DOM:document.adoptNode

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Contents 1 Summary 2 Syntax 3 Example 4 Notes 5 Specification

[edit] Summary

Adopts a node from an external document. The node and its subtree is removed from the document it's in (if any), and its ownerDocument is changed to the current document. The node can then be inserted into the current document.

Supported since Gecko 1.9 (Firefox 3)

[edit] Syntax

var node = document.adoptNode(externalNode);

• node is the adopted node that can be used in the current document. The new node's parentNode is null, since it has not yet been inserted into the document tree.
• externalNode is the node from another document to be adopted.

[edit] Example

[edit] Notes

In general the adoptNode call may fail due to the source node coming from a different implementation, however this should not be a problem with browser implementations.

Nodes from external documents should be cloned using importNode() (or adopted using adoptNode()) before they can be inserted into the current document. For more on the ownerDocument issues see the W3C DOM FAQ.

Firefox does not presently enforce this rule (it did for a while during the development of Firefox 3, but too many sites break when this rule is enforced). We encourage web developers to fix their code to follow this rule for improved future compatibility.

[edit] Specification

DOM Level 3 Core: Document.adoptNode