Develop Reference

Access DOM elements on HTML page loaded with AJAX

Im currently struggling with an AJAX related problem on a website.
The goal is as follows:
There is a "simple" HTML page containing some links and content.
If you click on a link I want to open the file that gets includes with the link (from href) within a new div overlayed to the page. The content from the page is of course loaded with AJAX into the new div (the overlayed one).
Within this new overlayed div I want to add some JS code which in general already works.
The problem anyway is that the DOM elements within the page loaded per AJAX cannot be accessed in a way that is comfortable to work with, in my specific case.
I got following piece of code so far:
$$('.add-exercise').addEvent('click', function(e) {
var request_exercise_add = new Request.HTML({
'method' : 'post',
'url' : e.target.get('href'),
onSuccess : function(responseTree, responseElements, responseHTML, responseJavaScript) {
// i know i can access responseElements here..
}
});
request_exercise_add.send('s=true');
return false;
});
I know I can access the elements returned within responseElements but the logic on the included website is somehow quite complex and therefore it should be
possible to add the JS within the HTML code in the dynamically loaded page.
Notice that the JS also cannot be added to the head section because it would not know the elements that are loaded after the dom-ready event.

have you tried iframe ?
or the website that you are trying to add does not have PPP cookie and AllowContentInIframe .. ?

If you want to add the script inside the ajax request you need evalScripts: true and you should remove the quotes around the request options.
$$('.add-exercise').addEvent('click', function (e) {
var request_exercise_add = new Request.HTML({
method: 'post',
url: e.target.get('href'),
evalScripts: true,
onSuccess: function (responseTree, responseElements, responseHTML, responseJavaScript) {
// i know i can access responseElements here..
}
});
request_exercise_add.send('s=true');
return false;
});
I don't know what is the content of the response but you might also want to use Mootools's .set() instead of innerHTML to append new elements (if you are not doing that yet). Maybe worth to check Dimitar's answer here about that.

shadowbox stops working after jquery function call

I have a shadowbox script. When I load the page everything works fine, but when I call this jquery load function and then try to trigger the shadowbox by clicking on the image, the large image opens in new window instead.
Here's the code:
<link href="CSS/main.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
<script type="text/javascript" src="shadowbox-3.0.3/shadowbox.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
Shadowbox.init();
</script>
<p id="compas"></p>
Any idea why this is happening?

