DOM Question

[Michael Ruebner]

Greetings,

What's the text between checkbox <INPUT> tags in DOM speak?
INPUTobj.childNodes returns true; however, firstChild returns NULL!?

e.g.: <INPUT type="checkbox" name="somename[]" id="id" value="1">text to
be changed on client event</INPUT>

Any pointers greatly appreciated.

Mike

[Richard Cornford]

Michael Ruebner wrote:

What's the text between checkbox <INPUT> tags in DOM speak?
That would depend on the HTML.
INPUTobj.childNodes returns true;
An empty childNodes collection is still a collection and so still an
object (it will type-convert to boolean true).
however, firstChild returns NULL!?
INPUT elements don't have content so they would have null firstChild
properties.
e.g.: <INPUT type="checkbox" name="somename[]" id="id" value="1">
text to be changed on client event</INPUT>
That is invalid mark-up as INPUT elements cannot have contents. Browser
error-correction would probably make the text a nextSibling of the input
element, but with invalid mark-up that cannot be guaranteed.
Any pointers greatly appreciated.

If you want any consistent behaviour when scripting start with formally
valid HTML.

Richard.

[RobG]

Michael Ruebner wrote:

Greetings,

What's the text between checkbox <INPUT> tags in DOM speak?
INPUTobj.childNodes returns true; however, firstChild returns NULL!?

e.g.: <INPUT type="checkbox" name="somename[]" id="id" value="1">text to
be changed on client event</INPUT>

As Richard says above, text placed in an <input> is a
sibling of the input and is (in Firefox) given a text node
type 3.

To turn it into an element (type 1) that you can
manipulate, put it inside an element tag, such as <p>
<span> <div> or similar valid HTML tags. It will be an
"official" sibling of the input.

Fred.

[Michael Winter]

On Mon, 04 Oct 2004 22:39:04 GMT, RobG <rg***@iinet.net.auau> wrote:

[snip]

To turn it into an element (type 1) that you can
manipulate, put it inside an element tag, such as <p>
<span> <div> or similar valid HTML tags. It will be an
"official" sibling of the input.

As the text probably qualifies as a label, the LABEL element would be the
best to use:

<label for="myInput"><input id="myInput" type="checkbox" ...>
Your text here</label>

All DOM-supporting browsers should access that label text with:

inputObj.nextSibling.data

(Verified with the latest versions of Opera, IE, Mozilla, Netscape, and
Firefox)

When you change the value, remember to add a space before the text so that
it doesn't appear flush next to the checkbox.

Mike

--
Michael Winter
Replace ".invalid" with ".uk" to reply by e-mail.

[Michael Ruebner]

Mike,

As the text probably qualifies as a label, the LABEL element would be
the best to use:

I settled for a SPAN following the closing <INPUT> tag. Thanks a lot for
your, Rob's, and Richard's input [sic]! I guess Richard is right:
sometimes it pays to use valid HTML....

Bests

Mike