querySelector search immediate children

Question

I have some jquery-like function:

function(elem) {
    return $('> someselector', elem);
};

The question is how can i do the same with querySelector()?

The problem is > selector in querySelector() requires parent to be explicitly specified. Is there any workaround?

Answer 1

Complete :scope polyfill

As avetisk has mentioned Selectors API 2 uses :scope pseudo-selector.
To make this work in all browsers (that support querySelector) here is the polyfill

(function(doc, proto) {
  try { // check if browser supports :scope natively
    doc.querySelector(':scope body');
  } catch (err) { // polyfill native methods if it doesn't
    ['querySelector', 'querySelectorAll'].forEach(function(method) {
      var nativ = proto[method];
      proto[method] = function(selectors) {
        if (/(^|,)\s*:scope/.test(selectors)) { // only if selectors contains :scope
          var id = this.id; // remember current element id
          this.id = 'ID_' + Date.now(); // assign new unique id
          selectors = selectors.replace(/((^|,)\s*):scope/g, '$1#' + this.id); // replace :scope with #ID
          var result = doc[method](selectors);
          this.id = id; // restore previous id
          return result;
        } else {
          return nativ.call(this, selectors); // use native code for other selectors
        }
      }
    });
  }
})(window.document, Element.prototype);

Usage

node.querySelector(':scope > someselector');
node.querySelectorAll(':scope > someselector');

---

For historical reasons, my previous solution

Based on all answers

// Caution! Prototype extending
Node.prototype.find = function(selector) {
    if (/(^\s*|,\s*)>/.test(selector)) {
        if (!this.id) {
            this.id = 'ID_' + new Date().getTime();
            var removeId = true;
        }
        selector = selector.replace(/(^\s*|,\s*)>/g, '$1#' + this.id + ' >');
        var result = document.querySelectorAll(selector);
        if (removeId) {
            this.id = null;
        }
        return result;
    } else {
        return this.querySelectorAll(selector);
    }
};

Usage

elem.find('> a');

Answer 2

There’s a query-relative lib, which is quite handy replacement for query-selector. It polyfills children selector '> *' and :scope (inc. IE8), as well as normalizes :root selector. Also it provides some special relative pseudos like :closest, :parent, :prev, :next, just in case.

Answer 3

CLAIM

Personally I would take the answer from patrick dw, and +1 his answer, my answer is for seeking alternative solution. I don't think it deserves a downvote.

Here is my attempt :

function q(elem){
    var nodes = elem.querySelectorAll('someSeletor');
    console.log(nodes);
    for(var i = 0; i < nodes.length; i++){
        if(nodes[i].parentNode === elem) return nodes[i];
    }
}

see http://jsfiddle.net/Lgaw5/8/

Answer 4

check if element have id else add random id and do search based on it

function(elem) {
      if(!elem.id)
          elem.id = Math.random().toString(36).substr(2, 10);
      return elem.querySelectorAll(elem.id + ' > someselector');
    };

will do same thing as

$("> someselector",$(elem))