Question

I’m trying to return the ajax success array from one function to another. For some reason I don’t seem to be able to pass the data stored in a variable in the success part of the ajax function into the parent function to return.

I looked at this post to try and figure things out, but not such luck:
jQuery Ajax call – Set variable value on success

Thanks so much for any assistance.

Here’s a simplified version of the code:

// make json_to_return global
var json_to_return;

function loop_through_data(){

  // call the load_days function and put its array data into days_array
  var days_data = load_days(03,2010);

  // I'd like to be able to iterate through days_data here
  //
  //
}

function load_days(selectedMonth, selectedYear){  
                  $.ajax({
                   type: "POST",
                   dataType: "json",
                   url: "../includes/get_availability.php",
                   data: "month=" + selectedMonth + "&year=" + selectedYear,
                   success: function(available_json){
                       json_to_return = available_json;
                   },
                   error: function(msg){
                    alert("error " + msg);
                   }
                 });
               return json_to_return;

}   

Answer 1

This part of your function happens later:

success: function(available_json){
                   json_to_return = available_json;
               }

So the variable you’re returning is undefined, because the code to set it doesn’t happen until the response comes back from the server. Either call the rest of the code to run from your success function, so it’ll run when the data’s ready, or set async:false (less desirable because it locks the browser).

The async: false method is like this:

              $.ajax({
               type: "POST",
               async: false,
               dataType: "json",
               url: "../includes/get_availability.php",
               data: "month=" + selectedMonth + "&year=" + selectedYear,
               success: function(available_json){
                   json_to_return = available_json;
               },
               error: function(msg){
                alert("error " + msg);
               }
             });

The better approach:

              $.ajax({
               type: "POST",
               dataType: "json",
               url: "../includes/get_availability.php",
               data: "month=" + selectedMonth + "&year=" + selectedYear,
               success: function(available_json){
                   loopThroughTheDaysAndDoStuff(available_json);
               },
               error: function(msg){
                alert("error " + msg);
               }
             });