Question

I am trying to copy text from list item in unordered list to a text box.

<div class='this_section_is_created_dynamically_and_repeats_up_to_99_times'>
<label>Serial</label>
<input name="part" class= "part" type="text">
<ul>
    <li class="pattern"><a href="#" class="clickme">test1</a></li>
    <li class="pattern"><a href="#" class="clickme">test2</a></li>
</ul> 

<script>

$('.clickme').live('click', function() {                

            alert($(this).text());  // this works
        // try to copy value clicked to input box. these do not work
        $(this).prevAll('[input:text]').val($(this).text()); 
        $(this).prev(":text").val($(this).text()); 
    });     

Answer 1

prev() and prevAll() look at siblings. The input is a sibling of your ul which is the parent of your lis which are the parents of your anchors:

These should work:

$(this).parent().parent().prev("input:text").val($(this).text());

Or:

$(this).parents('ul').first().prev('input:text').val($(this).text());

You could also give your input an id and just select it directly rather than traversing the DOM.

PS. You should close your input tag: <input name="part" class= "part" type="text" />