Guide on removing an item from a list using a JavaScript button

Question

Guide on removing an item from a list using a JavaScript button

I am in the process of creating a basic task list that allows users to input tasks. When the add button is clicked, the task will be added to an unordered list along with a delete button. As a beginner in JavaScript, I am struggling to figure out how to make the delete button remove the specific list element when clicked (it's a span element, not a button).

Although I believe removeChild() could be useful for this task, I am having difficulty implementing it.

let addButton = document.getElementById("add-item");

addButton.addEventListener("click", function () {
    
    // Get the 'list'
    let list = document.getElementById("items");
    let textNode = window.prompt("Enter item:");
    if (textNode != null) {
        let item = document.createElement("li");
        // Convert user input into a textnode
        item.appendChild(document.createTextNode(textNode));
        // Append user's textnode at the end of the list
        list.appendChild(item);
        // Create a delete button 
        let deleteButton = document.createElement("span");
        deleteButton.innerHTML = "Delete"
        item.appendChild(deleteButton)
    }
});

ul {
    padding: 0px;
}

li {
    display: flex;
    background-color: #eee;
    margin: 5px;
    padding: 5px;
    align-items: center;
}

li > span {
    margin-left: auto;
    background-color: #aaa;
    padding: 5px;
    cursor: pointer;
}

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <link href="app_2.css" rel="stylesheet>
    <title>Items</title>
</head>

<body>
    <h1>Items</h1>

    <ul id="items">
       <!--
            This is the template for an item in the list:

            <li>The first item is free! <span>Delete</span></li>
        -->
    </ul>
    
    <button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

    <script src="app_2.js"></script>
</body>

</html>

javascript html css

Answer 1

Answer №1

You could implement a click event on the deleteButton in order to handle that scenario

deleteButton.addEventListener("click", function() {
   item.remove()
})

Here is the complete code snippet

let addButton = document.getElementById("add-item");

const currentIndex = 0

addButton.addEventListener("click", function() {

  // Accesses the 'list'
  let list = document.getElementById("items");
  let textNode = window.prompt("Enter item:");
  if (textNode != null) {
    let item = document.createElement("li");
    // Turns user input into textnode
    item.appendChild(document.createTextNode(textNode));
    // Appends user's textnode at the end of the list
    list.appendChild(item);
    // Generates a delete button 
    let deleteButton = document.createElement("span");
    // Attaches a click event to remove the current item
    deleteButton.addEventListener("click", function() {
      item.remove()
    })
    deleteButton.innerHTML = "Delete"
    item.appendChild(deleteButton)
  }
});

ul {
  padding: 0px;
}

li {
  display: flex;
  background-color: #eee;
  margin: 5px;
  padding: 5px;
  align-items: center;
}

li>span {
  margin-left: auto;
  background-color: #aaa;
  padding: 5px;
  cursor: pointer;
}

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <link href="app_2.css" rel="stylesheet">
  <title>Items</title>
</head>

<body>
  <h1>Items</h1>

  <ul id="items">
    <!--
            This is the template for an item in the list:

            <li>The first item is free! <span>Delete</span></li>
        -->
  </ul>

  <button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

  <script src="app_2.js"></script>
</body>

</html>

Answer 2

You could implement a click event on the deleteButton in order to handle that scenario

deleteButton.addEventListener("click", function() {
   item.remove()
})

Here is the complete code snippet

let addButton = document.getElementById("add-item");

const currentIndex = 0

addButton.addEventListener("click", function() {

  // Accesses the 'list'
  let list = document.getElementById("items");
  let textNode = window.prompt("Enter item:");
  if (textNode != null) {
    let item = document.createElement("li");
    // Turns user input into textnode
    item.appendChild(document.createTextNode(textNode));
    // Appends user's textnode at the end of the list
    list.appendChild(item);
    // Generates a delete button 
    let deleteButton = document.createElement("span");
    // Attaches a click event to remove the current item
    deleteButton.addEventListener("click", function() {
      item.remove()
    })
    deleteButton.innerHTML = "Delete"
    item.appendChild(deleteButton)
  }
});

ul {
  padding: 0px;
}

li {
  display: flex;
  background-color: #eee;
  margin: 5px;
  padding: 5px;
  align-items: center;
}

li>span {
  margin-left: auto;
  background-color: #aaa;
  padding: 5px;
  cursor: pointer;
}

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <link href="app_2.css" rel="stylesheet">
  <title>Items</title>
</head>

<body>
  <h1>Items</h1>

  <ul id="items">
    <!--
            This is the template for an item in the list:

