Handling errors in jQuery.getScript

Question

jQuery's getScript function doesn't seem to support an error callback function. I can't use the global ajax error handling code here, a local error function would be ideal.

Documentation that the callback gets data/textStatus seems incorrect - the callback gets neither.

Any suggestions on how I detect that a call to getScript failed (server not available, for instance)?

EDIT: Just looked at source, and it seems like the callback is only invoked on success, with data always set to null and textStatus not defined (since it's a success-only callback, I presume). The documentation is very incorrect for this function.

Answer 1

$.getScript("your_script.js", function (data, textStatus) {
    if (textStatus === "success") {
        // do your stuff
    } else {
        // error
    }
});

Answer 2

This is a bit of a hack, but..

You could declare a variable inside the scripts you load and check for it after you've loaded a script (assuming that the complete-function still fires):

script_test.js:

var script_test = true;

And then:

$.getScript("script_test.js", function ()
{
    if (typeof script_test !== undefined) alert("script has been loaded!");
});

Or you could just try and see if whatever is in your script, actually exists--functions, variables, objects, etc.


A more generic way to do this would be adding a self-executing function inside the scripts you want to load, and make them execute a function in your "main" script:

main_script.js:

function scriptLoaded(scriptName)
{
    alert(scriptName + " loaded!");
}

$.getScript("script_test.js");

script_test.js:

(function ()
{
    scriptLoaded("script_test.js");
})();

Answer 3

I think the real answer is don't use getScript!

Try something like this instead:

$.ajax({
  url: 'http://yoururl.com',
  dataType: 'script',
  error: function() {
    handle that error
  }
});

getScript is only a shortcut, and unfortuneately, in this case it can't support what you'd like to do.