Using jQuery to search a string of HTML

javascript, jquery, jquery-selectors

Solution

Let's split this question into two parts.

First:

var html= '<html><head></head><body><div class="bar"></div></body></html>';
console.log($(html).find('div'));

and

var html= '<html><head></head><body><div><div class="bar"></div></div></body></html>';
console.log($(html).find('div'));

do not work because according to the `jQuery()` docs:

When passing in complex HTML, some browsers may not generate a DOM that exactly replicates the HTML source provided. As mentioned, we use the browser's .innerHTML property to parse the passed HTML and insert it into the current document. During this process, some browsers filter out certain elements such as `<html>`, `<title>`, or `<head>` elements. As a result, the elements inserted may not be representative of the original string passed.

- In the first code block, your `<html>`, `<head>`, and `<body>` tags are getting stripped out, and `<div class="bar"></div>` remains. `find` only searches inside the resulting `<div>`, and cannot find anything.

- In the second code block, your `<html>`, `<head>`, and `<body>` tags are getting stripped out, and `<div><div class="bar"></div></div>` remains. `find` searches inside the result, and finds a single `<div>`.

As for your second part:

var code = $("<div id='foo'>1</div><div id='bar'>2</div>");
console.log(code.find('div'));

You first give jQuery a string, which it takes and makes into a jQuery object with the two `<div>`'s. Then, `find` searches in each `<div>`, finds nothing and returns no results.

Next, in

var code = $("<div id='foo'>1</div><div id='bar'>2</div>");
code.each(function() {
    alert( this.nodeName );
})

`each` loops through the jQuery object, taking each of the two created `<div>`'s, and alerts their node name. Therefore, you get two alerts.

Problem

If I run this code - ``` var html= '<html><head></head><body><div class="bar"></div></body></html>'; console.log($(html).find('div')); ``` I get no results returned, if I run this code - ``` var html= '<html><head></head><body><div><div class="bar"></div></div></body></html>'; console.log($(html).find('div')); ``` Then I get a single result returned - the inner div (`<div class="bar"></div>`). I would have expected the first code snippet to return a single result and the second snippet two results. Similarly, this code returns no results - ``` var code = $("<div id='foo'>1</div><div id='bar'>2</div>"); console.log(code.find('div')); ``` but this code alerts 'div' twice - ``` var code = $("<div id='foo'>1</div><div id='bar'>2</div>"); code.each(function() { alert( this.nodeName ); }) ``` Given the result of the second snippet, I would have expected the first code snippet to return two results. Could someone please explain why I'm getting the results I'm getting? http://jsfiddle.net/ipr101/GTCuv/

Original source