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Executing a script from jQuery GET request

I'm sending a GET request with jQuery
$.get("/index.html", /*Adding '?update' to the request*/ "update",
function (data) {/* Enter code here */}, "html");
where data is my server's response. I'm sending back a simple script like alert() so the 'data' variable equals <script> alert("Hello world!") </script>.
I need a way to automatically execute the script. I could just .append(data) to an element but I'm having multiple appends so that isn't really practical.
What is the easiest and the most practical way of executing the script?

Either .append it, like you said, or use eval(data), but then you'd have to get rid of the <script></script>. You can supply eval() a piece of Javascript code and it will execute that.
Please be aware that using eval should be avoided at all costs.

I did some crazy stuff in a case like this but you may think it is extreme. In my case I had to store some functions in localStorage and execute them by history state ( when user goes back/forth ). I have created a json object similar to
{obj:'myObject', fn: 'myfn', args: myArgs}
then stored this data base64 encoded. then when I need it back, I simply decoded content and
window.[data.fn].[data.obj].apply(null,data.args)`
did the trick without exposing too much data and not using eval. Eval comes from Evil so I would stay away. =)
UPDATE
So in my case all main core functions are json objects at window namespace similar to ( not actual content but an sample)
Member = {
initialize: function (){
//some process
},
render:function(memberId, selector){
//Some process
},
//...etc }
So when I store each item it, I used something similar to
var data = {obj: 'Member', fn: 'render', args: [1,'#member-block']}
then encoded version will be
localStorage.setItem('data', btoa(JSON.stringify(data)));
dmFyIGRhdGEgPSB7b2JqOiAnTWVtYmVyJywgZm46ICdyZW5kZXInLCBhcmdzOiB7bWVtYmVySWQ6MSwgc2VsZWN0b3I6ICcjbWVtYmVyLWJsb2NrJ319
Then when I need to call back
var data = JSON.parse(atob(localStorage.getItem('data'));
would return my original data object. Since the main functions in my case are in window namespace.
if (typeof window[data.obj]!=='undefined') { // same as window.Member
if (typeof window[data.obj][data.fn]!=='undefined' && typeof window[data.obj][data.fn]!=='function' ) { // make sure fn is defined and is a function
window[data.obj][data.fn].apply(null, data.args);
// we pass same arguments to function call with apply.
// `apply` will give us option to add arguments dynamically without knowing its size.
// it can be null any number of arguments that needed for that function.
}
}

call javascript page function inside ajaxed html

I have a page where i use jQuery to load some content into a div element
<div id="contents-box-in"></div>
jQuery code in page
$(document).ready(function() {
$("#contents-box-in").load("new-01.php", function() {
$('#contents-box-in').fadeIn(120);
});
var updateBoxData = function(data) {
$('#contents-box-in').fadeOut(100, function() {
$('#contents-box-in').html(data).fadeIn(130);
});
}
});
the content that i load is a form that needs to load a new page sending collected data from form
$('#form-buttons-next').click(function(e) {
var formData = new FormData($(this)[0]);
var formS = $.ajax({
url : 'new-02.php',
type : 'POST',
data : formData,
async : false,
cache : false,
processData : false,
contentType : false
});
formS.done(function(data) {
if (data != null) {
updateBoxData(data);
}
});
formS.fail(function(jqXHR, textStatus) {
alert("error");
});
});
since i do this in different step i would like to use a shared function contained in page that is loading the ajax content but i get updateBoxData is undefined
I guess that ajaxed content can't see parent container function
The easy way would be to load a different .js file containing shared function, i was wondering if is possible to access the updateBoxData from ajaxed contents

...i would like to use a shared function contained in page that is loading the ajax content but i get updateBoxData is undefined
I guess that ajaxed content can't see parent container function
No, that's not why. Your updateBoxData variable is scoped to the function it's declared in (your ready) callback. If you want it accessible globally, you'll need to make it global instead.
The problem is, though, the global namespace is already incredibly crowded. So if you put all of your useful functions there as globals, you're going to run into conflicts sooner or later.
For that reason, for now until browsers support ES2015 modules (which will take a while), I suggest giving yourself just one global symbol, something unlikely to conflict with other things, and assigning an object to it with properties for your various utility functions. E.g.:
var MyNiftyUtils = {
updateBoxData: function() {
// ...
}
};
Then you call that via MyNiftyUtils.updateBoxData. If the verbosity bothers you, no worries, just use a scoping function and assign it to a local:
(function() {
var u = MyNiftyUtils;
// ....
u.updateBoxData(/*...*/);
})();
(There are about 18 variations on that theme, this is just one of them.)

