Question

Using jquery how do i simply check if it is read only?

this is what i am trying..

$("#item").keydown(function (event) {
     //alert(event.keyCode);
     if (event.keyCode == 13) {
         $("#ok").click();               
         if ($('#dropLength').prop("disabled") == false) {
             $("#dropLength").focus();
             return;
         }
         if ($('#dropUnit').prop("disabled") == false) {
             $("#dropUnit").focus();
             return;
         }
         $("#qty").focus();                
         return ;
     }
 });

The dropdowns are set to readonly using jquery also:

if ($('#dropLength').find('option').length <= 1) {
      $('#dropLength').attr("disabled", "disabled");
}
if ($('#dropUnit').find('option').length <= 1) {
      $('#dropUnit').attr("disabled", "disabled");
}   

Answer 1

The legacy solution, before 1.6, was to use .attr and handle the returned value as a bool. The main problem is that the returned type of .attr has changed to string, and therefore the comparison with == true is broken (see http://jsfiddle.net/2vene/1/ (and switch the jquery-version)).

With 1.6 .prop was introduced, which returns a bool.

Nevertheless, I suggest to use .is(), as the returned type is intrinsically bool, like:

$('#dropUnit').is(':disabled');
$('#dropUnit').is(':enabled');

Furthermore .is() is much more natural (in terms of “natural language”) and adds more conditions than a simple attribute-comparison (eg: .is(':last'), .is(':visible'), … please see documentation on selectors).