18 comments

• 

  Rick

  9 months ago

  There's one problem with any EndsWith selection - the same problem that INamingContainer is trying to solve. If the element is inside a repeater, each will end with the same value. Or, if you have two similarly named elements "Password" / "VerifyPassword" would both match for "Password". I would suggest delimiting by the separator character for some added protection.
  reply
• 

  Eric Hoff

  9 months ago

  Rick: Couldn't you then use the .each() function? Also, in a situation like like a repeater it wouldn't be out of order to use a class selector.
  I do agree though, there are a few situations where something like "TextBox1" might happen more than once, such as multiple user controls on one page.
  
  This is a brilliant solution John, thanks! I can't wait to try it.
  reply
• 

  John Sheehan

  9 months ago

  Items in a repeater shouldn't have the same ID as that's invalid HTML (each ID should only be used once on a page) and as Eric mentioned, that's a great case for using classes. Similar named items is definitely a valid concern. The problem is if I add the underscore ASP.NET generates before the ID, pages without panels/user controls/master pages won't work with this method as they spit out a valid, unaltered ID.
  
  I'd be fine with INamingContainer if it was limited to repeaters and such. It's master pages and user controls that cause the most problems for me.
  reply
• 

  Rick Strahl

  9 months ago

  John, this is pretty cool. Actually I didn't realize you could extend selector filters at all, but that makes sense.
  
  FWIW, some time ago I updated the component you reference above and have an option to auto generate ALL clientIds on the object. As you mention the downside there is that it sends all those ids to the client when the page is loaded but you do end up with a single object with properties. (serverVars.txtNameId for example) without having to modify server code specifically to add controls. I've used this quite a bit and it works and is worth the overhead on all but really huge forms with tons of controls.
  
  Ultimately though I've come to prefer marking up controls with pseudo classes rather than IDs. That makes it much easier:
  
  $(".txtName").blah()
  
  Still an extra step but an easy and also very explicit one.
  reply
• 

  Joe Brinkman

  9 months ago

  @John - great idea. I wrote the original StackOverflow item that you discuss as a result of running into this issue while adding jQuery support to DotNetNuke. This selector would definitely simplify things a little.
  reply
• 

  ChantersNod

  9 months ago

  "Since INamingContainer-generated IDs always end in the ID you specify in your ASPX markup, it works."
  
  What happens when you have two user controls on a page, each with a textbox1? These will be client-ized by msft as something like ctl01_textbox1 and ctl02_textbox1. Which textbox1 will your code select?
  
  You could tell developers on large projects to communicate with one another and make sure their user controls absolutely never have nested controls with overlapping names, but ...
  
  (BTW - great blog!)
  reply
• 

  John Sheehan

  9 months ago

  I don't usually need to select just one item in a repeater, so that's not an issue for me. This code would select all matches and act on them all. That might be what you want anyway.
  reply
• 

  Loque

  8 months ago

  You should subscribe to the jQuery list on google groups... people on there are amazing and can give feedback to people of all levels - even if I dont have time to read it most of the time (as its very popular) its still great for posting a quick question like this and seeing what you get back :¬)
  
  Wish i had more time to actually offer a suggestion too, i dont think you need to extend jQuery to do what you want :¬)
  reply
• 

  John Sheehan

  8 months ago

  I posted a question about this on the mailing list and didn't get a response.
  reply
• 

  WebDevVote

  7 months ago

  You're been voted!!
  Track back from http://webdevvote.com/Tips_And_Tricks/Custom_jQ...
  reply
• 

  Tim Banks

  5 months ago

  Hey John. I just upgraded to jQuery 1.3 and I am receiving an error when trying to use your custom selector. Have you experienced any problems when upgrading to 1.3?
  
  I will continue to look into the situation myself and let you know if I find anything.
  
  Thanks.
  reply
• 

  Tim Banks

  5 months ago

  I just figured out how to update this to make it work.
  
  Instead of using:
  jQuery.extend(
  jQuery.expr[":"],
  {
  asp: "jQuery(a).attr('id').endsWith(m[3]);"
  }
  );
  
  Use this instead:
  jQuery.extend(
  jQuery.expr[":"].asp = function(a,i,m) {
  return jQuery(a).attr('id').endsWith(m[3]);
  }
  );
  
  Hope this helps out
  reply
• 

  John Sheehan

  5 months ago

  Thanks Tim. I was actually going to revisit this tonight, so I'll
  include this in any update I post.
  reply
• 

  Brian Grinstead

  5 months ago

  I noticed that this doesn't work in Internet Explorer when testing (an error like 'attr(...)' is null or not an object. I figured this meant that it was trying to apply endswith on an object that is undefined. I was able to make it work by:
  
  jQuery.expr[":"].asp = function(a, i, m) {
  return jQuery(a).attr('id') && jQuery(a).attr('id').endsWith(m[3]);
  };
  
  May perform slightly better if it is formed like this:
  
  jQuery.expr[":"].asp = function(a, i, m) {
  return (id = jQuery(a).attr('id')) && id.endsWith(m[3]);
  };
  
  Either way, it works fine in Internet Explorer now.
  reply
• 

  John Sheehan

  5 months ago

  Thanks, I'll make note of this here: http://john-sheehan.com/blog/updated-webforms-c...
  reply
• 

  Nick Gilbert

  1 month ago

  Thanks for this. I think you should alter it though, so that either the entire string has to match, or it has to end with an underscore followed by the search term. Otherwise it can match other elements which end in the same string.
  reply
• 

  aXiniXe

  1 month ago

  function SelectByID(type, endPart)
  {
  return element = $(type + "[id$=" + endPart + "]");
  }
  
  seemed to do the trick for me,
  also using _ as leading in the endpart to avoid mismacthes.
  reply
• 

  jQuery Howto

  1 week ago

  Recently I made a post about custom jQuery selectors and thought you might find it usefule. It explains how one can create a custom selector WITH parameters:
  
  http://jquery-howto.blogspot.com/2009/06/jquery...
  reply