The function updateBoxData is defined inside a callback function you passed to .ready and hence its scope is limited to that function. Let us call this callback function Fx.
The click handler (the function passed to .click in the second part), which we call it Fy is defined outside of Fx and as a result does not have access to the variables defined in Fx (remember updateBoxData is a variable inside Fx).
That is why your code does not work. To get it working simply take updateBoxData out of the callback in .ready function:
$(document).ready(function() {
$("#contents-box-in").load("new-01.php", function() {
$('#contents-box-in').fadeIn(120);
});
});
function updateBoxData(data) {
$('#contents-box-in').fadeOut(100, function() {
$('#contents-box-in').html(data).fadeIn(130);
});
}
...
The rest is the same.

Additional url attribute at nightwatch page object

I was trying to add an additional url attribute as a function to my page-object while using nightwatchjs.
Like:
module.exports = {
url: function() {
return this.api.launchUrl + '/content/site1.xhtml';
},
cancelUrl: function() {
return this.api.launchUrl + '/content/cancel_site1.xhtml';
}
}
Anyhow nightwatch is not able to get that 2nd attribute cancelUrl, ie undefined.
Why is that so? Shouldn't nightwatch be able to access that attribute as it is nothing more than a function call returning a string or am I misunderstanding a javascript or special page-object concept?
--
I am aware that there should be a page-object for each site so there should not be a 2nd site. Anyhow I would like to understand why this is not working technically.

Not sure I can answer the "why" (other than to say that when nightwatch loads up your page objects as globally available it must be wrapping your js file and filtering on 'known' functions) but I can offer a solution: add a command to your page object with the desired function. For example:
let pageCommands = {
cancelUrl: function() {
return this.api.launchUrl + '/content/cancel_site1.xhtml';
}
};
module.exports = {
commands: [pageCommands],
...
}
It's not the typical use of page commands, but your test would then be able to access the cancelUrl function on the page object instance.
More on page commands here

Javascript scope issue, inside an anonymous function

Sorry I couldn't be anymore specific with the title.
I'm building a web-site (personal), which displays different content to the user depending on the query string that is used in the url.
e.g. page=home.html would display home.html
The websites Javascript is wrapped inside an object, with each value containing different data, some pseudo code:
(function(){
var wrapper = {
init: function(){
//Runs on document ready
this.foo();
this.nav.render();
},
foo: function(){
//Some functionality goes here for the website, e.g. Display something from an API
},
nav: {
//Functionality to handle the navigation, has different properties
config: {
//Contains the config for nav, e.g. page names + locations
dir: '/directory/to/content/',
pages: {
page_name: wrapper.nav.config.dir + 'page_value'
}
},
render: function(){
//some code
},
routes: function(){
//some code}
}
}
};
$(function(){
wrapper.init();
});
})();
My problem is that I'm trying to prepend the dir value to each of the page values (inside the object where the pages are defined), expecting to get the output of (in this pseudo code case) of directory/to/content/page_value, but instead dir is undefined when I'm trying to access it, I've tried the following to achieve what I want:
wrapper.nav.config.dir + 'page_value'
I've been playing around with the last 30 minutes trying to find out what I'm doing wrong, and even thought about hard-coding the URL in for each page.
The reasoning for wanting to do this is that my local development server and web host have different directory structures, so I don't want to re-write the URL's each time I want to develop + publish. As for why everything is wrapped inside an object, I thought it would be easier to maintain this way.
Hopefully the answer is simple and it's just an amateur mistake / lack of understanding.

The issue is that you can't refer to a variable that is being defined in that very definition.
So, inside the definition of wrapper, you can't refer to wrapper. And, inside the definition of config, you can't refer to config either and so on.
The usual design pattern for solving this is to initialize as much as you can in the declaration of your data structure and then do the rest in .init() when you can freely access all of it.

