:nth-of-type() in jQuery / Sizzle?

It surprised me that Sizzle (the selector engine jQuery uses) comes with a built-in :nth-child() selector, but lacks an :nth-of-type() selector.

To illustrate the difference between :nth-child() and :nth-of-type() and to illustrate the problem, consider the following HTML document:

<!doctype html>
<html>
 <head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <title>:nth-of-type() in Sizzle/jQuery?</title>
  <style>
   body p:nth-of-type(2n) { background: red; }
  </style>
 </head>
 <body>
  <p>The following CSS is applied to this document:</p>
  <pre>body p:nth-of-type(2n) { background: red; }</pre>
  <p>This is paragraph #1.</p>
  <p>This is paragraph #2. (Should be matched.)</p>
  <p>This is paragraph #3.</p>
  <p>This is paragraph #4. (Should be matched.)</p>
  <div>This is not a paragraph, but a <code>div</code>.</div>
  <p>This is paragraph #5.</p>
  <p>This is paragraph #6. (Should be matched.)</p>
  <script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4/jquery.min.js"></script>
  <script>
   $(function() {
    // The following should give every second paragraph (those that had red backgrounds already after the CSS was applied) an orange background.
    // $('body p:nth-of-type(2n)').css('background', 'orange');
   });
  </script>
 </body>
</html>

Since Sizzle uses the browser-native querySelector() and querySelectorAll() methods if those are present (i.e. in browsers that already implement the Selectors API), stuff like $('body p:nth-child'); will of course work. It won’t work in older browsers though, because Sizzle has no fallback method for this selector.

Is it possible to easily add the :nth-of-type() selector to Sizzle, or to implement it in jQuery (by using the built-in :nth-child() selector, perhaps)? A custom selector with parameters would be nice.

Solution 1:

/**
 * Return true to include current element
 * Return false to exclude current element
 */
$.expr[':']['nth-of-type'] = function(elem, i, match) {
    if (match[3].indexOf("n") === -1) return i + 1 == match[3];
    var parts = match[3].split("+");
    return (i + 1 - (parts[1] || 0)) % parseInt(parts[0], 10) === 0;
};

Test case - (check in IE or rename the selector)

You can of course add even & odd too:

match[3] = match[3] == "even" ? "2n" : match[3] == "odd" ? "2n+1" : match[3];

Solution 2:

the jQuery plugin moreSelectors has support for nth-of-type (and many other selectors). I suggest either using that, or simply implement a simple plugin that only implements the exact selectors you need. You should be able to copy-paste code from there.

Happy hacking!

Solution 3:

I can't pretend to know how nth-of-type is implemented, but jQuery does provide a mechanism by which you can create your own custom selector.

The following question deals with custom selectors, and may provide a useful insight to you

What useful custom jQuery selectors have you written?

:nth-of-type() in jQuery / Sizzle?

Solution 1:

Solution 2:

Solution 3:

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