I want to check if an HTML5 data attribute exists using plain javascript. I have tried the below code snippet, but it doesn't work.
if(object.getAttribute("data-params")==="undefined") {
//data-attribute doesn't exist
}
Element.getAttribute returns null or empty string if the attribute does not exist.
You'd use Element.hasAttribute:
if (!object.hasAttribute("data-example-param")) {
// data attribute doesn't exist
}
or Element.dataset (see also: in operator):
if (!("exampleParam" in object.dataset)) {
// data attribute doesn't exist
}
or even
if (!object.getAttribute("data-example-param")) {
// data attribute doesn't exist or is empty
}
You could as well just use the dataset API.
The HTMLElement.dataset read-only property allows access, both in reading and writing mode, to all the custom data attributes (data-*) set on the element. It is a map of DOMString, one entry for each custom data attribute.
Sadly this will not work in IE10 but i am pretty sure that there is a shim out there somewhere.
Here is an example
var containerData = document.querySelector('#container').dataset,
contentData = document.querySelector('#content').dataset;
// Check if dataset is empty or not.
console.log(Object.keys(containerData).length === 0);
console.log(Object.keys(contentData).length === 0);
// Check for specific data
if (containerData.hasOwnProperty('bar')) {
console.log(containerData.bar);
}
// Here is the dataset
console.log(containerData);
<div id="container" data-foo="bar" data-bar="foo">
<div id="content">
Content
</div>
</div>
The code you posted doesn't won't work as you expect, what you're doing here is checking if the attribute-value of the named attribute ("data-params") is equal to "undefined", which will return true only if the attribute is data-params="undefined".
if (object.getAttribute("data-params") === "undefined") {
// the "data-params" attribute-value is exactly "undefined"
// note that `getAttribute()` is a
}
What I suspect you want to do is:
var typeOfObjectAttribute = typeof object.getAttribute("data-params");
if (typeOfObjectAttribute === null || typeOfObjectAttribute === "") {
// data-params attribute doesn't exist on that Node.
}
Note that – according Mozilla Developer Network (at the reference for Element.getAttribute(), below) – states that:
getAttribute()returns the value of a specified attribute on the element. If the given attribute does not exist, the value returned will either benullor""(the empty string)…
It's also worth noting that getAttribute() is a method of the Element nodes, rather than generic objects.
Incidentally, you could also use the following approach (again, testing that the attribute is not set):
// here we look to see if the 'params' key is present in the
// HTMLElement.dataset object of the element, and then invert
// that result using the '!' operator, to check that the
// attribute *isn't* present:
if (!('params' in document.getElementById('elementID').dataset)) {
// the data-params attribute is not present.
}
References:
Try using typeof:
if(typeof object.getAttribute("data-params") === "undefined") {
console.log('data-attribute doesn't exist');
}
If anyone landed here knowing what data attribute they are looking for then you can check if it exists with
HTML:
<input id="your-element" data-type="something">
JS:
const element = document.querySelector('#your-element');
if( element.dataset.type === 'something'){
// Do something
}
Of course the type in data-type in the example above is a custom name, data attributes can have any name such as data-cats or data-dogs etc.. ... ...
You can use the matches() method and the selector works the same way as a query selector does
if(typeof obj["data-attribute"] !== "undefined"){ // code here }