JQuery - this.empty() is not a function

[nicky77]

Hi, I've been trying to figure out why Firebug is giving me the following error on this page. I'm using JQuery 1.2.6 (the gallery script i'm using on the website isn't compatible with 1.3.x) - the error is as follows:

this.empty is not a function
http://www.maguiresonline.co.uk/development/ian/js/jquery.js
Line 12

I've not seen this error on other sites where i'm using 1.2.6 - can anyone see why this might be happening? Thanks in advance!

[Jeff Mott]

It means that somewhere, you're trying to call a jQuery method on a variable that is not a jQuery object.

So instead of this.empty() you need to do $(this).empty()

[nicky77]

Thanks Jeff. I've found the culprit in my galleria config script - I've changed

image.attr('alt', caption.text);

to

image.attr('alt', this.text);

[alanomaly]

Greetings, people of 2009.

I come from the future to say two things:

• By the end of 2012, this post will top the Google rankings for 'jQuery "this.empty is not a function"'.
• A common cause for this error (probably also the cause in this case) is calling .text on a jQuery object (note no brackets/parenthesis). Either you're calling .text on the wrong thing, and meant to call it on a non-jQuery object (as in this case), or, you actually meant to call the jQuery method, .text() (note the brackets/parenthesis)

It's jQuery that is calling .empty(), not your code.

I will now return to 2012.