javascriptregex

Find all elements whose id begins with a common string

I have a XSL that created multiple elements with the id of "createdOn" plus a $unique-id

Example : createdOnid0xfff5db30

I want to find and store these in a variable using JavaScript. I've tried

var dates = document.getElementsById(/createdOn/);

but that doesn't appear to work.

Solution

  • Using jQuery you can use the attr starts with selector:

    var dates = $('[id^="createdOnid"]');

    Using modern browsers, you can use the CSS3 attribute value begins with selector along with querySelectorAll:

    var dates = document.querySelectorAll('[id^="createdOnID"]');

    But for a fallback for old browsers (and without jQuery) you'll need:

    var dateRE = /^createdOnid/;
var dates=[],els=document.getElementsByTagName('*');
for (var i=els.length;i--;) if (dateRE.test(els[i].id)) dates.push(els[i]);