Wait for AJAX before continuing through separate function

Question

Alright... at 2am, this is where I draw the line. Help... before my laptop ends up going out the window. :)

I\'ve tried using setTimer, callbacks, and everything else I

Answer 1

AJAX stands for asynchronous. That means that in your original code, saveRecord will be executed before the client will receive the response from the server (and, depending on the $.ajax implementation, it might be before the client will send the request to the server).

Additionally, you seem to misunderstand how functions work in JS. var category = autoSelectCategory(payee); will set the category to the return value of autoSelectCategory; but the autoSelectCategory function in your code returns nothing.

From the other side, the data return value of your anonymous function could only be used by $.ajax function (and $.ajax likely ignores the success parameter return value).

Here is the code that should work:

function parseRow(row){
    var rowArray     = row.trim().split(",");
    var date         = rowArray[0];
    var checknum     = rowArray[1];
    var payee        = rowArray[2];
    var memo         = rowArray[3];
    var amount       = rowArray[4];

    autoSelectCategory(payee, function (category) {    
        saveRecord(date, checkNum, payee, memo, category, payment, deposit);
    });
}

function autoSelectCategory(payee, callback) {
    $.ajax({
        async: false,
        url: "autoselectcategory",
        dataType: "json",
        data: {
            string: payee
        },
        success: callback
    });
}

Answer 2

Do not use async: false option. It's a pure evil (blocks all scripts in browser and even other tabs!) and it's deprecated since jQuery 1.8. You should use callbacks as it was always meant to be.

function parseRow(row) {
    /* the other code */
    autoSelectCategory(payee, function() {
        saveRecord(date, checkNum, payee, memo, category, payment, deposit);
    });
}

function autoSelectCategory(payee, callback) { // <---- note the additional arg
    $.ajax({
        url: "autoselectcategory",
        dataType: "json",
        data: {
            string: payee
        },
        success: function(res) {
            /* the other code */
            callback();
        }
    });
}