Develop Reference

JavaScript: register a custom script type and define a handler?

HTML elements with a unique custom type attribute are ignored by the browser. Sometimes these are used by template engines. How do I define what happens when such a script element is loaded/created? (either while loading the page or when inserted dynamically)
In other words, does an onCreateElement event of some sorts exist in the DOM?
I could quite easily iterate through all script elements with attribute type=text/mycustomtype when the DOM loads using for instance the querySelector and then parse them with a function. This however does not work when a new script element is created and appended programatically. Is this currently possible?
var d = document.createElement('script')
d.setAttribute('type', 'text/mycustomtype')
d.innerHTML = 'define foo = 1;' // some code in some custom language
document.body.appendChild(d)
In this case, nothing will happen because the browser will ignore this unknown type. Can I somehow define a handler function for this? Thanks in advance.

I recently saw python script running in a browser using brython. View source and I see:
<script type="text/python3">
from interpreter import Interpreter
# open REPL in textarea with id "code"
Interpreter("code")
</script>
I wanted to know how this is possible. I googled for the answer, and found the dreaded stackoverflow question that's exactly what I want - with no answers.
I found a good answer in: Everything I Know About The Script Tag. It's exactly as you predicted when you say iterate through all script elements.
Their example looks like this:
<script type="text/emerald">
make a social network
but for cats
</script>
<script>
var codez = document.querySelectorAll('script[type="text/emerald"]');
for (var i=0; i < codez.length; i++)
runEmeraldCode(codez[i].innerHTML);
</script>

Running the javascript code present on another html page through jquery

It might be a noob questions but I have just started using jquery.
My basic requirement to extract the link which is there in the javascript code present in another html (code is embedded in the html page and not in a seperate file).
The link is also present as a href attribute of <a> tag inside a tag, just to add if it is easier to extract it from there (I am using chrome so I think it considers there are no child nodes of <noscript> tag)
After this I tried doing an ajax request to the html page (using $.ajax) thinking it will run the scripts on the page but got the html code of the page in return :S . I have also heard of something called evalscripts:true but not sure if that will work here or how to use it?
I have also tried to search for the link in html code returned by my html page by using the "contains" operation of jquery.
I am doing all this to create a greasemonkey script. Please suggest
Example Code:
This is a function present inside the html of that page:
function fun() {
obj = new pollingObj('argument', "a link I want to extract comes here");
}
I want to extract the link: "a link I want to extract comes here" and then open it.on my page where I am running my jquery script
This link is also present like this on the html page:
<noscript>
blabla
</noscript>
Also is it possible to run the javascripts present on that page if the link extraction is not possible?

If you're able to get the html code of the page successfully via .ajax, and the data you want is in the HTML code, it's not worth the effort to bother with trying to run the scripts. Just access the URL through the DOM:
// ajax success function
success: function(html) {
var anchorCode = $(html)
// this assumes that noscript is a top-level element
// otherwise, use .find('noscript')
.filter('noscript')
.text(); // get the code for the anchor tag, as a string
var myLink = $(anchorCode).attr('href');
// do something with myLink
}
Edit: It turns out that jQuery is a little funny in the way it deals with noscript tags - inner tags don't appear to be considered part of the DOM, so you need to grab the text content of the tag and then use jQuery to DOM-ify it. See updated code above.

Recommended method to locate the current script?

I am writing a script that needs to add DOM elements to the page, at the place where the script is located (widget-like approach).
What is the best way to do this?
Here are the techniques I am considering:
Include an element with an id="Locator" right above the script. Issues:
I don't like the extra markup
If I reuse the widget in the page, several elements will have the same "Locator" id. I was thinking about adding a line in the script to remove the id once used, but still...
Add an id to the script. Issues:
even though it seems to work, the id attribute is not valid for the script element
same issue as above, several elements will have the same id if I reuse the script in the page.
Use getElementsByTagName("script") and pick the last element. This has worked for me so far, it just seems a little heavy and I am not sure if it is reliable (thinking about deferred scripts)
document.write: not elegant, but seems to do the job.
[Edit] Based on the reply from idealmachine, I am thinking about one more option:
Include in the script tag an attribute, for example goal="tabify".
Use getElementsByTagName("script") to get all the scripts.
Loop through the scripts and check the goal="tabify" attribute to find my script.
Remove the goal attribute in case there's another widget in the page.
[Edit] Another idea, also inspired by the replies so far:
Use getElementsByTagName("script") to get all the scripts.
Loop through the scripts and check innerHTML to find my script.
At the end of the script, remove the script tag in case there's another widget in the page.

