document.documentElement vs document.all

Question

Can anybody tell me the difference between these two JavaScript commands?
Also what is the compatibility of these two across major browsers? I know documentElement is compatible with most browsers.

Thanks

[Don't use document.all](http://simonwillison.net/2003/Aug/11/documentAll/) — Clive, Oct 07 '11 at 22:45
people are speaking about `document.querySelector()` now days... — Mohsen, Oct 07 '11 at 22:50
The question that makes more sense is about the difference between document.getElementById and document.all http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2408424/document-all-vs-document-getelementbyid since document.documentElement and document.all are completely different beasts — Ruan Mendes, Oct 07 '11 at 22:51
actually i want to know the working of these two. i think question was asked by me like that it is looking that i want the comparison of these two. sorry about that — farjad, Oct 07 '11 at 22:59

score 7 · Answer 1 · edited Jul 18 '12 at 14:38

7

document.documentElement is a reference to the root element of the document, usually the <html> tag.

document.all is a collection type, containing an enumeration of all the children tags within the document. It's IE specific and should be avoided for cross-browser scripts.

document.documentElement is DOM Level 2, so should work in pretty much any major browser these days.

edited Jul 18 '12 at 14:38

S.L. Barth is on codidact.com

8,198
71
51
66

answered Oct 07 '11 at 22:46

Mike Christensen

88,082
50
208
326

i was working on a web application that i have to make safari compatible. major issue i faced was document.all was used for IE.is there any equivalent to document.all???? – farjad Oct 07 '11 at 22:55

score 6 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:14

6

document.all is a proprietary Microsoft extension to the W3C-standard.
It's an old function and should not be used anymore!

rfc document.all vs. document.getElementById

edited May 23 '17 at 12:14

Community

1
1

answered Oct 07 '11 at 22:47

Tim

662
1
7
16

1

To be noted: `document.all` is nice to have the number of DOM elements on a page. Just run in the console: `document.all.length` – Florian Margaine Jul 18 '12 at 14:48

document.documentElement vs document.all

2 Answers2

Linked