Question

I just don’t really understand why an ID is not a valid parent:
http://api.jquery.com/child-selector/

Valid:

$("#listequestions tr").click(function() {
  $(this).addClass("success");
});

Not valid:

$("#listequestions > tr").click(function() {
  $(this).addClass("success");
});

Can somebody help me to understand why?

Thank you.

Answer 1

A tbody is automatically inserted in a table if there is none.

That’s why the only possible way to match "#listequestions > tr" would be to give the id to a thead, a tfoot or a tbody.

That’s one of the perils of the child selector.

Let’s suppose you have the following HTML :

<table id=listequestions>
    <tr><td>some text</td></tr>
</table>​

Then the tr would be matched by those two queries :

• $('#listequestions > tbody > tr')
• $('#listequestions tr')