| # css-select [](https://npmjs.org/package/css-select) [](http://travis-ci.com/fb55/css-select) [](https://npmjs.org/package/css-select) [](https://coveralls.io/r/fb55/css-select) |
| |
| A CSS selector compiler and engine |
| |
| ## What? |
| |
| As a **compiler**, css-select turns CSS selectors into functions that tests if |
| elements match them. |
| |
| As an **engine**, css-select looks through a DOM tree, searching for elements. |
| Elements are tested "from the top", similar to how browsers execute CSS |
| selectors. |
| |
| In its default configuration, css-select queries the DOM structure of the |
| [`domhandler`](https://github.com/fb55/domhandler) module (also known as |
| htmlparser2 DOM). To query alternative DOM structures, see [`Options`](#options) |
| below. |
| |
| **Features:** |
| |
| - ๐ฌ Full implementation of CSS3 selectors, as well as most CSS4 selectors |
| - ๐งช Partial implementation of jQuery/Sizzle extensions (see |
| [cheerio-select](https://github.com/cheeriojs/cheerio-select) for the |
| remaining selectors) |
| - ๐งโ๐ฌ High test coverage, including the full test suites from Sizzle, Qwery |
| and NWMatcher. |
| - ๐ฅผ Reliably great performance |
| |
| ## Why? |
| |
| Most CSS engines written in JavaScript execute selectors left-to-right. That |
| means thet execute every component of the selector in order, from left to right |
| _(duh)_. As an example: For the selector `a b`, these engines will first query |
| for `a` elements, then search these for `b` elements. (That's the approach of |
| eg. [`Sizzle`](https://github.com/jquery/sizzle), |
| [`nwmatcher`](https://github.com/dperini/nwmatcher/) and |
| [`qwery`](https://github.com/ded/qwery).) |
| |
| While this works, it has some downsides: Children of `a`s will be checked |
| multiple times; first, to check if they are also `a`s, then, for every superior |
| `a` once, if they are `b`s. Using |
| [Big O notation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_O_notation), that would be |
| `O(n^(k+1))`, where `k` is the number of descendant selectors (that's the space |
| in the example above). |
| |
| The far more efficient approach is to first look for `b` elements, then check if |
| they have superior `a` elements: Using big O notation again, that would be |
| `O(n)`. That's called right-to-left execution. |
| |
| And that's what css-select does โ and why it's quite performant. |
| |
| ## How does it work? |
| |
| By building a stack of functions. |
| |
| _Wait, what?_ |
| |
| Okay, so let's suppose we want to compile the selector `a b`, for right-to-left |
| execution. We start by _parsing_ the selector. This turns the selector into an |
| array of the building blocks. That's what the |
| [`css-what`](https://github.com/fb55/css-what) module is for, if you want to |
| have a look. |
| |
| Anyway, after parsing, we end up with an array like this one: |
| |
| ```js |
| [ |
| { type: "tag", name: "a" }, |
| { type: "descendant" }, |
| { type: "tag", name: "b" }, |
| ]; |
| ``` |
| |
| (Actually, this array is wrapped in another array, but that's another story, |
| involving commas in selectors.) |
| |
| Now that we know the meaning of every part of the selector, we can compile it. |
| That is where things become interesting. |
| |
| The basic idea is to turn every part of the selector into a function, which |
| takes an element as its only argument. The function checks whether a passed |
| element matches its part of the selector: If it does, the element is passed to |
| the next function representing the next part of the selector. That function does |
| the same. If an element is accepted by all parts of the selector, it _matches_ |
| the selector and double rainbow ALL THE WAY. |
| |
| As said before, we want to do right-to-left execution with all the big O |
| improvements. That means elements are passed from the rightmost part of the |
| selector (`b` in our example) to the leftmost (~~which would be `c`~~ of course |
| `a`). |
| |
| For traversals, such as the _descendant_ operating the space between `a` and |
| `b`, we walk up the DOM tree, starting from the element passed as argument. |
| |
| _//TODO: More in-depth description. Implementation details. Build a spaceship._ |
| |
| ## API |
| |
| ```js |
| const CSSselect = require("css-select"); |
| ``` |
| |
| **Note:** css-select throws errors when invalid selectors are passed to it.This |
| is done to aid with writing css selectors, but can be unexpected when processing |
| arbitrary strings. |
| |
| #### `CSSselect.selectAll(query, elems, options)` |
| |
| Queries `elems`, returns an array containing all matches. |
| |
| - `query` can be either a CSS selector or a function. |
| - `elems` can be either an array of elements, or a single element. If it is an |
| element, its children will be queried. |
| - `options` is described below. |
| |
| Aliases: `default` export, `CSSselect.iterate(query, elems)`. |
| |
| #### `CSSselect.compile(query, options)` |
| |
| Compiles the query, returns a function. |
| |
| #### `CSSselect.is(elem, query, options)` |
| |
| Tests whether or not an element is matched by `query`. `query` can be either a |
| CSS selector or a function. |
| |
| #### `CSSselect.selectOne(query, elems, options)` |
| |
| Arguments are the same as for `CSSselect.selectAll(query, elems)`. Only returns |
| the first match, or `null` if there was no match. |
| |
| ### Options |
| |
| All options are optional. |
| |
| - `xmlMode`: When enabled, tag names will be case-sensitive. Default: `false`. |
| - `rootFunc`: The last function in the stack, will be called with the last |
| element that's looked at. |
| - `adapter`: The adapter to use when interacting with the backing DOM |
| structure. By default it uses the `domutils` module. |
| - `context`: The context of the current query. Used to limit the scope of |
| searches. Can be matched directly using the `:scope` pseudo-selector. |
| - `cacheResults`: Allow css-select to cache results for some selectors, |
