JavaScript dollar sign function ($)

If you have been working with JavaScript in recent years you may be aware of the wide used of the dollar sign function. Generally, the dollar sign function is use as a shortcut to document.getElementById and document.getElementByName; however, it can be use for anything. So here is the version of the dollar sign function that I will be using in other JavaScript examples within this blog.

function $() {

    var elements = [];

    var e = null;

    for (var i = 0; i < arguments.length; i++) {

        var element = null;

        var arg = arguments[i];

        if (typeof arg == 'string') {

            element = document.getElementById(arg);

            if (element === null) {

                element = document.getElementsByTagName(arg);

                if (element.length == 1) {

                    element = element[0];

                }

            }

            if (element.length === 0) {

                element = document.getElementsByName(arg);

                /* note: IE does not return this as an array so only the first element

                in the collection (only if more than one exists) will be accessible.*/

                if (element.length === 1) {

                    element = element[0];

                }

                e = element;

            }

        } else {

            element = arg;

        }

        if (arguments.length == 1) {

            return element;

        }

        if (element !== null) {

            elements.push(element);

        }

    }

    return elements;

}

Usage
Accessing an element by id:
document.getElementById('id').innerHTML = 'Hello World';
With the dollar function would be:
$('id').innerHTML = 'Hello World';


Accessing an element by name:
document.getElementByName('name').innerHTML = 'Hello Tokyo';

With the dollar function would be:

$('name').innerHTML = 'Hello Tokyo';

Accessing more than one element at a time:
for (var i = 0; i < 2; i++) {
           $('name1', 'name2')[i].innerHTML = "test";
}




Compress this code here