I have the following:

var html = document.documentElement;
var class = html.className;

This returns "black ng-scope";

How can I make it so that class just returns the first word?

I have the following:

var html = document.documentElement;
var class = html.className;

This returns "black ng-scope";

How can I make it so that class just returns the first word?

• javascript

Share Follow asked Oct 21, 2013 at 19:47 Samantha J T StarSamantha J T Star 32.9k8989 gold badges257257 silver badges441441 bronze badges 1

• Already asked : stackoverflow./q/3203966/1636522 – user1636522 Commented Oct 21, 2013 at 19:58

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5 Answers 5

Sorted by: Reset to default 9

You can use

var firstClass = html.className.split(' ')[0]

An alternative way of getting the separated class names is by using classList. see browser support and documentation

> "hey there".split(" ")[0]
"hey"

var classes = class.split(" "); // Returns an array
var firstclass = classes[0];

Another idea is using regular expressions if you could have other word boundaries than space.

var reg = /(.+?)(?:\s|$)/,
    match = html.className.match(reg);

if (match) {
    match[1]; // Your match
}

This has the added benefit of matching more than a single space.

EDIT: If you are using this to strictly get all classes of an HTML element and you are targeting sufficiently new browsers use classList like Jakob W suggested.