JavaScript: distinguish DOM element objects and Event objects

Question

Possible Duplicate:
Javascript isDOM — How do you check if a Javascript Object is a DOM Object?

I have the following simple function:

function do_smth(el){

    if(typeof el != 'object'){
        el = this
    }
    var val = $.trim(el.value)

     /**** some code here ****/

}

Sometimes it is binded to an element as an event

1)

element.onclick = do_smth

and sometimes it is used the following way

2)

do_smth(element)

both ways this should work good...

The problem is that I get the el as Event object in the first case, even if there are no arguments passed. So typeof el != 'object' does not work as expected.

How can I distinguish DOM element or Event?

You should use the function in a consistent way imo. – Felix Kling Aug 29 '11 at 18:47 — Felix Kling, Aug 29 '11 at 18:47

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 29 '11 at 18:46

1

To distingusih a DOM element do

if(el.nodeType)

answered Aug 29 '11 at 18:46

Lime

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Well if you certain it is an element and not a document or text node then you could do `el.nodeType===1` https://developer.mozilla.org/en/nodeType – Lime Aug 29 '11 at 18:48
nodeType returns a 1 for element nodes. https://developer.mozilla.org/en/nodeType – Trevor Aug 29 '11 at 18:48
Yeah, but event objects don't have a nodeType at all, so just querying if the value is existent should be fine. It would be more safe to do `if(el.nodeType===1)` though – Lime Aug 29 '11 at 18:51
Yup well there is a slight bug in [IE5](http://quirksmode.org/dom/w3c_core.html#t21) – Lime Aug 29 '11 at 18:54

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 29 '11 at 18:49

1

function do_smth(el){
    el = el.nodeType == 1 ? el : this;
    var val = $.trim(el.value)
}

answered Aug 29 '11 at 18:49

David Hellsing

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`el` will be the event object when used as event handler. – Felix Kling Aug 29 '11 at 18:51
no, `el` is always defined, it can be an event – Dan Aug 29 '11 at 18:51
right, I misunderstood the question. Updated... – David Hellsing Aug 29 '11 at 18:53

JavaScript: distinguish DOM element objects and Event objects

2 Answers2