The jQuery #id selector uses the id attribute of an HTML tag to find the specific element. An id should be unique within a page, so you should use the #id selector when you want to find a single, unique element.
If you have a variable containing a DOM element, and want to select elements related to that DOM element, simply wrap it in a jQuery object. var myDomElement = document. getElementById( "foo" ); // A plain DOM element. $( myDomElement ).
The jQuery Object: The Wrapped Set: Selectors return a jQuery object known as the "wrapped set," which is an array-like structure that contains all the selected DOM elements. You can iterate over the wrapped set like an array or access individual elements via the indexer ($(sel)[0] for example).
jQuery Selectors are used to select HTML element(s) from an HTML document. Consider an HTML document is given and you need to select all the <div> from this document. This is where jQuery Selectors will help. jQuery Selectors can find HTML elements (ie.
Ok, so in a comment above the question asker Fidilip
said that what he/she's really after is to get the path to the current element.
Here's a script that will "climb" the DOM ancestor tree and then build fairly specific selector including any id
or class
attributes on the item clicked.
See it working on jsFiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/Jkj2n/209/
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.11.0/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script>
$(function() {
$("*").on("click", function(e) {
e.preventDefault();
var selector = $(this)
.parents()
.map(function() { return this.tagName; })
.get()
.reverse()
.concat([this.nodeName])
.join(">");
var id = $(this).attr("id");
if (id) {
selector += "#"+ id;
}
var classNames = $(this).attr("class");
if (classNames) {
selector += "." + $.trim(classNames).replace(/\s/gi, ".");
}
alert(selector);
});
});
</script>
</head>
<body>
<h1><span>I love</span> jQuery</h1>
<div>
<p>It's the <strong>BEST THING</strong> ever</p>
<button id="myButton">Button test</button>
</div>
<ul>
<li>Item one
<ul>
<li id="sub2" >Sub one</li>
<li id="sub2" class="subitem otherclass">Sub two</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</body>
</html>
For example, if you were to click the 2nd list nested list item in the HTML below, you would get the following result:
HTML>BODY>UL>LI>UL>LI#sub2.subitem.otherclass
The jQuery object has a selector property I saw when digging in its code yesterday. Don't know if it's defined in the docs are how reliable it is (for future proofing). But it works!
$('*').selector // returns *
Edit: If you were to find the selector inside the event, that information should ideally be part of the event itself and not the element because an element could have multiple click events assigned through various selectors. A solution would be to use a wrapper to around bind()
, click()
etc. to add events instead of adding it directly.
jQuery.fn.addEvent = function(type, handler) {
this.bind(type, {'selector': this.selector}, handler);
};
The selector is being passed as an object's property named selector
. Access it as event.data.selector
.
Let's try it on some markup (http://jsfiddle.net/DFh7z/):
<p class='info'>some text and <a>a link</a></p>
$('p a').addEvent('click', function(event) {
alert(event.data.selector); // p a
});
Disclaimer: Remember that just as with live()
events, the selector property may be invalid if DOM traversal methods are used.
<div><a>a link</a></div>
The code below will NOT work, as live
relies on the selector property
which in this case is a.parent()
- an invalid selector.
$('a').parent().live(function() { alert('something'); });
Our addEvent
method will fire, but you too will see the wrong selector - a.parent()
.
In collaboration with @drzaus we've come up with the following jQuery plugin.
!(function ($, undefined) {
/// adapted http://jsfiddle.net/drzaus/Hgjfh/5/
var get_selector = function (element) {
var pieces = [];
for (; element && element.tagName !== undefined; element = element.parentNode) {
if (element.className) {
var classes = element.className.split(' ');
for (var i in classes) {
if (classes.hasOwnProperty(i) && classes[i]) {
pieces.unshift(classes[i]);
pieces.unshift('.');
}
}
}
if (element.id && !/\s/.test(element.id)) {
pieces.unshift(element.id);
pieces.unshift('#');
}
pieces.unshift(element.tagName);
pieces.unshift(' > ');
}
return pieces.slice(1).join('');
};
$.fn.getSelector = function (only_one) {
if (true === only_one) {
return get_selector(this[0]);
} else {
return $.map(this, function (el) {
return get_selector(el);
});
}
};
})(window.jQuery);
// http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2420970/how-can-i-get-selector-from-jquery-object/15623322#15623322
!function(e,t){var n=function(e){var n=[];for(;e&&e.tagName!==t;e=e.parentNode){if(e.className){var r=e.className.split(" ");for(var i in r){if(r.hasOwnProperty(i)&&r[i]){n.unshift(r[i]);n.unshift(".")}}}if(e.id&&!/\s/.test(e.id)){n.unshift(e.id);n.unshift("#")}n.unshift(e.tagName);n.unshift(" > ")}return n.slice(1).join("")};e.fn.getSelector=function(t){if(true===t){return n(this[0])}else{return e.map(this,function(e){return n(e)})}}}(window.jQuery)
<html>
<head>...</head>
<body>
<div id="sidebar">
<ul>
<li>
<a href="/" id="home">Home</a>
</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div id="main">
<h1 id="title">Welcome</h1>
</div>
<script type="text/javascript">
// Simple use case
$('#main').getSelector(); // => 'HTML > BODY > DIV#main'
// If there are multiple matches then an array will be returned
$('body > div').getSelector(); // => ['HTML > BODY > DIV#main', 'HTML > BODY > DIV#sidebar']
// Passing true to the method will cause it to return the selector for the first match
$('body > div').getSelector(true); // => 'HTML > BODY > DIV#main'
</script>
</body>
</html>
http://jsfiddle.net/CALY5/5/
Did you try this ?
$("*").click(function(){
$(this).attr("id");
});
Try this:
$("*").click(function(event){
console.log($(event.handleObj.selector));
});
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