Change the first two lines to:
var wrapper = null;
(function(){
wrapper = {
Otherwise, the wrapper is a local variable to your anonymous function.

The problem is that you're still busy defining the wrapper when you ask for its value, which is why it's still undefined.
The code below fails too:
var x = {
y:"1",
z:x.y
}

Why not:
//...
init: function(){
//Runs on document ready
this.foo();
var config = this.nav.config;
for (var page in config.pages) {
config.pages[page] = config.dir + config.pages[page];
}
},
//...

Avoiding eval when executing js returned from ajax call

I want to make an ajax call that will return a json object. One of this JSON object's properties will be the string of a function to be executed in the client. I realise this can easily be solved by using eval, but seeing the many disadvantages of eval, I'd rather avoid it. My question is:
Can I in some way return from the server some js code and execute it without resorting to eval?
As requested, here's some example code:
Server (Node.js):
var testFunc = function() {
alert('h1');
};
app.get('/testPack', function(req, res) {
var template = jade.render('h1 hi');
res.send({
template : template,
entity : testFunc.toString(),
data : {
id: "OMG I love this"
}
});
});
Client:
$(document).ready(function() {
$.ajax({
url: '/testPack',
success: function(data) {
$('body').append($(data.template))
alert(data.data.id);
var entity = eval(data.entity);
entity();
}
})
})
Of course, the returned function called entity wouldn't do such a silly thing, it would expose an API of the returned widget.
Just to clarify, I'd like to avoid having to make a separate call for the javascript itself. I'd rather bundle it with the template and data to render.

Easiest way to do that, is not to call a server through an ajax, but instead to create a new script tag on the page with the url pointing to a RESTful web-service that would output pure JavaScript (not JSON). That way your output will be evaluated by the browser directly without the use of eval.
To expand a little on my answer:
To get around the problems of running script in the global context you could do some tricks. For example, when you are adding script tag to the head, you can bind onload event (or rather fake onload event, since IE doesn't support onload on the script tag) to it, and if your response from the server will be always wrapped in the the function with a known name, you could apply that function from within your object. Example code below (this is just an example though):
function test ()
{
this.init = function ()
{
var script = document.createElement("script");
script.type = "text/javascript";
script.language = "javascript";
script.src = "test.js";
var me = this;
window.callMe = function () { me.scriptReady(me); };
var head = document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0];
head.appendChild(script);
};
this.scriptReady = function (object)
{
serverResponse.call(object);
};
this.name = "From inside the object";
this.init();
}
var t=new test();
The server response should look something like this:
function serverResponse()
{
alert(this.name);
}
window.callMe();
In this case, everything inside serverResponse() will use your object as "this". Now if you modify your server response in this way:
function serverResponse()
{
this.serverJSONString = { "testVar1": "1", "testVar2": 2 };
function Test()
{
alert("From the server");
}
Test();
}
window.callMe();
You can have multiple things being returned from the server and with just one response. If you don't like just setting variables, then create a function in your main object to handle JSON string that you can supply by calling this function from your response.
As you can see, it's all doable, it really doesn't look pretty, but then again, what you are trying to do is not pretty to begin with.
P.S. Just inserting a string inside tag will not work for IE, it will not allow you to do that. If you don't have to support IE, then you could get away with just inserting server response inside a newly created script tag and be done with it.
P.P.S. Please don't use this code as is, cause I didn't spend too much time writting it. It's ugly as hell, but was just ment as an example:-)

No, you can't do this by definition, because JavaScript functions are not valid JSON. See the spec here:
http://www.json.org/
If you're returning a string, then that's what it is: just a string. You can't evaluate it without eval. You can call whatever else you're returning whatever you want, but please don't call it JSON.

Here's an example of how I think this could work.
The json object represents what is returned from the server. The c and d properties contain function names as strings. If those functions are properties of some other object which exists in your page, then you should be able to call them using the object["property"] accessor.
See it working on jsFiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/WUY4n/1/
// This function is a child of the window object
window.winScopedFunction = function() {
alert("ROCK THE WIN");
}
// This function is a child of another object
var myObject = {
myFunction : function() {
alert("ROCK ON");
}
};
// pretend that this json object was the result of an ajax call.
var jsonResultFromServer= {
a : 1,
b : 2,
c : "myFunction",
d : "winScopedFunction"
};
// you can call the local functions like so
myObject[jsonResultFromServer.c]();
window[jsonResultFromServer.d]();

Yes, there's a way, but it has the exact same disadvantages as eval.
You can use the Function constructor to create a new function, and then call it. For example:
new Function(code)();

http://code.google.com/p/json-sans-eval/ is a fast JSON parser that does not use eval, and JSON.parse is becoming increasing widely available in new browsers. Both are excellent alternatives to eval for parsing JSON.