EDIT
So, we finally get the bottom of this. 15 hours after first commenting on this issue, and at least 50 iterations later, we finally have identified what the problem is and how to fix it.
It actually struck me suddenly when I was creating local aaa.html and bbb.html on my server. That was when it hit me that the element nodes for the content that was being replaced was being removed altogether from the DOM when $.load() runs the callback function. So, once the #menu-home content elements were replaced, they were removed from the DOM and no longer had Shadowbox applied to them.
Once I figured this out, it was just a matter of a single web search and I found:
Nabble-Shadowbox - Reinit Shadowbox
Specifically, the response from mjijackson. What he describes is how to "restart" (reinitialize) Shadowbox using:
Shadowbox.clearCache();
Shadowbox.setup();
So once the #menu-home content was reloaded, what needs to happen is the Shadowbox cache needs to be cleared (essentially, shutting it down on the page), then the Shadowbox.setup() is run, which will detect the elements all over again. You don't run the Shadowbox.init() method again either.
I noticed that you had tried to copy/paste the Shadowbox.setup() in after the $.load(), at least sequentially in the code. However, this wasn't going to work, due to the cache clearing that needs to happen first, and primarily because the .clearCache() and .setup() functions need to be run after the $.load() completes (finishes and runs any callbacks). Those two functions need to be run in the $.load() callback handler; otherwise, you're running it's immediately, but the $.load() is asynchronous and will complete at some later time.
I'm going to go over some other changes I made, just so you understand what, why and wherefore.
Note, I'm not sure if you're familiar with <base>, but the following is at the top of the HEAD element:
<base href="http://62.162.170.125/"/>
This just let's me use the resource files on your computer. You'll not want to use this on your actual site more than likely. If you copy/paste, make sure and remove this line.
<div id="menu">
<ul>
<li><a id="menu-home" href="index.html" rel="http://jfcoder.com/test/homecontent.html">Home</a></li>
<li><a id="menu-services" href="services.html" rel="http://jfcoder.com/test/servicescontent.html">Services</a></li>
<li><a id="menu-tour" href="tour.html" rel="http://jfcoder.com/test/tourcontent.html">Tour</a></li>
<li><a id="menulogin" href="login.html">Login</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
Here, you'll notice I have a relative url in the HREF attribute, and a link to some pages on my server. The reason for the links to my server is that I couldn't access your aaa.html and bbb.html files through AJAX due to cross-site scripting limitations. The links to my website should be removed as well.
Now, the reason I'm using the rel attribute here is that I want allow for the links by way of the href attribute to continue to work in case the JS doesn't function correctly or there's some other error. If you have separate files, one for full HTML document and another for just the fragments, this is what you'll want to do. If you can serve both the full document AND the content-only from the linked file, then you probably don't need the rel attribute, but you'll need to manage the request so the server knows how to respond (full document or just the content part).
var boxInitialize = function(){
try {
if (!Shadowbox.initialized) {
Shadowbox.init();
Shadowbox.initialized = true;
} else {
Shadowbox.clearCache();
Shadowbox.setup();
}
} catch(e) {
try {
Shadowbox.init();
} catch(e) {};
}
};
All I've done here is create a central location for the initialization/setup requests. Fairly straightforward. Note, I added the Shadowbox.initialized property so I could keep track of if the Shadowbox.init() had run, which can only be run once. However, keeping it all in one spot is a good idea if possible.
I also created a variable function which can be called either as a regular function:
boxInitialize();
Or as a function reference:
window.onload = boxInitialize; // Note, no () at the end, which execute the function
You'll probably notice I removed the $() and replaced them with jQuery() instead. This can turn into a real nightmare if you end up with an environment with multiple frameworks and libraries competing for $(), so it's best to avoid it. This actually just bit me real good the other day.
Since we have a closure scope within the .ready() callback, we can take advantage of that to save several "private" variables for ow use at different times in the scripts execution.
var $ = jQuery,
$content = jQuery("#content"), // This is "caching" the jQuery selected result
view = '',
detectcachedview = '',
$fragment,
s = Object.prototype.toString,
init;
Note the , at the end of all but the last line. See how I "imported" the $ by making it equal to the jQuery variable, which means you could actually use it in that#.
var loadCallback = function(response, status, xhr){
if (init != '' && s.call(init) == '[object Function]') {
boxInitialize();
}
if (xhr.success()
&& view != ''
&& typeof view == 'string'
&& view.length > 1) {
$fragment = $content.clone(true, true);
cacheContent(view, $fragment);
}
};
This runs when the $.load() completes the process of the AJAX request. Note, the content returned in the request has already been placed on the DOM by the time this runs. Note as well that we're storing the actual cached content in the $content.data(), which should never be removed from the page; only the content underneath it.
var cacheContent = function(key, $data){
if (typeof key == 'string'
&& key.length > 1
&& $data instanceof jQuery) {
$content.data(key, $data.html());
$content.data(detectcachedview, true);
}
};
cacheContent() is one a method you may not want; essentially, if it was already loaded on a previous request, then it will be cached and then directly retrieved instead of initiating another $.load() to get the content from the server. You may not want to do this; if so, just comment out the second if block in the menuLoadContent() function.
