jQuery on click $(document) - get clicked element

Question

I'm trying to figure out how to get the clicked element whey using $(document).click() method:

$(document).click(function() {
    if ($(this) !== obj) {
        obj2.hide();
    }
});

In the example above the obj is the object is the dropdown menu - and if clicked I don't want it to do anything, but if the click was on the body of the page or any other element - it should trigger the hide() method.

Answer 1

You can use event.target. You should also compare DOM elements instead of jQuery objects, since two jQuery objects containing the same elements will still be considered as different:

$(document).click(function(event) {
    if (event.target !== obj[0]) {
        obj2.hide();
    }
});

Answer 2

You most likely want to check all parent elements + the target itself for .topNavigation class

$(document).click(function(event) {
    if ( !$(event.target).closest( ".topNavigation" ).length ) {
        obj2.hide();
    }
});