If you've noticed on LinkedIn messaging when you chat with someone, you hit the ENTER key to send the message across and SHIFT+ENTER to enter a new line in the chat box. Most people aren't used to SHIFT+ENTER to go to the next line though.

This is pretty simple to replicate using AlpineJS. We listen to @keydown.shift and @keyup.shift where keyup / keydown are the keys that are pressed down or up respectively and .shift is for listening specifically for the SHIFT key.

    <textarea
        @keyup.enter="
        if (!shiftPressed)
        {
            chats.push($event.target.value);
            $event.target.value = '';
        }
        "
        @keydown.shift="shiftPressed = true"
        @keyup.shift="shiftPressed = false"
        placeholder="type your message here... and hit enter - hit SHIFT+ENTER to enter a new line"
        rows="10" cols="50"
        ></textarea>

Using x-html is dangerous but newlines in textarea should be converted to HTML.

Here's the complete code.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<head>
    <meta charset="utf-8" />
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" />
    <title>AlpineJS Chat with Shift Enter</title>
</head>
<body>

<div x-data="{
    shiftPressed: false,
    chats: []
}">

    <template x-for="chat in chats">
        <div>
            <div x-html="chat"></div>
            <hr/>
        </div>
    </template>

    <textarea
        @keyup.enter="
        if (!shiftPressed)
        {
            chats.push($event.target.value.replace('\n', '<br/>'));
            $event.target.value = '';
        }
        "
        @keydown.shift="shiftPressed = true"
        @keyup.shift="shiftPressed = false"
        placeholder="type your message here... and hit enter - hit SHIFT+ENTER to enter a new line"
        rows="10" cols="50"
        ></textarea>

</div>

<script defer src="https://unpkg.com/alpinejs@3.13.2/dist/cdn.min.js"></script>
</body>
</html>

Demo : https://anjanesh.s3.amazonaws.com/demo/alpine/shift-enter.html

Using ENTER for submit and SHIFT+ENTER for multi-line chat

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Anjanesh Lekshminarayanan

Anjanesh Lekshminarayanan