Get unique selector of element in Jquery
I want to create something like a recorder whichs tracks all actions of a user. For that, i need to identify elements the user interacts with, so that i can refer to these elements in a later session.
Spoken in pseudo-code, i want to be able to do something like the following
Sample HTML (could be of any complexity):
<html>
<body>
<div class="example">
<p>foo</p>
<span><a href="bar">bar</a></span>
</div>
</body>
</html>
User clicks on something, like the link. Now i need to identify the clicked element and save its location in the DOM tree for later usage:
(any element).onclick(function() {
uniqueSelector = $(this).getUniqueSelector();
})
Now, uniqueSelector should be something like (i don't mind if it is xpath or css selector style):
html > body > div.example > span > a
This would provide the possibility to save that selector string and use it at a later time, to replay the actions the user made.
How is that possible?
Update
Got my answer: Getting a jQuery selector for an element
Answer
I'll answer this myself, because i found a solution which i had to modify. The following script is working and is based on a script of Blixt:
jQuery.fn.extend({
getPath: function () {
var path, node = this;
while (node.length) {
var realNode = node[0], name = realNode.name;
if (!name) break;
name = name.toLowerCase();
var parent = node.parent();
var sameTagSiblings = parent.children(name);
if (sameTagSiblings.length > 1) {
var allSiblings = parent.children();
var index = allSiblings.index(realNode) + 1;
if (index > 1) {
name += ':nth-child(' + index + ')';
}
}
path = name + (path ? '>' + path : '');
node = parent;
}
return path;
}
});