You can use the trick that Google does with Google Charts.
<html>
<head>
<script>
function onWorkDone(data) {
console.log(data);
}
</script>
<script src="callback.js"></script>
</head>
</html>
Then your callback.js is:
function doWork(callback) {
callback({result: 'foo'});
}
doWork(onWorkDone);
Basically, your script will call onWorkDone when the doWork completed. You can see a working example here:
http://jsfiddle.net/ea9Gc/

Do you have some example cases? Some things I can think of is you that you can just have a regular function inside your js file, and your server will return some parameters for your function to execute. You can even specify what function to use! (Isn't that amazing?)
// your js file
var some_namespace = {
some_function : function(a, b){
// stuff
}
}
// your server output
{
some_other_data: "123",
execute: {
func: "some_namespace.some_function",
params: [1, 2]
}
}
// your ajax callback
function(r){
window[r.execute.func].apply(this, r.execute.params);
}

The reasons of not using eval
Well, you already said it yourself. Don't use eval. But you have a wrong picture regarding why.
It is not that eval is evil. You are getting the reason wrong. Performance considerations aside, using eval this way allows a sloppy programmer to execute code passed from server on the client. Notice the "passed from server" part.
Why never execute code passed from server
Why don't you want to execute code passed from the server (incidentally that's what you're planning to do)?
When a browser executes a script on a web page, as long as the web site is valid -- i.e. really yours, and not a malware site pretending to be yours trying to trick your users -- you can be reasonably sure that every bit of code the browser is running is written by yourself.
Hacker's heaven -- script injection attacks
Now, if you are passing data from the server to your web application, and that data contains executable functions, you're asking for trouble. In the long, twisted journey of that data going from your server to your client's browser, it goes through the wild west called the Internet, perhaps through multiple layers of proxies and filters and converters, most of which you do not control.
Now, if a hacker is hiding somewhere in the middle, takes your data from the server, modify the code to those functions to something really bad, and sends it away to your client, then your client browser takes the data and executes the code. Voila! Bad things happen. The worse is: you (at the server side) will never know that your clients are hacked.
This is called a "script injection attack" and is a serious sercurity risk.
Therefore, the rule is: Never execute functions returned from a server.
Only pass data from server
If you only accept data from a server, the most that can happen whan a hacker tempers with it is that your client will see strange data coming back, and hopefully your scripts will filter them out or handle them as incorrect data. Your client's browser will not be running any arbitrary code written by the hacker with glee.
In your client-side script, of course you're sticking to the Golden Rule: Do not trust ANY data coming through the Internet. Therefore you'd already be type-check and validating the JSON data before using it, and disallowing anything that looks suspicious.
Don't do it -- pass functions from server and execute on client
So, to make a long story short: DON'T DO IT.
Think of another way to specify pluggable functionalities on the browser -- there are multiple methods.

I've had this same question, and I fixed it this way:
File: functions.js.php?f=1,3
$functions=array(
'showMessage' => 'function(msg){ alert(msg); }',
'confirmAction' => 'function(action){
return confirm("Are you sure you want to "+action+"?");
}',
'getName' => 'function getName(){
return prompt("What is your name?");
}'
);
$queried = explode($_REQUEST['f']);
echo 'var FuncUtils = {'; // begin javascript object
$counter=1;
foreach($functions as $name=>$function){
if(in_array($counter, $queried))
echo '"'.$name.'":,'.$function.',';
$counter++;
}
echo '"dummy":null };'; // end javascript object
File: data5.json
{
"action" : ['confirmAction','exit']
}
File: test.js
$(document).ready(function(){
$.getScript('functions.js.php?f=1,3');
});
function onBeforeExit(){
$.getJSON('data5.json', function(data) {
var func = data.action.shift();
FuncUtils[func].apply(null, data.action);
});
}