeclk), // Get if object is already tested or input type
        e = ev.originalEvent;
    if( b === true || !e.touches || e.touches.length > 1 || !window.__touchTypes[e.type]  )
     { return; } //allow multi-touch gestures to work

    var oEv = ( !bSame && typeof b != 'boolean')?$(ev.target).data('events'):false,
        b = (!bSame)?(ev.target.__ajqmeclk = oEv?(oEv['click'] || oEv['mousedown'] || oEv['mouseup'] || oEv['mousemove']):false ):false;

    if( b || window.__touchInputs[ev.target.tagName] )
     { return; } //allow default clicks to work (and on inputs)

    // https://developer.mozilla.org/en/DOM/event.initMouseEvent for API
    var touch = e.changedTouches[0], newEvent = document.createEvent("MouseEvent");
    newEvent.initMouseEvent(window.__touchTypes[e.type], true, true, window, 1,
            touch.screenX, touch.screenY,
            touch.clientX, touch.clientY, false,
            false, false, false, 0, null);

    touch.target.dispatchEvent(newEvent);
    e.preventDefault();
    ev.stopImmediatePropagation();
    ev.stopPropagation();
    ev.preventDefault();
});
 return true;
}; 

What it does: At first, it translates single touch events into mouse events. It checks if an event is caused by an element on/in the element that must be dragged around. If it is an input element like input, textarea etc, it skips the translation, or if a standard mouse event is attached to it it will also skip a translation.

Result: Every element on a draggable element is still working.

Happy coding, greetz, Erwin Haantjes