Why doesn't this jquery selector with a period work

Question

I have a div with an ID

this jquery selector works

$(\"[id^=\'updates-pane         


        

Answer 1

Yes, HTML5 allows period in id but jQuery isn't built by the w3 org. It's just a utility library optimized for the most common cases.

If your ID has a period, or any other character making jQuery parse it as more than just an id, then you'd better use the standard function :

$(document.getElementById(yourId))

This is the preferred solution if your id comes from a variable.

Answer 2

Use this to escape your dot:

$("#updates-pane-user\\.followed_on")

Reference: http://docs.jquery.com/Frequently_Asked_Questions#How_do_I_select_an_element_by_an_ID_that_has_characters_used_in_CSS_notation.3F

Answer 3

Because of the dot in the id attribute which in jQuery syntax represents class selector. This selector is equivalent to selecting node as:

<div id="updates-pane-user" class="followed_on">