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Hi.

Could some kind sould tell me what the javascript would be to get a
given attribute of the parent "table" element of a given element
inside that table.

So,

<table width="54">
[SNIP - LOTS OF HTML HERE]
<a href="#" onclick="Foo();">get the width attribute's value</a>
</table>

When I click on the anchor tag, it returns the number "54".

How do I do this?

pbd22 wrote:
> Hi.
>
> Could some kind sould tell me what the javascript would be to get a
> given attribute of the parent "table" element of a given element
> inside that table.
>
> So,
>
> <table width="54">
> [SNIP - LOTS OF HTML HERE]
> <a href="#" onclick="Foo();">get the width attribute's value</a>
> </table>
>
> When I click on the anchor tag, it returns the number "54".
>
> How do I do this?
>
Give the table an ID and getElementById on it.

pbd22 wrote:
> <table width="54">

The `width' attribute is presentational. Use CSS instead.

> [SNIP - LOTS OF HTML HERE]
> <a href="#" onclick="Foo();">get the width attribute's value</a>

That element should be generated by client-side scripting:

<script type="text/javascript">
document.write('<a ...>...<\/a>');
</script>

Foo() would not be a constructor or a factory, and so should be foo().

> </table>
>
> When I click on the anchor tag, it returns the number "54".
>
> How do I do this?

You don't, as you cannot click on a tag if not in your source code editor.

Provided that you mean a click on the `a' element there, you have to obtain
the ancestor element object reference through iteration:

function getNextAncestor(o, sElemType)
{
if (o)
{
var rxElemType;

if (typeof sElemType == "string")
{
rxElemType = new RegExp(sElemType.toLowerCase(), "i");
}

if (rxElemType)
{
while ((o = o.parentNode))
{
if (rxElemType.test(o.tagName))
{
return o;
}
}
}
}

return null;
}

function getAncestorTableWidth(o)
{
return (getNextAncestor(o, "table") || {width: -1}).width;
}

<table width="54">
...
<tr>
<td>...<a
href="#"
onclick="window.alert(getAncestorTableWidth(this)) ; return false"
>get the width attribute's value</a>...</td>
</tr>
...
</table>


HTH

PointedEars
--
realism: HTML 4.01 Strict
evangelism: XHTML 1.0 Strict
madness: XHTML 1.1 as application/xhtml+xml
-- Bjoern Hoehrmann

Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn wrote:
> rxElemType = new RegExp(sElemType.toLowerCase(), "i");

`.toLowerCase()' can be safely omitted here.


PointedEars
--
Anyone who slaps a 'this page is best viewed with Browser X' label on
a Web page appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web,
when you had very little chance of reading a document written on another
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