$(this) OR event.target OR var input = $(this)

Question

jQuery is currently providing me with a fun introduction to Javascript after 12 years of surviving happily without. I\'m at the stage where I\'m trying to learn as much as I

Answer 1

In my experience i would go with the following:

$('#a_button').click(function() {
    // USING this
    var buttonValue = $(this).val();
    $(this).addClass('button_has_been_clicked');
});

The this in the context of your click callback method is a reference to the DOM event. Since you already have a reference to the DOM object it is trival to convert it into a jQuery object since a lookup is not required.

But on a side note, if you don't need to use jQuery in your callback, then don't. You can simply get the value of the button using standard JS this.currentTarget.value.

The other examples you mentioned require a DOM lookup, and depending on the complexity of your selector can take longer. Using a id based lookup like '#a_button' will perform better than a class based looked like .myClass.