I’m trying to learn JQuery – and I have a small problem with ajax.

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Asked: May 11, 20262026-05-11T19:40:48+00:00 2026-05-11T19:40:48+00:00

I’m trying to learn JQuery – and I have a small problem with ajax.

0

I’m trying to learn JQuery – and I have a small problem with ajax. I’m trying to populate a javascript array with values returned from an XML response from a page.
Here’s my main page (ajax.html):

<html>
<head>
<script type="text/javascript" src="jquery/jquery.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="jquery/fiber.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
<p>Ajax</p>
<script>
var ringType = new Array();

</script>
</body>
</html>

fiber.js is this:

//process things for fiber map
jQuery(document).ready(function() {
// do stuff when DOM is ready

//populate and display ringType
$.ajax({
  type: "GET",
  url: "ajaxHelper.pl",
  data: {
      getRingTypes: "1",
      },
  dataType: "xml",
  success: function(xml) {
      //if the query was successfull,
      alert("Got an xml object:"+$(xml));
      $(xml).find("ringType").each( function(){
          alert("Received reply "+$(this).text());
          var type = $(this).html(); //save the value
          //append to ringType array
          ringType.push(type);
      });
  },
  error:function (xhr, ajaxOptions, thrownError){
      alert(xhr.status);
      alert(thrownError);
  }
 });
 for(var i=0; i<ringType.length; i++){
    document.write("<br>"+ringType[i]);
 }

});

ajaxHelper.pl generates this XML (without the backslashes in \?) (as content-type text/xml):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
    <\?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"\?>
    <ringType>IA</ringType>
    <ringType>IL</ringType>
    <ringType>IN</ringType>
    <ringType>IR</ringType>
    <ringType>RT</ringType>

The problem is, every time I load ajax.html, the ajax query is successful, but the error function is executed! xhr.status = 200 (meaning the query was ok) and thrownException is undefined.