            <li>The first item is free! <span>Delete</span></li>
        -->
  </ul>

  <button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

  <script src="app_2.js"></script>
</body>

</html>

Answer 3

Answer №2

One way to implement an event listener for the delete button and make it remove items from a list is shown below. Commentary has been added within the code to highlight the modifications made and provide an explanation of the functionality.

let addButton = document.getElementById("add-item");

addButton.addEventListener("click", function () {
    
    // Get the 'list' element
    let list = document.getElementById("items");
    let textNode = window.prompt("Enter item:");
    if (textNode != null) {
        let item = document.createElement("li");
        // Create a textnode using user input
        item.appendChild(document.createTextNode(textNode));
        // Append the user's textnode at the end of the list
        list.appendChild(item);
        // Create a delete button 
        let deleteButton = document.createElement("span");
        deleteButton.innerHTML = "Delete"
        item.appendChild(deleteButton);
        
        
        // Add an event listener for the delete button
        deleteButton.addEventListener("click", function(){
          
          // Get the parent of the span (li) 
          let listItem = this.parentNode;
          // Get the parent of the list item (ul)
          let list = listItem.parentNode;
          // Remove the child from the list         
          list.removeChild(listItem);
         
        });
    }
});

ul {
    padding: 0px;
}

li {
    display: flex;
    background-color: #eee;
    margin: 5px;
    padding: 5px;
    align-items: center;
}

li > span {
    margin-left: auto;
    background-color: #aaa;
    padding: 5px;
    cursor: pointer;
}

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <link href="app_2.css" rel="stylesheet">
    <title>Items</title>
</head>

<body>
    <h1>Items</h1>

    <ul id="items">
        <!--
            This is the template for an item in the list:

            <li>The first item is free! <span>Delete</span></li>
        -->
    </ul>
    
    <button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

    <script src="app_2.js"></script>
</body>

</html>

Answer 4

One way to implement an event listener for the delete button and make it remove items from a list is shown below. Commentary has been added within the code to highlight the modifications made and provide an explanation of the functionality.

let addButton = document.getElementById("add-item");

addButton.addEventListener("click", function () {
    
    // Get the 'list' element
    let list = document.getElementById("items");
    let textNode = window.prompt("Enter item:");
    if (textNode != null) {
        let item = document.createElement("li");
        // Create a textnode using user input
        item.appendChild(document.createTextNode(textNode));
        // Append the user's textnode at the end of the list
        list.appendChild(item);
        // Create a delete button 
        let deleteButton = document.createElement("span");
        deleteButton.innerHTML = "Delete"
        item.appendChild(deleteButton);
        
        
        // Add an event listener for the delete button
        deleteButton.addEventListener("click", function(){
          
          // Get the parent of the span (li) 
          let listItem = this.parentNode;
          // Get the parent of the list item (ul)
          let list = listItem.parentNode;
          // Remove the child from the list         
          list.removeChild(listItem);
         
        });
    }
});

ul {
    padding: 0px;
}

li {
    display: flex;
    background-color: #eee;
    margin: 5px;
    padding: 5px;
    align-items: center;
}

li > span {
    margin-left: auto;
    background-color: #aaa;
    padding: 5px;
    cursor: pointer;
}

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <link href="app_2.css" rel="stylesheet">
    <title>Items</title>
</head>

<body>
    <h1>Items</h1>

    <ul id="items">
        <!--
            This is the template for an item in the list:

            <li>The first item is free! <span>Delete</span></li>
        -->
    </ul>
    
    <button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

    <script src="app_2.js"></script>
</body>

</html>

Answer 5

Answer №3

Implement event delegation. Instead of individually attaching event listeners to each button, attach a single listener to the parent element (in this case the ul element), which will handle all events from its child elements as they propagate up the DOM and then call a function to update the list.

I have chosen a more modern approach for constructing the rows in my response, which you might find helpful. References to relevant MDN documentation can be found at the end of the answer.

const items = document.querySelector('#items');
const addButton = document.querySelector('#add-item');

// Add event listeners to both the button and the items list element
// In the case of `addItem`, I'm directly invoking the function instead of just returning a reference to the function.
items.addEventListener('click', handleClick, false);
addButton.addEventListener('click', addItem(), false);

function handleClick(e) {

  // Since we are using event delegation, we need to validate that the clicked element is the button with the delete class
  if (e.target.matches('.delete')) {

    // If it is, extract the id from the element's dataset
    const { id } = e.target.dataset;

    // Use the id to create a selector
    const selector = `li[data-id="${id}"]`;