Out of the box : document.currentScript (not supported by IE)

I've worked for OnlyWire which provides, as their main service, a widget to put on your site.
We use the var scripts = document.getElementsByTagName("script"); var thisScript = scripts[scripts.length - 1]; trick and it seems to work pretty well. Then we use thisScript.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, thisScript); to insert whatever we want before it, in the DOM tree.
I'm not sure I understand why you consider this a "heavy" solution... it doesn't involve iteration, it's a pure cross-browser solution which integrates perfectly.

This works with multiple copies of same code on page as well as with dynamically inserted code:
<script type="text/javascript" class="to-run">
(function(self){
if (self == window) {
var script = document.querySelector('script.to-run');
script.className = '';
Function(script.innerHTML).call(script);
} else {
// Do real stuff here. self refers to current script element.
console.log(1, self);
}
})(this);
</script>

Either document.write or picking the last script element will work for synchronously loaded scripts in the majority of web pages. However, there are some options I can think of that you did not consider to allow for async loading:
Adding a div with class="Locator" before the script. HTML classes has the advantage that duplicates are not invalid. Of course, to handle the multiple widget case, you will want to change the element's class name when done adding the HTML elements so you do not add them twice. (Note that it is also possible for an element to be a member of multiple classes; it is a space-separated list.)
Checking the src of each script element can ensure that tracking code (e.g. Google Analytics legacy tracking code) and other scripts loaded at the very end of the page will not prevent your script from working properly when async loading is used. Again, to handle the multiple widget case, you may need to remove the script elements when done with them (i.e. when the desired code has been added to the page).
One final comment I will make (although you may already be aware of this) is that when coding a widget, you need to declare all your variables using var and enclose all your code within: (JSLint can help check this)
(function(){
...
})();
This has been called a "self-executing function" and will ensure that variables used in your script do not interfere with the rest of the Web page.

Whether you drop a <script> tag in or a <div class="mywidget">, you're adding something to the markup. Personally, I prefer the latter as the script itself is only added once. Too many scripts in the page body can slow down the page load time.
But if you need to add the script tag where the widget is going to be, I don't see what's wrong with using document.write() to place a div.

I just found another method that seems to answer my question:
How to access parent Iframe from javascript
Embedding the script in an iframe allows to locate it anytime, as the script always keeps a reference to its own window.
I vote this the best approach, as it'll always work no matter how many times you add the script to the page (think widget). You're welcome to comment.
What pushed me to consider iframes in the first place was an experiment I did to build a Google gadget.

In many cases this work well (hud.js is the name of the scipt):
var jsscript = document.getElementsByTagName("script");
for (var i = 0; i < jsscript.length; i++) {
var pattern = /hud.js/i;
if ( pattern.test( jsscript[i].getAttribute("src") ) )
{
var parser = document.createElement('a');
parser.href = jsscript[i].getAttribute("src");
host = parser.host;
}
}

Also you can add individual script's name inside them.
either inside some js-script
dataset['my_prefix_name'] = 'someScriptName'
or inside HTML - in the <script> tag
data-my_prefix_name='someScriptName'
and next search appropriate one by looping over document.scripts array:
... function(){
for (var i = 0, n = document.scripts.length; i < n; i++) {
var prefix = document.scripts[i].dataset['my_prefix_name']
if (prefix == 'whatYouNeed')
return prefix
}
}

I haven't had access to internet explorer since forever, but this should work pretty much everywhere:
<script src="script.js"
data-count="30"
data-headline="My headline"
onload="uniqueFunctionName(this)"
defer
></script>
and inside script.js:
window.uniqueFunctionName = function (currentScript) {
var dataset = currentScript.dataset
console.log(dataset['count'])
console.log(dataset['headline'])
}

How do I get the original innerHTML source without the Javascript generated contents?

