How do I initialize a jQuery UI datepicker to a date from the querystring?

Question

Given this markup:

// Calendar.html?date=1/2/2003
<script>
  $(function() { 
    $('.inlinedatepicker').datepicker();
  });
</script>
...

<div class="inlinedatepicker" id="calendar"/>

This will display an inline datepicker with very little effort (awesome!). How do I preset the datepicker to the date passed in via the query string?

Note that in this case, I don't have an input box--just a calendar attached to a div.

Answer 1

This should work, though you may run into locale issues (specifically, M/D/Y vs. D/M/Y).

var date = location.match(/(?:\?|&)date=(\d+\/\d+\/\d+)(&|$)/)[1];
$('.inlinedatepicker').datepicker().datepicker("setDate", new Date(date));

Answer 2

I managed to do this with

$('.inlinedatepicker').datepicker().datepicker("setDate", new Date(2011,11,01)); // Date equals December 1, 2011.

I had to subtract one from the month though to get the right date as it seems that date is starting from zero (0 = January)