jQuery Select Element that has no Class or ID

Question

Trying to find a selector to get all elements that have both no class, and no id set to them.

So far I have 2 different outputs depending on if there is a space in the selector:

                                      // outputs
        var noID = $('*:not([id])');// 144 - may have a class
        var noClass = $('*:not([class])');  // 100 - may have an id

        var withSpace = $('*:not([id]) *:not([class])'); // 99 ?
        var noSpace= $('*:not([id])*:not([class])'); // 84 ?

Which one is correct, my guess is the noSpace - but I don't know. Anyone tried this before?

My guess is that with the space, the selector is going inside the tag that has no ID, and selecting the children elements that have no class associated with them.

And the noSpace result is the correct one, as it selects only the elemets that have both no class, and no id.

Can someone verify? Thanks!

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Answer

Use this selector to find elements that have neither a class, or an id associated with them.

$('*:not([id]):not([class])');

bonus: $('body *:not([id]):not([class])'); - If you only want to deal with the actual content

Answer 1

withSpace - $('*:not([id]) *:not([class])'); will find all elements with no class that are inside an element without an ID. Putting a space in the selector is like calling find seperately.

You could change noSpace to be this instead and still get the right result:

var noSpace= $('*:not([id]):not([class])'); // second * not needed

JSFiddle used for testing