I don't remember why i use this.defaultValue ? this.defaultValue : '': in the code below, istead of only this.defaultValue.
$('input:text, textarea').blur(function() {
if ($.trim(this.value) == ''){
this.value = (this.defaultValue ? this.defaultValue : '');
}
});
Why not this:
$('input:text, textarea').blur(function() {
if ($.trim(this.value) == ''){
this.value = this.defaultValue;
}
});
Because if defaultValue is not defined, you'll get 'undefined' instead of ''
It's a security. In case this.defaultValue is undefined, it returns an empty string, avoiding this.value to receive undefined.
The thing is that this property is only available for <input>´ and`, pretty much limiting the scope of such a feature. It's pretty common to have selects in a form for instance.
A more straightforward approach would be to use store the default values in a "data-" attribute. It's an HTML5 feature but it has a sort-of backward compatibility as they are just html attributes.
<select data-defaultValue="1">
<option value="1">One</option>
<option value="2">Two</option>
</select>
And you can access the attribute with:
$('select').attr('data-defaultValue');
// or
$('select').data('defaultValue');
More info:
On a related note, why not use HTML5's placeholder attribute- you don't have to play around with defaultValue. http://www.w3schools.com/html5/att_input_placeholder.asp
It is not supported on IE as far as I know, but works well on others
