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JavaScript Interactive Web Pages with JavaScript Traversing and Manipulating the DOM with JavaScript Traversing Elements

Gabriel Kunkel
Gabriel Kunkel
2,566 Points
Posted by Gabriel Kunkel
Gabriel Kunkel
2,566 Points

How is the anchor an "a" element? What is an "a" element? I'm trying to interpret the instructions for a Challenge Task.

I'd like to give more details, but the question box is blocking the instructions.

app.js 
//Select the naviagation
var navigation = document.getElementById("navigation");

//Select all listItems from the navigation
var listItems = navigation.children;

//When a navigation link is pressed
var linkListener = function() {
  console.log("Listener is clicked!");
}

var bindEventsToLinks = function(listItem) {
  //Select the anchor
  var anchor = listItem;
  //Bind the linkListener to the anchor element (a) 
  anchor.onclick = linkListener;
}

for(var i = 0; i < listItems.length ; i++) {
    bindEventsToLinks(listItems[i]);
}
index.html 
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head></head>
<body>

<ul id="navigation">
  <li>
    <a href="#home">Home</a>
  </li>
  <li>
    <a href="#about">About</a>
  </li>
  <li>    
    <a href="#contact">Contact</a>
  </li>
</ul>

<p>A few of my favourite things:</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    Rain drops on roses
  </li>
  <li>
    Whiskers on kittens
  </li>
  <li>
    Brown paper packages wrapped up with string
  </li>
</ul>

<script src="app.js"></script>
</body>
</html>

2 Answers

Gabriel Kunkel
Gabriel Kunkel
2,566 Points
Gabriel Kunkel
Gabriel Kunkel
2,566 Points

I figured out that what they were referring to was the "a" in the <a href=""> tags. This is what they were calling the "anchor".

Stefan Hoffmann
Stefan Hoffmann
24,811 Points
Stefan Hoffmann
Stefan Hoffmann
24,811 Points

Html documents are loaded into a DOM (Document Object Model) by the web browser of your choice. The individual parts of the DOM are called "elements" (that can contain a content, attributes...).

The Html "<a>"-Tag describes what we know as anchor or link.

Javascript is used to manipulate the DOM. So it accesses elements. Anchor elements in this case. Which have been anchor tags in the html.