In JavaScript can I make a "click" event fire programmatically for a file input element?

javascript html
user28655 picture user28655 · Oct 17, 2008 · Viewed 330.2k times · Source

I'd like to make a click event fire on an <input type="file"> tag programmatically.

Just calling click() doesn't seem to do anything or at least it doesn't pop up a file selection dialog.

I've been experimenting with capturing events using listeners and redirecting the event, but I haven't been able to get that to actually perform the event like someone clicked on it.

Answer

Romas picture Romas · Jun 12, 2010

I have been searching for solution to this whole day. And these are the conclusions that I have made:

  1. For the security reasons Opera and Firefox don't allow to trigger file input.
  2. The only convenient alternative is to create a "hidden" file input (using opacity, not "hidden" or "display: none"!) and afterwards create the button "below" it. In this way the button is seen but on user click it actually activates the file input.

Hope this helps! :)

<div style="display: block; width: 100px; height: 20px; overflow: hidden;">
<button style="width: 110px; height: 30px; position: relative; top: -5px; left: -5px;"><a href="javascript: void(0)">Upload File</a></button>
<input type="file" id="upload_input" name="upload" style="font-size: 50px; width: 120px; opacity: 0; filter:alpha(opacity=0);  position: relative; top: -40px;; left: -20px" />
</div>

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