Trigger a keypress/keydown/keyup event in JS/jQuery?

Question

What is the best way to simulate a user entering text in a text input box in JS and/or jQuery?

I don\'t want to actually put text in the input box,

Answer 1

First of all, I need to say that sample from Sionnach733 worked flawlessly. Some users complain about absent of actual examples. Here is my two cents. I've been working on mouse click simulation when using this site: https://www.youtube.com/tv. You can open any video and try run this code. It performs switch to next video.

function triggerEvent(el, type, keyCode) {
    if ('createEvent' in document) {
            // modern browsers, IE9+
            var e = document.createEvent('HTMLEvents');
            e.keyCode = keyCode;
            e.initEvent(type, false, true);
            el.dispatchEvent(e);
    } else {
        // IE 8
        var e = document.createEventObject();
        e.keyCode = keyCode;
        e.eventType = type;
        el.fireEvent('on'+e.eventType, e);
    }
}

var nextButton = document.getElementsByClassName('icon-player-next')[0];
triggerEvent(nextButton, 'keyup', 13); // simulate mouse/enter key press