parent vs closest

Question

Why does this work:

$(\'.button_30\').click(function(){
    $(this).closest(\'.portlet\').find(\'.portlet_content\').text(\"foo\");
});​

an

Answer 1

Because in the second selector you're looking for the Parent and this function move's into the DOM to the node father but only one level which contains the class portlet_footer portlet_footer_30 not the classes that you're passing to the selector .portlet to work with parent you should move two levels in other words.

each time that you're using parent you move one node up