I have a Simple JavaScript Function:
function f1() { alert("HI"); } I'm calling the same Javascript function from two places, say:
<input type="submit" id="btn1" onclick="f1()"/> <input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1()"/> How to find the target element which called this Function?
EDIT: How to check if the element is a button or some other?
HTML
<input type="submit" id="btn1" onclick="f1(this)"/> <input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1(this)"/> Js
function f1(el) { console.log(el) } Demo: Fiddle
Try with this
<input type="submit" id="btn1" onclick="f1(this)"/> <input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1(this)"/> and console like
function f1(comp) { console.log(comp); } 
function f1(element) { alert($(element).attr("id")); if ($(element).is(":button")) { alert("Im button"); } } <input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1(this)"/> 
Easiest way:
<input type="submit" id="btn1" onclick="f1(this)"/> <input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1(this)"/> JS:
function f1(btn) { alert("Hi from " + btn); } Add this to the function call
<input type="submit" id="btn1" onclick="f1(this)"/>
<input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1(this)"/>
And modify your js as
function f1(el) { alert(el.nodeName) ; // alerts type of HTML element } el will contain a reference to the element
EDIT : added code to detect type of HTML element
If you are already using jquery on your page, maybe you should try giving all the elements that you want to target a shared class and then detect the clicks?
<input class="same_kind_buttons" type="submit" id="btn1" /> <input class="same_kind_buttons" type="button" id="btn2" /> <script> $(".same_kind_buttons").click(function() { console.log($(this).attr("type")); console.log(this.id); }); </script> Of course if your'e not using jquery on the page you shouldn't include it just for that function and you can use :
<input type="submit" id="btn1" onclick="f1(this);"/> <input type="submit" id="btn2" onclick="f1(this);" /> <script> function f1(elem) { console.log(elem.tagName); console.log(elem.id); } </script>
$(#btn1).click(...).