Set Webkit Keyframes Values Using Javascript Variable

Okay, not what your actual code looks like, but you can't throw JavaScript variables into CSS, it won't recognize them.

Instead, you need to create the CSS rules through JavaScript and insert them into the CSSOM (CSS Object Model). This can be done a few ways -- you can either just create a keyframe animation and add it in, or you can overwrite an existing animation. For this sake of this question, I'm going to assume you want to continually overwrite an existing keyframe animation with different rotation values.

I've put together (and documented) a JSFiddle for you to take a look at: http://jsfiddle.net/russelluresti/RHhBz/2/

It starts off running a -10 -> 10 degree rotation animation, but then you can click the button to have it execute a rotation between random values (between -360 and 360 degrees).

This example was hacked together primarily from earlier experimentation done by Simon Hausmann. You can see the source here: http://www.gitorious.org/~simon/qtwebkit/simons-clone/blobs/ceaa977f87947290fa2d063861f90c820417827f/LayoutTests/animations/change-keyframes.html (for as long as that link works, gitorious is pretty bad at maintaining urls).

I've also taken the randomFromTo JavaScript function code from here: http://www.admixweb.com/2010/08/24/javascript-tip-get-a-random-number-between-two-integers/

I've added documentation to the parts of the Simon Hausmann script that I've taken from him (though I've slightly modified them). I've also used jQuery just to attach the click event to my button--all other script is written in native JavaScript.

I've tested this for Chrome 18 and Safari 5.1, and it seems to work fine in both browsers.

Hope this helps.


In chrome 49 onwards and Firefox 48 onwards you can leverage the new Javascript API element.animate() to push in your keyframe animations.

Please be informed that this API is experimental and doesn't work cross browser except for the aforementioned.

Dated solutions like adding class or injecting keyframes could be leveraged for backward compatibility. A shim for the same was not available immediately.

Yanked the MDN example

document.getElementById("tunnel").animate([
  // keyframes
  { transform: 'translateY(0px)' }, 
  { transform: 'translateY(-300px)' }
], { 
  // timing options
  duration: 1000,
  iterations: Infinity
});

refer:

  • caniuse.com/#feat=web-animation
  • MDN documentation