jQuery how to find an element based on a data-attribute value?

You have to inject the value of current into an Attribute Equals selector:

$("ul").find(`[data-slide='${current}']`)

For older JavaScript environments (ES5 and earlier):

$("ul").find("[data-slide='" + current + "']"); 

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in case you don't want to type all that, here's a shorter way to query by data attribute:

$("ul[data-slide='" + current +"']");

FYI: http://james.padolsey.com/javascript/a-better-data-selector-for-jquery/

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When searching with [data-x=...], watch out, it doesn't work with jQuery.data(..) setter:

$('<b data-x="1">'  ).is('[data-x=1]') // this works
> true

$('<b>').data('x', 1).is('[data-x=1]') // this doesn't
> false

$('<b>').attr('data-x', 1).is('[data-x=1]') // this is the workaround
> true

You can use this instead:

$.fn.filterByData = function(prop, val) {
    return this.filter(
        function() { return $(this).data(prop)==val; }
    );
}

$('<b>').data('x', 1).filterByData('x', 1).length
> 1

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Without JQuery, ES6

document.querySelectorAll(`[data-slide='${current}']`);

I know the question is about JQuery, but readers may want a pure JS method.

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I improved upon psycho brm's filterByData extension to jQuery.

Where the former extension searched on a key-value pair, with this extension you can additionally search for the presence of a data attribute, irrespective of its value.

(function ($) {

    $.fn.filterByData = function (prop, val) {
        var $self = this;
        if (typeof val === 'undefined') {
            return $self.filter(
                function () { return typeof $(this).data(prop) !== 'undefined'; }
            );
        }
        return $self.filter(
            function () { return $(this).data(prop) == val; }
        );
    };

})(window.jQuery);

Usage:

$('<b>').data('x', 1).filterByData('x', 1).length    // output: 1
$('<b>').data('x', 1).filterByData('x').length       // output: 1

// test data function extractData() { log('data-prop=val ...... ' + $('div').filterByData('prop', 'val').length); log('data-prop .......... ' + $('div').filterByData('prop').length); log('data-random ........ ' + $('div').filterByData('random').length); log('data-test .......... ' + $('div').filterByData('test').length); log('data-test=anyval ... ' + $('div').filterByData('test', 'anyval').length); } $(document).ready(function() { $('#b5').data('test', 'anyval'); }); // the actual extension (function($) { $.fn.filterByData = function(prop, val) { var $self = this; if (typeof val === 'undefined') { return $self.filter( function() { return typeof $(this).data(prop) !== 'undefined'; }); } return $self.filter( function() { return $(this).data(prop) == val; }); }; })(window.jQuery); //just to quickly log function log(txt) { if (window.console && console.log) { console.log(txt); //} else { // alert('You need a console to check the results'); } $("#result").append(txt + "
"); } #bPratik { font-family: monospace; }

Or the fiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/PTqmE/46/

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I have faced the same issue while fetching elements using jQuery and data-* attribute.

so for your reference the shortest code is here:

This is my HTML Code:

<section data-js="carousel"></section>
<section></section>
<section></section>
<section data-js="carousel"></section>

This is my jQuery selector:

$('section[data-js="carousel"]');
// this will return array of the section elements which has data-js="carousel" attribute.

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This selector $("ul [data-slide='" + current +"']"); will work for following structure:

<ul><li data-slide="item"></li></ul>  

While this $("ul[data-slide='" + current +"']"); will work for:

<ul data-slide="item"><li></li></ul>

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$("ul").find("li[data-slide='" + current + "']");

I hope this may work better

thanks

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Going back to his original question, about how to make this work without knowing the element type in advance, the following does this:

$(ContainerNode).find(el.nodeName + "[data-slide='" + current + "']");

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