How to detect text direction of element using Javascript?

Question

What\'s the best way to detect the text direction of an html element using Javascript? I would expect to get either \"rtl\" or \"ltr\".

Answer 1

@explosion-pills answer is correct. I did some more research for IE compatibility and came up with the following:

function getDirection(el) {
    var dir;
    if (el.currentStyle)
        dir = el.currentStyle['direction'];
    else if (window.getComputedStyle)
        dir = getComputedStyle(el, null).getPropertyValue('direction');
    return dir;
}

This should even work on Firefox 3.6 which requires null as the second parameter to getPropertyValue.

Since this gives more information I thought I would post it in case it helps someone.