    // Remove the corresponding list item from the list
    items.querySelector(selector).remove();

  }

}

// To minimize global variables, I am using a closure where the inner function retains a copy of `id` which can be updated
function addItem() {

  let id = 0;

  return function () {

    const text = window.prompt('Enter item:');

    if (text) {

      // Using template strings to build the HTML instead of `createElement`
      // Adding the id to both the item and the button for proper deletion handling
      const html = `
        <li data-id="${id}">
          ${text}
          <button
            type="button"
            data-id="${id}"
            class="delete"
          >Delete
          </button>
        </li>
      `;

      // Inserting the HTML into the list
      items.insertAdjacentHTML('beforeend', html);
      
      // Incrementing the row id
      ++id;

    }

  }

}

ul{padding:0}
li{display:flex;background-color:#eee;margin:5px;padding:5px;align-items:center}
.delete{margin-left:auto;background-color:#aaa;padding:5px;cursor:pointer}

<h1>Items</h1>
<ul id="items"></ul>
<button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

Additional resources

Answer 6

Implement event delegation. Instead of individually attaching event listeners to each button, attach a single listener to the parent element (in this case the ul element), which will handle all events from its child elements as they propagate up the DOM and then call a function to update the list.

I have chosen a more modern approach for constructing the rows in my response, which you might find helpful. References to relevant MDN documentation can be found at the end of the answer.

const items = document.querySelector('#items');
const addButton = document.querySelector('#add-item');

// Add event listeners to both the button and the items list element
// In the case of `addItem`, I'm directly invoking the function instead of just returning a reference to the function.
items.addEventListener('click', handleClick, false);
addButton.addEventListener('click', addItem(), false);

function handleClick(e) {

  // Since we are using event delegation, we need to validate that the clicked element is the button with the delete class
  if (e.target.matches('.delete')) {

    // If it is, extract the id from the element's dataset
    const { id } = e.target.dataset;

    // Use the id to create a selector
    const selector = `li[data-id="${id}"]`;

    // Remove the corresponding list item from the list
    items.querySelector(selector).remove();

  }

}

// To minimize global variables, I am using a closure where the inner function retains a copy of `id` which can be updated
function addItem() {

  let id = 0;

  return function () {

    const text = window.prompt('Enter item:');

    if (text) {

      // Using template strings to build the HTML instead of `createElement`
      // Adding the id to both the item and the button for proper deletion handling
      const html = `
        <li data-id="${id}">
          ${text}
          <button
            type="button"
            data-id="${id}"
            class="delete"
          >Delete
          </button>
        </li>
      `;

      // Inserting the HTML into the list
      items.insertAdjacentHTML('beforeend', html);
      
      // Incrementing the row id
      ++id;

    }

  }

}

ul{padding:0}
li{display:flex;background-color:#eee;margin:5px;padding:5px;align-items:center}
.delete{margin-left:auto;background-color:#aaa;padding:5px;cursor:pointer}

<h1>Items</h1>
<ul id="items"></ul>
<button type="button" id="add-item">Add item</button>

Additional resources

Guide on removing an item from a list using a JavaScript button

Answer №1

Answer №2

Answer №3

Similar questions

Monitor fetch() API calls and responses in JavaScript

Switch between multiple unordered lists (ul) so that when one list is clicked, the other lists reset to their initial state as though they were never

What is the best way to click on the third div class "link" using Selenium when they all have the same div class?

What is the best method for securely storing and managing refresh and access tokens within a node.js application?

Is there a solution for the continuous automatic incrementing of the jQuery UI spinner that occurs when I right-click on it?

Why isn't the VueJS component loading state getting updated after Canceling an Axios network request?

Trigger the function when the keyboard event is deactivated

Issue with JQuery's parentsUntil method when using an element as a variable not producing the desired results

Unable to properly cancel a post request using abort functionality

The NPM version needs to be updated as it is outdated

Troubleshooting spacing and padding problems in Bootstrap 5.2.3's Scrollspy feature

Unable to retrieve the 'href' on different pages

Could someone explain to me why searchQuery.value is coming up as undefined?

Display error page when unable to load ng-view template

The Ion-button seems to be malfunctioning

the div background is limited to the exact size of the text, not filling the entire

Using Vue Js directive to implement a Select2 component

Troubleshooting the Ineffectiveness of the CSS Custom Property Url in Asp .Net

Making a column in a Vue data grid return as a clickable button

Encountering an issue with Apollo Express GraphQL: Error message stating that the schema must have distinct type names, yet it contains more than one type named "DateTime"