javascriptdomobject

How do you check if a JavaScript Object is a DOM Object?


I'm trying to get:

document.createElement('div')  //=> true
{tagName: 'foobar something'}  //=> false

In my own scripts, I used to just use this since I never needed tagName as a property:

if (!object.tagName) throw ...;

So for the second object, I came up with the following as a quick solution -- which mostly works. ;)

The problem is, it depends on browsers enforcing read-only properties, which not all do.

function isDOM(obj) {
  var tag = obj.tagName;
  try {
    obj.tagName = '';  // Read-only for DOM, should throw exception
    obj.tagName = tag; // Restore for normal objects
    return false;
  } catch (e) {
    return true;
  }
}

Is there a good substitute?


Solution

  • This might be of interest:

    function isElement(obj) {
      try {
        //Using W3 DOM2 (works for FF, Opera and Chrome)
        return obj instanceof HTMLElement;
      }
      catch(e){
        //Browsers not supporting W3 DOM2 don't have HTMLElement and
        //an exception is thrown and we end up here. Testing some
        //properties that all elements have (works on IE7)
        return (typeof obj==="object") &&
          (obj.nodeType===1) && (typeof obj.style === "object") &&
          (typeof obj.ownerDocument ==="object");
      }
    }
    

    It's part of the DOM, Level2.

    Update 2: This is how I implemented it in my own library: (the previous code didn't work in Chrome, because Node and HTMLElement are functions instead of the expected object. This code is tested in FF3, IE7, Chrome 1 and Opera 9).

    //Returns true if it is a DOM node
    function isNode(o){
      return (
        typeof Node === "object" ? o instanceof Node : 
        o && typeof o === "object" && typeof o.nodeType === "number" && typeof o.nodeName==="string"
      );
    }
    
    //Returns true if it is a DOM element    
    function isElement(o){
      return (
        typeof HTMLElement === "object" ? o instanceof HTMLElement : //DOM2
        o && typeof o === "object" && o !== null && o.nodeType === 1 && typeof o.nodeName==="string"
    );
    }