Question

What is this JavaScript code doing here, specifically the while loop:

function setAjaxLinks(){
    var links = document.body.getElementsByTagName("a");
    var linkL = links.length;

    while (linkL--) {
        if (!links[linkL].href.match('#')) {
            mj.pageLoad(links[linkL]);
        }
    }
}

I’m aware “mj” doesn’t really mean anything, but what is the general gist?

Answer 1

It loops through all links (a-tags) on the page from the last to the first (decrementing).

If it finds a link that doesn’t have a # symbol in it, it calls the mj.pageLoad function with the link in question as parameter.

Here’s a blow by blow:

function setAjaxLinks(){
    //find all <a> tag elements on the page
    var links = document.body.getElementsByTagName("a");
    //get the amount of <a> tags on the page
    var linkL = links.length;
    //loop over all <a> tags on the page from last to first
    while (linkL--) {
        //if the href attribute on the current <a> tag has a # sign in it
        if (!links[linkL].href.match('#')) {
            //then call this function (and from the name of the function convert it to an ajax call) 
            mj.pageLoad(links[linkL]);
        }
    }
}