jQuery loop with an array error

Question

i have this snippet. As a result i see an error: Invalid left-hand side in assignment.

var arr = [ "text1", "text2", "text3", "text4" ];
 jQuery.each(arr, function(index, value) {
 this = jQuery("#sc-dialog ."+value).val();
});

Does anyone can point me to how to fix this? Thanks.

This is an UPDATE I need that variable 'text' will have the numbers in the loop: text1, text2, text3... i have made it like this:

var arr = [ "1", "2", "3", "4" ];
jQuery.each(arr, function(index, value) {
 var text + index = jQuery("#sc-dialog .text"+value).val();
});

But i got an error: Unexpected identifier. The problem is here: var text + index

• James Allardice: You can't assign to this. What are you trying to do?
• Trufa: what is this = supposed to mean?
• odupont: What do you want to do ? Modify each entry of the array ?
• Vasili: I'm trying to get the content of each array item which is passed from textarea elements.

Answer 1

Try like this:

jQuery.each(arr, function(index, value) {
 arr[index] = jQuery("#sc-dialog ."+value).val();
});

Answer 2

Putting a + after your variable name is a syntax error in your var statement:

var text + index = jQuery("#sc-dialog .text"+value).val()

A valid variable declaration will be either variable name by itself:

var text;

Or the variable name with an assigned value:

var text = jQuery("#sc-dialog .text"+value).val();

The value being assigned can have a + or other operators in it:

var x = y + z - 5 * (a + b);

And in a single var statement you can declared multiple variables with or without values by separating them with commas:

var i, j = 0, k, text = jQuery("#sc-dialog .text"+value).val(), x = 12 + 4;

An array of numbers that follow a simple pattern (in this case array element index plus 1) is kind of pointless when you can achieve the same thing with a standard for loop. EDIT: from your comment it seems like you don't want to process the values within the loop, you want to store the values for later use. You mention wanting text1, text2, etc., but if you need to reference them individually it sounds like your various textareas aren't really a group and it doesn't make sense to process them in a loop at all. But if you insist then you should store the values in an array:

var i,
 text = [];
for (i = 1; i <=4; i++) {
 text[i] = jQuery("#sc-dialog .text"+i).val();
}
// later in your code
// text[1] is first value,
// text[2] is second value, etc

Note that JS array indexes are zero-based, and array .length is one more than the highest index, but your field numbering starts at 1 - keep that in mind if you later loop over the text array.

• Vasili: Thank you for your help and explanation, however i still have issues. The Variables: text1, text2, text3... i'm pulling out lower in the code. So now i got errors like: text1 is not defined. I wanted to use a loop instead of writing this for each textarea: var text1 = $("#sc-dialog .text1").val(); var text2 = $("#sc-dialog .text2").val(); var text3 = $("#sc-dialog .text3").val();
• nnnnnn: It doesn't make sense to use a loop if you plan to reference the values individually. Are these textareas used for unrelated purposes? In any case I've updated my answer to show one way to do this with an array.

Answer 3

You can't use 'this' as a variable name. try something like:

var arr = [ "text1", "text2", "text3", "text4" ];
 jQuery.each(arr, function(index, value) {
 var dialogValue = jQuery("#sc-dialog ."+value).val();
});