Did you ever use some weird class like class="user-fuu"
for JavaScript
to then pick up this class?
Since HTML5
Spec, we can use something better for this, and it's called Data Attributes!
Let's dive into using Data Attributes together.
HTML Markup
<div id="demo" data-user="fuu" data-custom-emoji="🔥"></div>
Very simple, for each element we want to add, we can use data-
with a name, note we use multiple dashes for spaces.
Vanilla JavaScript dataset API
So HTML5
brings us the wonderful Dataset API, much like the classList
, as we explored before. But it's not quite as impressive.
We can only get and set data.
Getting a Data Attribute
To get a data attribute we can use the following code:
var element = document.getElementById('demo');console.log(element.dataset.user);console.log(element.dataset.customEmoji);// fuu// 🔥
Pretty cool right!
Note that we have to use camelCase
to retrieve the data, while we inputted as dash-style
. This is the rule, and we have to obey to it.
Setting Data Attributes
To set, we use the same Dataset API
element.dataset.customEmoji = '⚡️';element.dataset.bar = 'Fuu?';console.log(element.dataset.customEmoji);console.log(element.dataset.bar);// ⚡️// Fuu?
As you can see, we can easily overwrite data attributes, or even add new ones!
Magic powers and trust me, you will use this quite often.
Alternative method setAttribute and getAttribute
An alternative is using setAttribute
and getAttribute
methods.
element.setAttribute('data-custom-emoji', '🤟');console.log(element.getAttribute('data-custom-emoji'));// 🤟
As you can see, this method needs to dash-style
again.
Using Data Attributes in CSS
Another strong value for Data Attributes is that they can be accessed in CSS!
Look at this example:
[data-user] { width: 50px; height: 50px; background: teal; border-radius: 50%;}
Wow, what can these bad boy Data Attributes not do right!
See the following Codepen for all these examples:
See the Pen Vanilla JavaScript Data Attributes by Chris Bongers (@rebelchris) on CodePen.
Browser support
Really good browser support for Dataset, so why not use it!
Thank you for reading, and let's connect!
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