Question

my problem is that I need handle multiple events for rectangle. That sound simple,
for example this works

  node.click(function(e){
     click(); // this is function defined in same scope, it works ok
  });

  node.mouseout(function(e){
     mouseout();  
  });

But, I want to automatize this, so it should looks like this:

var events = new Array("click", "mouseout");
for(var i in events){
     node[events[i]](function(e){
         events[i](); /*THIS is problem, no matter if it is click or mouseout
                        this always fires function with same name as last item
                        in events array (in this case mouseout) 
                      */
     }
}

Do you have any idea why a how I should solve it?

Answer 1

Your handlers created in a loop are sharing a variable. By the time they are called, the variable is the last value in the loop.

You have to use a technique I call “freezing your closures” so that each handler gets a separate copy of the shared variable. In your case, the shared variable that changes is i

Your other problem is that you want to call your functions “click/mouseout” from a string, so you have to get a handle to the function, right now your code is attempting to call "hello"() which does not work

Your last problems (but not a bug yet) are that you shouldn’t use the Array constructor and you shouldn’t use a for in loop to iterate over arrays.

function createHandler(eventName) {
    return function(e) {
        window[eventName]();
    }
}

var events = ["click", "mouseout"];
for(var i=0; i < events.length; i++){
     node[events[i]](createHandler(events[i]));
}

The above example is easier to comprehend but you could use self invoking anonymous functions to do the same thing

var events = ["click", "mouseout"];
for(var i=0; i < events.length; i++){
     node[events[i]]((function(eventName){
         return function(e) {
             window[eventName]();
         };
     })(events[i]));
}