jQuery: How Do I simulate Drag and Drop in Code?

Question

EDIT: Here's a link to show you my sample code: http://www.singingeels.com/jqtest/

I have a very simple page that references jquery-1.3.2.js, ui.core.js (latest version) and ui.draggable.js (also latest version).

I have a div that I can drag around very easily (using the mouse of course):

<div id="myDiv">hello</div>

and then in JavaScript:

$("#myDiv").draggable();

This is works perfectly. But, I need to be able to simulate a 'drag and drop' using code alone. I have it mostly working, but the problem is that the events that are firing are the placeholder events.

If you open "ui.core.js" and scroll to the bottom... you'll see this:

// These are placeholder methods, to be overriden by extending plugin
_mouseStart: function(event) { },
_mouseDrag: function(event) { },
_mouseStop: function(event) { },
_mouseCapture: function(event) { return true; }

Why aren't the events being extended properly in my simulation, but when you click down with the mouse, they are? - Any ideas on how to force the _mouseDrag: property to obey the overriding extension in "ui.draggable.js"?

Solving this would be huge - and I plan to show the major benefits later.

Thanks, -Timothy

EDIT: Here's a link to show you my sample code: http://www.singingeels.com/jqtest/

EDIT 2: Click that link above and view-source... you'll see what I'm trying to do. Here's a snippet:

$(document).ready(function() {
 var myDiv = $("#myDiv");

 myDiv.draggable();

 // This will set enough properties to simulate valid mouse options.
 $.ui.mouse.options = $.ui.mouse.defaults;

 var divOffset = myDiv.offset();

 // This will simulate clicking down on the div - works mostly.
 $.ui.mouse._mouseDown({
  target: myDiv,
  pageX: divOffset.left,
  pageY: divOffset.top,
  which: 1,

  preventDefault: function() { }
 });
});

Answer 1

You need to show the code you are using to "simulate" this. My gut instinct is you'll need to construct the proper DOM events and fire them, but I don't know if jQuery has facilities for injecting artificial events.

Could you just call the event handlers directly?