var setContent = function(html){
$content.empty().html(html);
if (init != '' && s.call(init) == '[object Function]') {
boxInitialize();
}
};
What this does is first empty the $content element of it's contents/elements, then add the specified string-based markup that we saved earlier by getting the $content.html(). This is what we'll re-add when possible; you can see once the different links have been clicked and loaded, reclicking to get that to redisplay is really quick. Also, if it's the same request as currently loaded, it also will skip running the code altogether.
(We use $content like because it is a reference to a variable containing a jQuery element. I am doing this because it's in a closure-scope, which means it doesn't show up in the global scope, but will be available for things like event handlers.
Look for the inline comments in the code.
var menuLoadContent = function(){
// This is where I cancel the request; we're going to show the same thing
// again, so why not just cancel?
if (view == this.id || !this.rel) {
return false;
}
// I use this in setContent() and loadCallback() functions to detect if
// the Shadowbox needs to be cleared and re-setup. This and code below
// resolve the issue you were having with the compass functionality.
init = this.id == 'menu-home' ? boxInitialize : '';
view = this.id;
detectcachedview = "__" + view;
// This is what blocks the superfluous $.load() calls for content that's
// already been cached.
if ($content.data(detectcachedview) === true) {
setContent($content.data(view));
return false;
}
// Now I have this in two different spots; there's also one up in
// loadCallback(). Why? Because I want to cache the content that
// loaded on the initial page view, so if you try to go back to
// it, you'll just pickup what was sent with the full document.
// Also note I'm cloning $content, and then get it's .html()
// in cacheContent().
$fragment = $content.clone(true, true);
cacheContent(view, $fragment);
// See how I use the loadCallback as a function reference, and omit
// the () so it's not called immediately?
$content.load(this.rel, loadCallback);
// These return false's in this function block the link from navigating
// to it's href URL.
return false;
};
Now, I select the relevant menu items differently. You don't need a separate $.click() declaration for each element; instead, I select the #menu a[rel], which will get each a element in the menu that has a rel="not empty rel attribute". Again, note how I use menuLoadContent here as a function reference.
jQuery("#menu a[rel]").click(menuLoadContent);
Then, at the very bottom, I run the boxInitialize(); to setup Shadowbox.
Let me know if you have any questions.
I think I might be getting to the bottom of this. I think the flaw is the way you're handling the $.load() of the new content when clicking a menu item, coupled with an uncaught exception I saw having to do with an iframe:
Uncaught exception: Unknown player iframe
This Nabble-Shadowbox forum thread deals with this error. I'm actually not getting that anymore, however I think it came up with I clicked on the tour menu item.
Now, what you're doing to load the content for the menu items really doesn't make any sense. You're requesting an entire HTML document, and then selecting just an element with a class="content". The only benefit I can see for doing this is that the page never reloads, but you need to take another approach to how to get and display the data that doesn't involve downloading the entire page through AJAX and then trying to get jQuery to parse out just the part you want.
I believe handling the content loading this way is the root cause of your problem, hence the $.load() toggling of menu views breaks your page in unexpected ways.
Question: Why don't you just link to the actual page and skip all the $.load() fanciness? Speed-wise, it won't make that much of an impact, if any at all. It just doesn't make sense to use AJAX like this, when you could just link them to the same content without issue.
There are two alternatives that would allow you to prevent roundtrip page reloads:
Setup your AJAX calls to only request the .content portion of the markup if you have the ?contentonly=true flag in the URL, not the entire HTML document. This is how it's traditionally done, and is usually relative simple to do if you have a scripting environment.
$(".content").load('index.html?contentonly=true');
Then your server responds only with the content view requested.
Serve all of the content views within the same HTML document, then show as appropriate:
var $content = $('.content');
$content.find('.content-view').hide();
$content.find('#services-content').show();
It doesn't look like you have a whole lot of content to provide, so the initial page load probably won't have that much of an impact with this particular approach. You might have to look into how to preload images, but that's a very well known technique with many quality scripts and tutorials out there.
Either one of these techniques could use the #! (hashbang) technique to load content, although I believe there are some issues with this for search engines. However, here is a link to a simple technique I put together some time ago:
http://jfcoder.com/test/hash.html
Also, this is just a tip, but don't refer to your "content" element with a class, ie, .content. There should only be one content-displaying element in the markup, right? There's not more than one? Use an id="content"; that's what ID attributes are for, to reference a single element. classes are meant to group elements by some characteristic they share, so above when I .hide() the inline content views (see #2), I look for all of the class="content-view" elements, which are all similar (they contain content view markup). But the $content variable should refer to $('#content');. This is descriptive of what the elements are.

