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JavaScript Interacting with the DOM Traversing the DOM Getting All Children of a Node with children

Samuel Kleos
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Samuel Kleos
Front End Web Development Techdegree Student 13,728 Points
Posted by Samuel Kleos
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Samuel Kleos
Front End Web Development Techdegree Student 13,728 Points

Why can't I add a button to the <li> before adding text content to the same <li>? See my snapshot.

Here is my snapshot: https://w.trhou.se/qohzirpvk9

Please consider this button creation function which adds a button to a list item:

function addBtnRemove(li) {
    let btnRemove = document.createElement('button');
    btnRemove.className = 'remove';
    btnRemove.textContent = "Remove";
    li.appendChild(btnRemove);
}

If I add the btnRemove function after the li.textContent = input.value; the button appears on the newly created list item just fine:

btnCreate.addEventListener('click', () => {
  const input = document.querySelector('.input-main');
  let ul = document.getElementsByTagName('ul')[0];

  let li = document.createElement('li');
  li.textContent = input.value;
  addBtnRemove(li);
  ul.appendChild(li);
  input.value = '';
});

However, If I add the btnRemove function before li.textContent = input.value; the button doesn't appear:

btnCreate.addEventListener('click', () => {
  const input = document.querySelector('.input-main');
  let ul = document.getElementsByTagName('ul')[0];

  let li = document.createElement('li');
  addBtnRemove(li);
  li.textContent = input.value;
  ul.appendChild(li);
  input.value = '';
});

Why?

1 Answer

Rachel Johnson
STAFF
Rachel Johnson
Treehouse Teacher
Rachel Johnson
Rachel Johnson
Treehouse Teacher

Hey Samuel, thanks for your question! This essentially comes down to the use of .textContent. .textContent replaces the contents of that HTML DOM element.

By calling addBtnRemove(li) before line 48, you're:

  • appending a button to li
  • and then changing it's content to [your string here] Essentially the button is wiped by using .textContent

By calling addBtnRemove(li) AFTER line 48, you're:

  • changing li's contents to [your string here]
  • appending a button to li Therefore both will appear because we added the button after changing the content

I hope this helps!