Masked Input Plugin for jQuery

Notice: This project is no longer being maintained.

I started this project over 10 years ago to fill a need for a side project I was working on at the time. Nothing ever became of that side project, but this little plugin lived on. Over the years it brought me joy to stumble on sites using this thing. It was super encouraging to hear from people using it in their own products. I tried for a while to maintain it, even after I had moved away from front end web development.

The time has come to officially call it quits. The web has changed(A LOT) and there are better things out there like Cleave.js. I'll leave this repo up for posterity in an archived state. Thank you to everyone who contributed to or used this plugin over the years.

Overview

This is a masked input plugin for the jQuery javascript library. It allows a user to more easily enter fixed width input where you would like them to enter the data in a certain format (dates,phone numbers, etc). It has been tested on Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Opera, and Chrome. A mask is defined by a format made up of mask literals and mask definitions. Any character not in the definitions list below is considered a mask literal. Mask literals will be automatically entered for the user as they type and will not be able to be removed by the user.The following mask definitions are predefined:

• a - Represents an alpha character (A-Z,a-z)
• 9 - Represents a numeric character (0-9)
• * - Represents an alphanumeric character (A-Z,a-z,0-9)

Usage

First, include the jQuery and masked input javascript files.

<script src="jquery.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script src="jquery.maskedinput.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

Next, call the mask function for those items you wish to have masked.

jQuery(function($){
   $("#date").mask("99/99/9999");
   $("#phone").mask("(999) 999-9999");
   $("#tin").mask("99-9999999");
   $("#ssn").mask("999-99-9999");
});

Optionally, if you are not satisfied with the underscore ('_') character as a placeholder, you may pass an optional argument to the maskedinput method.

jQuery(function($){
   $("#product").mask("99/99/9999",{placeholder:" "});
});

Optionally, if you would like to execute a function once the mask has been completed, you can specify that function as an optional argument to the maskedinput method.

jQuery(function($){
   $("#product").mask("99/99/9999",{completed:function(){alert("You typed the following: "+this.val());}});
});

Optionally, if you would like to disable the automatic discarding of the uncomplete input, you may pass an optional argument to the maskedinput method

jQuery(function($){
   $("#product").mask("99/99/9999",{autoclear: false});
});

You can now supply your own mask definitions.

jQuery(function($){
   $.mask.definitions['~']='[+-]';
   $("#eyescript").mask("~9.99 ~9.99 999");
});

You can have part of your mask be optional. Anything listed after '?' within the mask is considered optional user input. The common example for this is phone number + optional extension.

jQuery(function($){
   $("#phone").mask("(999) 999-9999? x99999");
});

If your requirements aren't met by the predefined placeholders, you can always add your own. For example, maybe you need a mask to only allow hexadecimal characters. You can add your own definition for a placeholder, say 'h', like so: $.mask.definitions['h'] = "[A-Fa-f0-9]"; Then you can use that to mask for something like css colors in hex with a mask "#hhhhhh".

jQuery(function($){
   $("#phone").mask("#hhhhhh");
});

By design, this plugin will reject input which doesn't complete the mask. You can bypass this by using a '?' character at the position where you would like to consider input optional. For example, a mask of "(999) 999-9999? x99999" would require only the first 10 digits of a phone number with extension being optional.

Getting the bits

We generally recommend that you use bower to install jquery.maskedinput plugin.

$ bower install --save jquery.maskedinput

Setting up your Developer Environment

jQuery Masked Input uses NodeJS and GruntJS as it's developer platform and build automation tool.

To get your environment setup correctly, you'll need nodejs version 0.8.25 or greater installed. You'll also need to install the grunt command line tool:

$ sudo npm install -g grunt-cli

Once node is installed on your system all that you need to do is install the developer dependencies and run the grunt build:

$ npm install
$ grunt

All of the tests for jQuery Masked Input are run using the jasmine test runner.