This worked for us, we made a site that used vertical tabs and called in the pages with our shadowbox images using jQuery.load
Just give all of your anchor tags the class="sbox" and paste this script in the header.
<script>
Shadowbox.init({
skipSetup:true,
});
$(document).ready(function() {
Shadowbox.setup($('.sbox'));//set up links with class of sbox
$('a.sbox').live('click',function(e){
Shadowbox.open(this);
//Stops loading link
e.preventDefault();
});
});
</script>
Note: we had to put the .sbox class on all our rel="shadowbox" anchors as well as the on the anchor for the tab that called the .load
Thanks to this guy-> http://www.webmuse.co.uk/blog/shadowbox-ajax-and-other-generated-content-with-jquery-and-javascript/

Well, based on Shem's answer, this is my solution.
Every click on specific class, setup and open shadowbox with elements from same class:
jQuery('.sb-gallery a').live('click',function(e){
Shadowbox.setup(jQuery('.sb-gallery a'));
Shadowbox.open(this);
//Stops loading link
e.preventDefault();
});
Thanks to all

Reload? Javascript after Jquery .live/.load

I wanted to load some fragments of external content inside a div, through a menu.
Found "load" and "live", found a tutorial used it = success!
Except, like what's explicit in the documentation, it doesn't load JavaScript.
The thing is, the destination page already loads, inside the header, that same JavaScript, 'cause Wordpress loads it in every page. In this particular page, I'm only using the plugin (nextgen gallery) through the jQuery AJAX call.
So, what I believe is my problem is that I somehow need to alert/reload the JavaScript, right?
And how can I do this?
<script type="text/javascript" charset="utf-8">
jQuery(document).ready(function(){
// ajax pagination
jQuery('#naveg a').live('click', function(){ // if not using wp-page-numbers, change this to correct ID
var link = jQuery(this).attr('href');
// #main is the ID of the outer div wrapping your posts
jQuery('#fora').html('<div class="loading"><h2>Loading...</h2></div>');
// #entries is the ID of the inner div wrapping your posts
jQuery('#fora').load(link+' #dentro')
return false;
});
}); // end ready function
</script>
PS: I've substituted "live" with "on" but didn't work either.

I'm not sure if I understand... your load() command is puling in some Javascript that you want executed? I'm not sure if you can do that. But if you just need to call some JS upon load() completion, you can pass it a function like so:
jQuery('#fora').load(link+' #dentro', function() {
console.log("load completed");
// JS code to be executed...
});

If you want to execute Javascript code included in the loaded page (the page you retrieve via .load()), than you have to use the url-parameter without the "suffixed selector expression". See jQuery documentation for (.load()):
Note: When calling .load() using a URL without a suffixed selector expression, the content is passed to .html() prior to scripts being
removed. This executes the script blocks before they are discarded. If
.load() is however called with a selector expression appended to the
URL, the scripts are stripped out prior to the DOM being updated,
which is why they are never executed. An example of both cases can be
seen below:
Here, any JavaScript loaded into #a as a part of the document will
successfully execute.
$('#a').load('article.html');
However in this case, script blocks in the document being loaded into
#b are stripped out prior to being executed:
$('#b').load('article.html #target');
I think that's your problem (although I have no solution for you, sorry).
Proposal: Maybe you can load the whole page (including the Scripts) and remove (or hide) the parts you don't need?
Cheers.

Removing jQuery ajax-added js-files from document again?