Is it possible to get in some way the original HTML source without the changes made by the processed Javascript? For example, if I do:
<div id="test">
<script type="text/javascript">document.write("hello");</script>
</div>
If I do:
alert(document.getElementById('test').innerHTML);
it shows:
<script type="text/javascript">document.write("hello");</script>hello
In simple terms, I would like the alert to show only:
<script type="text/javascript">document.write("hello");</script>
without the final hello (the result of the processed script).

I don't think there's a simple solution to just "grab original source" as it'll have to be something that's supplied by the browser. But, if you are only interested in doing this for a section of the page, then I have a workaround for you.
You can wrap the section of interest inside a "frozen" script:
<script id="frozen" type="text/x-frozen-html">
The type attribute I just made up, but it will force the browser to ignore everything inside it. You then add another script tag (proper javascript this time) immediately after this one - the "thawing" script. This thawing script will get the frozen script by ID, grab the text inside it, and do a document.write to add the actual contents to the page. Whenever you need the original source, it's still captured as text inside the frozen script.
And there you have it. The downside is that I wouldn't use this for the whole page... (SEO, syntax highlighting, performance...) but it's quite acceptable if you have a special requirement on part of a page.
Edit: Here is some sample code. Also, as #FlashXSFX correctly pointed out, any script tags within the frozen script will need to be escaped. So in this simple example, I'll make up a <x-script> tag for this purpose.
<script id="frozen" type="text/x-frozen-html">
<div id="test">
<x-script type="text/javascript">document.write("hello");</x-script>
</div>
</script>
<script type="text/javascript">
// Grab contents of frozen script and replace `x-script` with `script`
function getSource() {
return document.getElementById("frozen")
.innerHTML.replace(/x-script/gi, "script");
}
// Write it to the document so it actually executes
document.write(getSource());
</script>
Now whenever you need the source:
alert(getSource());
See the demo: http://jsbin.com/uyica3/edit

A simple way is to fetch it form the server again. It will be in the cache most probably. Here is my solution using jQuery.get(). It takes the original uri of the page and loads the data with an ajax call:
$.get(document.location.href, function(data,status,jq) {console.log(data);})
This will print the original code without any javascript. It does not do any error handling!
If don't want to use jQuery to fetch the source, consult the answer to this question: How to make an ajax call without jquery?

Could you send an Ajax request to the same page you're currently on and use the result as your original HTML? This is foolproof given the right conditions, since you are literally getting the original HTML document. However, this won't work if the page changes on every request (with dynamic content), or if, for whatever reason, you cannot make a request to that specific page.

Brute force approach
var orig = document.getElementById("test").innerHTML;
alert(orig.replace(/<\/script>[.\n\r]*.*/i,"</script>"));
EDIT:
This could be better
var orig = document.getElementById("test").innerHTML + "<<>>";
alert(orig.replace( /<\/script>[^(<<>>)]+<<>>/i, "<\/script>"));

If you override document.write to add some identifiers at the beginning and end of everything written to the document by the script, you will be able to remove those writes with a regular expression.
Here's what I came up with:
<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">
var docWrite = document.write;
document.write = myDocWrite;
function myDocWrite(wrt) {
docWrite.apply(document, ['<!--docwrite-->' + wrt + '<!--/docwrite-->']);
}
</script>
Added your example somewhere in the page after the initial script:
<div id="test">
<script type="text/javascript"> document.write("hello");</script>
</div>
Then I used this to alert what was inside:
var regEx = /<!--docwrite-->(.*?)<!--\/docwrite-->/gm;
alert(document.getElementById('test').innerHTML.replace(regEx, ''));

If you want the pristine document, you'll need to fetch it again. There's no way around that. If it weren't for the document.write() (or similar code that would run during the load process) you could load the original document's innerHTML into memory on load/domready, before you modify it.

