JavaScript/Adding elements

A reviewed version of this page, approved on 16 June 2019, was based off this revision.

Basic Usage

Using the Document Object Module we can create basic HTML elements. Let's create a div.

var myDiv = document.createElement("div");

What if we want the div to have an ID, or a class?

var myDiv = document.createElement("div");
myDiv.id = "myDiv";
myDiv.class = "main";

And we want it added into the page? Let's use the DOM again…

var myDiv = document.createElement("div");
myDiv.id = "myDiv";
myDiv.class = "main";
document.documentElement.appendChild(myDiv);

Further Use

So let's have a simple HTML page…

<html>
<head>
</head>
<body bgcolor="white" text="blue">
  <h1> A simple Javascript created button </h1>
  <div id="button"></div>
</body>
</html>

Where the div which has the id of button, let's add a button.

var myButton = document.createElement("input");
myButton.type = "button";
myButton.value = "my button";
placeHolder = document.getElementById("button");
placeHolder.appendChild(myButton);

All together the HTML code looks like:

<html>
<head>
</head>
<body bgcolor="white" text="blue">
  <h1> A simple Javascript created button </h1>
  <div id="button"></div>
  </body>
<script>
myButton = document.createElement("input");
myButton.type = "button";
myButton.value = "my button";
placeHolder = document.getElementById("button");
placeHolder.appendChild(myButton);
</script>
</html>