My site operates on an ajax "framework". Whenever a user opens a new page, that page loads in the necessary css and js files to view the page properly and adds them to the current document. The js files are loaded like this in jQuery:
function getJS(jsfiles) {
$.each(jsfiles, function(i, val) {
$.getScript(val);
});
}
My problem is that whenever a js-file is loaded, that file is added to the document permanently and operates across all ajax "sub-sites". Therefore I get problems with reserved function names, functions that requires certain DOM-elements to be present when executed and throws an error otherwise, etc. etc. Is there a way to remove these files from the document again?

I don't know how jQuery attaches new scripts, but you could do an AJAX request and build your own script elements in the callback, giving them a class that can be selected later for removal.
$.ajax({
url:'test.js',
dataType: 'text',
success: function(script) {
var head = document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0];
var scr_elem = document.createElement('script');
scr_elem.setAttribute("class","new_script");
scr_elem.setAttribute("className","new_script");
scr_elem.type="text/javascript";
scr_elem.appendChild(document.createTextNode(script));
head.appendChild(scr_elem);
}
});
// Later on
$('.new_script').remove();
Note that I've only tested this in Webkit and Firefox.

You could scope the contents of the JavaScript files you are loading, using a self-executing function. Or try assigning an ID to the script-blocks and remove them by doing: $("id of the script block").remove();.

You can try to do something like this
$('head').empty();
$('head').append('<script src="yourscript.js" type="text/javascript" />');
Hope this helps

Calling Javascript in a page after it's been loaded by jQuery GET

Imagine a normal page calling javscript in head. The trouble is some of the content isnt loaded untill i click on a link. Subsequently when this link loads the content it wont work. This is because i guess the javascript has already been run and therefor doesnt attach itself to those elements called later on. There is only standard html being called.
So for example this is the code which calls my external html.
$.get('content.inc.php', {id:id}, function(data){
$('#feature').children().fadeTo('fast', 0).parent().slideUp('slow', function(){
$(this).html(data).slideDown('slow');
});
});
If the html i was calling for example and H1 tag was already in the page the cufon would work. However because i am loading the content via the above method H1 tags will not be changed with my chosen font.This is only an example. The same will apply for any javascript.
I was wonering whether there is a way around this without calling the the javascript as well the html when its received from the above function

If you want to attach events to elements on the page that are dynamically created take a look at the "live" keyword.
$('H1').live("click", function() { alert('it works!'); });
Hope this is what you were looking for.

Does Cufon.refresh() do what you want?
As you said Cufon was just an example, I'd also suggest a more general:
$.get(url, options, function(html, status) {
var dom = $(html);
// call your function to manipulate the new elements and attach
// event handlers etc:
enhance(dom);
// insert DOM into page and animate:
dom.hide();
$target_element.append(dom); // <-- append/prepend/replace whatever.
dom.show(); // <-- replace with custom animation
});

You can attach event handlers to the data that you get via the get() inside of the callback function. For example
$.get('content.inc.php', {id:id}, function(data){
$('#feature').children().fadeTo('fast', 0).parent().slideUp('slow', function(){
$(this).html(data).find('a').click(function(e) {
// specify an event handler for <a> elements in returned data
}).end().slideDown('slow');
});
});
live() may also be an option for you, depending on what events you want to bind to (since live() uses event delegation, not all events are supported).

Andy try this. It will call the Cufon code after each AJAX request is complete and before the html is actually added to the page.
$.get('content.inc.php', {id:id}, function(data){
$('#feature').children().fadeTo('fast', 0).parent().slideUp('slow', function(){
$(this).html(data);
Cufon.replace('h1');
$(this).slideDown('slow');
});
});

JavaScript is not executed because of a security reason OR beccause jQuery is just setting this element's innerHTML to some text (which is not interpreted as a JavScript) if it's contained. So the security is the beside effect.
How to solve it?
try to find all SCRIPT tags in Your response and execute them as fallows:
var scripts = myelement.getElementsByTagName("SCRIPT");
var i = 0;
for (i = 0; i < scripts.length; i++)
eval(scripts[i].innerHTML);