I can't think of a solution that would work the way you're asking. The only code that Javascript has access to is via the DOM, which only contains the result after the page has been processed.
The closest I can think of to achieve what you want is to use Ajax to download a fresh copy of the raw HTML for your page into a Javascript string, at which point since it's a string you can do whatever you like with it, including displaying it in an alert box.

A tricky way is using <style> tag for template. So that you do not need rename x-script any more.
console.log(document.getElementById('test').innerHTML);
<style id="test" type="text/html+template">
<script type="text/javascript">document.write("hello");</script>
</style>
But I do not like this ugly solution.

I think you want to traverse the DOM nodes:
var childNodes = document.getElementById('test').childNodes, i, output = [];
for (i = 0; i < childNodes.length; i++)
if (childNodes[i].nodeName == "SCRIPT")
output.push(childNodes[i].innerHTML);
return output.join('');

Injecting JavaScript into head element of website using Fiddler

I was thinking of using Fiddler for the following purpose...
I have a JavaScript based service I want to demonstrate to potential clients. In order to show them what their website could look like if they install (i.e. include) my script, I want to set up Fiddler on my PC, so that when fetching the client's website, the
<script type="text/JavaScript" src="myscript.js"></script>
line will be included in the HTML <head> section.
Can this be easily done with Fiddler? Could someone point me to where I may find the documentation covering that, if it is?
Thanks!
----Update----
For the time being I have resorted to using a BHO to add my script to the page. I use execScript(), upon onDocumentComplete, to run a simple piece of JavaScript which appends the .js file I need to the page. But EricLaw's pointers and jitter's answer seem like the way to go for a more complete (and elegant) way to do what I need.
If someone is interested I could upload the BHO code here.
-Thanks!

Open fiddler -> Menu Rules -> Customize Rules (or hit Ctrl+R)
The CustomRule.js file opens. Scroll down until you find the line
static function OnBeforeResponse(oSession: Session)
This is where your code goes. Here you can change the server response before the browser sees it.
The following code sample shows how to include a custom piece of jQuery code which replaces the Unanswered link in the horizontal menu with a link which serves as short cut to Unanswered jQuery Questions
I first show you the jQuery code I want to include
<script type='text/javascript'>
$(function() {
var newLink = 'Unanswered jQuery';
$('div#hmenus div.nav:first ul li:last a').replaceWith(newLink);
});
</script>
Now the fiddler code (based on code found in CustomRules.js and code samples from the FiddlerScript CookBook)
//is it a html-response and is it from stackoverflow.com
if (oSession.oResponse.headers.ExistsAndContains("Content-Type", "html") &&
oSession.HostnameIs("stackoverflow.com")) {
// Remove any compression or chunking
oSession.utilDecodeResponse();
var oBody = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetString(oSession.responseBodyBytes);
// Match the jQuery script tag
var oRegEx = /(<script[^>]*jquery.min.js"><\/script>)/gi;
// replace the script tag withitself (no change) + append custom script tag
oBody = oBody.replace(oRegEx, "$1<script type='text/javascript'>$(function() {$('div#hmenus div.nav:first ul li:last a').replaceWith('Unanswered jQuery');})</script>");
// Set the response body to the changed body string
oSession.utilSetResponseBody(oBody);
}
I think you should now able to hackyourself together a piece of code which fits your problem.
Example
// Match the head end
var oRegEx = /(<\/head>)/gi;
// replace with new script
oBody = oBody.replace(oRegEx, "<script type='text/javascript' src='http://url/myscript.js'></script>$1");

if you use jQuery you can add js on the fly. I would probably think you can have a method which would include/exclude your script based on some query param. This is how you would include JS with jQuery
$.getScript('someScript.js',function(){
//Do something here after your script loads
});

Haven't tried it, but how about GreaseMonkey for IE?