http://bencoffman.com/blog/ News about Tech and a few other things. en-us Ben Coffman Mon, 25 Oct 2010 04:22:51 GMT newtelligence dasBlog 2.1.8102.813 coffmanben@gmail.com coffmanben@gmail.com http://bencoffman.com/blog/Trackback.aspx?guid=1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b http://bencoffman.com/blog/pingback.aspx http://bencoffman.com/blog/PermaLink,guid,1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b.aspx Ben Coffman http://bencoffman.com/blog/CommentView,guid,1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b.aspx http://bencoffman.com/blog/SyndicationService.asmx/GetEntryCommentsRss?guid=1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b

Problem:
When I look for the id of an ASP.NET element with some sort of neat DOM querying language I can't find it.

Solution:
Remember ASP.NETer's ASP.NET renames the id from what you named it to something different when it writes the element out to the page. The good news is ASP.NET always names it to the same unique name (something like but not necessarily  ctl00_classname_controlname). Knowing this, you can run your page once and grab the id from the page source. Now use your super cool DOM querying language of choice to find that id by it's new proper ASP.NET name.

Explanation:
Why does ASP.NET do this? The good super geeks at Microsoft know that most of us, not you the reader of course, are not wise enough to give each ASP.NET element a unique name so they won't conflict with each other when ASP.NET is doing all its little magic tricks.

Once again this is a stupid little error that hung me up for more than I'd like to admit. I knew ASP.NET did this I just didn't piece together on why I couldn't find the element by id with my querying language.

http://bencoffman.com/blog/PermaLink,guid,1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b.aspx http://bencoffman.com/blog/2010/10/25/FindingTheAspnetIdWithDojobyIdJqueryidAndMicrosoftAJAXGet.aspx Mon, 25 Oct 2010 04:22:51 GMT <img src="http://bencoffman.com/blog/content/binary/microsoft_.net_logo.png" width="120px" border="0" height="75px"> <br> <br> <b>Problem:</b> <br> When I look for the id of an ASP.NET element with some sort of neat DOM querying language I can't find it.<br> <br> <b>Solution:</b> <br> Remember ASP.NETer's ASP.NET renames the id from what you named it to something different when it writes the element out to the page. The good news is ASP.NET always names it to the same unique name (something like but not necessarily&nbsp; <span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; font-size: medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(26, 26, 166); font-family: monospace; white-space: pre-wrap;">ctl00_classname_controlname)</span></span>. Knowing this, you can run your page once and grab the id from the page source. Now use your super cool DOM querying language of choice to find that id by it's new proper ASP.NET name.<br> <br> <b>Explanation: </b> <br> Why does ASP.NET do this? The good super geeks at Microsoft know that most of us, not you the reader of course, are not wise enough to give each ASP.NET element a unique name so they won't conflict with each other when ASP.NET is doing all its little magic tricks. <br> <br> Once again this is a stupid little error that hung me up for more than I'd like to admit. I knew ASP.NET did this I just didn't piece together on why I couldn't find the element by id with my querying language. <br> <p> </p> <img width="0" height="0" src="http://bencoffman.com/blog/aggbug.ashx?id=1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b" /> http://bencoffman.com/blog/CommentView,guid,1553905e-bd00-4273-a60a-ab048cab966b.aspx .Net Dojo JQuery Microsoft AJAX