ID/Class Selector

Question

I have some kind of problem with jQuery selectors.

Let\'s say i want to select $(\'#elementID\') but the elementID is a variable.

Answer 1

If elementID is a variable ala var elementID = '#someId', I would suggest simply (although I didn't try it ):

$(elementID)

jQuery/JavaScript should dereference this variable as a string value and wrap the ID correctly for further operations...

Answer 2

I use $('#'+variable) all the time.

Answer 3

Not really, no. You need "#" as a selector to select an ID. No reason to not use the ID selector. Or you could write your own function, something like:

$.id = function(id)
{
    return $("#" + id);
}

var elementID = "elementID";
$.id(elementID).text();

That would return an element with the ID of "elementID" without having to use the "#". Kind of pointless though.

Answer 4

Not sure what you mean, but:

var variable = '#' + elementID;

$(variable)...

Answer 5

The following is probably the fastest and the cleanest solution:

$(document.getElementById(elementID))

Appending your variable to "#" would work of course, but it's inherently slower.