| sometimes greatly improving querying performance. Disable this if your |
| document can change in between queries with the same compiled selector. |
| Default: `true`. |
| |
| #### Custom Adapters |
| |
| A custom adapter must match the interface described |
| [here](https://github.com/fb55/css-select/blob/1aa44bdd64aaf2ebdfd7f338e2e76bed36521957/src/types.ts#L6-L96). |
| |
| You may want to have a look at [`domutils`](https://github.com/fb55/domutils) to |
| see the default implementation, or at |
| [`css-select-browser-adapter`](https://github.com/nrkn/css-select-browser-adapter/blob/master/index.js) |
| for an implementation backed by the DOM. |
| |
| ## Supported selectors |
| |
| _As defined by CSS 4 and / or jQuery._ |
| |
| - [Selector lists](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Selector_list) |
| (`,`) |
| - [Universal](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Universal_selectors) |
| (`*`) |
| - [Type](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Type_selectors) |
| (`<tagname>`) |
| - [Descendant](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Descendant_combinator) |
| (` `) |
| - [Child](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Child_combinator) |
| (`>`) |
| - Parent (`<`) |
| - [Adjacent sibling](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Adjacent_sibling_combinator) |
| (`+`) |
| - [General sibling](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/General_sibling_combinator) |
| (`~`) |
| - [Attribute](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Attribute_selectors) |
| (`[attr=foo]`), with supported comparisons: |
| - `[attr]` (existential) |
| - `=` |
| - `~=` |
| - `|=` |
| - `*=` |
| - `^=` |
| - `$=` |
| - `!=` |
| - `i` and `s` can be added after the comparison to make the comparison |
| case-insensitive or case-sensitive (eg. `[attr=foo i]`). If neither is |
| supplied, css-select will follow the HTML spec's |
| [case-sensitivity rules](https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/semantics-other.html#case-sensitivity-of-selectors). |
| - Pseudos: |
| - [`:not`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:not) |
| - [`:contains`](https://api.jquery.com/contains-selector) |
| - `:icontains` (case-insensitive version of `:contains`) |
| - [`:has`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:has) |
| - [`:root`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:root) |
| - [`:empty`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:empty) |
| - [`:parent`](https://api.jquery.com/parent-selector) |
| - [`:first-child`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:first-child), |
| [`:last-child`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:last-child), |
| [`:first-of-type`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:first-of-type), |
| [`:last-of-type`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:last-of-type) |
| - [`:only-of-type`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:only-of-type), |
| [`:only-child`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:only-child) |
| - [`:nth-child`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:nth-child), |
| [`:nth-last-child`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:nth-last-child), |
| [`:nth-of-type`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:nth-of-type), |
| [`:nth-last-of-type`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:nth-last-of-type), |
| - [`:link`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:link), |
| [`:any-link`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:any-link) |
| - [`:visited`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:visited), |
| [`:hover`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:hover), |
| [`:active`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:active) |
| (these depend on optional `Adapter` methods, so these will only match |
| elements if implemented in `Adapter`) |
| - [`:selected`](https://api.jquery.com/selected-selector), |
| [`:checked`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:checked) |
| - [`:enabled`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:enabled), |
| [`:disabled`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:disabled) |
| - [`:required`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:required), |
| [`:optional`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:optional) |
| - [`:header`](https://api.jquery.com/header-selector), |
| [`:button`](https://api.jquery.com/button-selector), |
| [`:input`](https://api.jquery.com/input-selector), |
| [`:text`](https://api.jquery.com/text-selector), |
| [`:checkbox`](https://api.jquery.com/checkbox-selector), |
| [`:file`](https://api.jquery.com/file-selector), |
| [`:password`](https://api.jquery.com/password-selector), |
| [`:reset`](https://api.jquery.com/reset-selector), |
| [`:radio`](https://api.jquery.com/radio-selector) etc. |
| - [`:is`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:is), plus its |
| legacy alias `:matches` |
| - [`:scope`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:scope) |
| (uses the context from the passed options) |
| |
| --- |
| |
| License: BSD-2-Clause |
| |
| ## Security contact information |
| |
| To report a security vulnerability, please use the |
| [Tidelift security contact](https://tidelift.com/security). Tidelift will |
| coordinate the fix and disclosure. |
| |
| ## `css-select` for enterprise |
| |
| Available as part of the Tidelift Subscription |
| |
| The maintainers of `css-select` and thousands of other packages are working with |
| Tidelift to deliver commercial support and maintenance for the open source |
| dependencies you use to build your applications. Save time, reduce risk, and |
| improve code health, while paying the maintainers of the exact dependencies you |
| use. |
| [Learn more.](https://tidelift.com/subscription/pkg/npm-css-select?utm_source=npm-css-select&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=enterprise&utm_term=repo) |