JavaScript SyntaxError in Chromium: missing ) after argument list

Question

I'm trying to execute a JavaScript function to see if an element exists in a webpage, but instead of receiving true/false, I'm getting a SyntaxError.

JavaScript:

javascript: var foo = function() { if (document.getElementById('bar') != null) return true; else return false; }; foo();

Error:

I/chromium: [INFO:CONSOLE(1)] "Uncaught SyntaxError: missing ) after argument list", source: (1)

I've run it through several JavaScript formatters, but I can't find the source of the error. Any ideas?

Cannot reproduce error. Are there portions of steps to reproduce error missing at Question? — guest271314
– guest271314, Commented May 12, 2017 at 23:34
Can you add an minimal reproducible example using a stacksnippet? — evolutionxbox
– evolutionxbox, Commented May 12, 2017 at 23:38
Apologies, I tagged this as android-webview, but I forgot to include that the error occurs when loading a webpage into an Android WebView, and evaluating JavaScript once the webpage has loaded. — lgdroid57
– lgdroid57, Commented May 12, 2017 at 23:40
Does it help to remove the javascript: label? How about to simplify the code since it seems you don't really need a function. This should do exactly the same: document.getElementById("bar") != null — user1106925
– user1106925, Commented May 12, 2017 at 23:42

Pablx nisu · Accepted Answer · 2017-10-05 18:13:31Z

2

i had a similar issue when triggering a javascript function in a WebView from the Android native code:

    wb.loadUrl("javascript:process('" + myParameter + ");");

The problem was solved adding a ' before the first closing parenthesis:

    wb.loadUrl("javascript:process('" + cff + "');");

Hope this help, although i can`t see such an error in your code.

answered Oct 5, 2017 at 18:13

Pablx nisu

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yeu0202 · Accepted Answer · 2022-10-21 11:47:30Z

1

I had a similar issue, and the issue was having singular quotes ' inside a string I wanted to send through javascript.

WebView.loadUrl("javascript:function('" + stringToSend + "')")

The stringToSend variable had singular quotes ' inside it, which, to javascript, ended the string. Javascript expected a ) after the end of the string, hence the error.

To fix this I added the escape character \ in front of every singular quote ' by looping through the stringToSend backwards and inserting them.

edited Oct 21, 2022 at 11:47

answered Oct 21, 2022 at 11:45

yeu0202

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2 Comments

Rajneesh Shukla Over a year ago

have you found any permanent solution for this. If there is more than this special chars than also it will break.

yeu0202 Over a year ago

It's best to not use nested quotes if you can avoid it, there are also a few other characters or escape sequences that need to be escaped properly. Check out the "Escape Characters" section here: w3schools.com/js/js_strings.asp. If you have to use them or can't control what goes in there, I would recommend looking up how to sanitize the string properly.

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