How to stop a timer function from running?

Question

I'm a bit new to js and have been trying to figure out how to stop this function from running when I click on a button. I tried using clearInterval but I am not sure I am doing it properly. Can someone take a look at this code and point me in the right direction?

Code:

<div><h1 id="target"></h1></div>
<button id="stop">Stop</button>​

Script:

var arr = [ "one", "two", "three"];

(function timer(counter) {
     var text = arr[counter];

    $('#target').fadeOut(500, function(){ 
        $("#target").empty().append(text).fadeIn(500);
    });

    delete arr[counter];
    arr.push(text);

    setTimeout(function() {
        timer(counter + 1);
    }, 3000);

    $("#stop").click(function () {
       clearInterval(timer);
    });

})(0);

setInterval(timer);

JS Fiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/58Jv5/13/

Thanks in advance for your help.

Answer 1

You need to give JavaScript a reference to the interval:

var t = setTimeout(function() {
    timer(counter + 1);
}, 3000);

Then you can clear it like so:

$("#stop").click(function () {
   clearTimeout(t);
});