Question

My code doesn’t run and I want the value to be cleared when you click on another

what am I doing wrong?

http://jsfiddle.net/AL2vS/

var placeholderText = $('input').val();

$(placeholderText).focus(function() {
    $(this).attr('value', "");
});
$(placeholderText).blur(function() {
    $(this).attr('value', phTextVal);
});​

Answer 1

You’re using ‘placeholderText’ as a selector, which won’t select anything. Use $('input').focus(... and $('input').blur(... instead.

UPDATE

If you want to store the existing value, and then replace it, then store it as .data() in the <input> element itself:

$('input').focus(function() {
    $this = $(this);
    $this.data('oldval',$this.val());
    $this.val('');
});
$('input').blur(function() {
    $this = $(this);
    $this.val($this.data('oldval'));
});​

http://jsfiddle.net/mblase75/AL2vS/12/

Or possibly:

$('input').blur(function() {
    $this = $(this);
    if ($this.val().length==0) { // only if the field is blank
        $this.val($this.data('oldval'));
    };
});​