Question

I am just getting into jQuery so please forgive this maby stupid question, but I encountert the following:

$('#pb_inner').css('width',data + '%');

this code works fine. However I wonder why I can’t do the following?

$('#pb_inner').style.width=data + '%';

Answer 1

Because $('#pb_inner') returns an array like jQuery object. A collection, not a single object (and even then, it would be another jQuery object):

From the docs:

(…), jQuery() — which can also be written as $() — searches through the DOM for any elements that match the provided selector and creates a new jQuery object that references these elements.

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You would have to use get:

$('#pb_inner').get(0).style.width=data + '%';

The .get() method grants us access to the DOM nodes underlying each jQuery object