I'm binding a dropdown

("#dropdownlist").change(function(){
    //Do stuff
});

The above code gets called many times.

How can I unbind this event before binding it each time?

I'm binding a dropdown

("#dropdownlist").change(function(){
    //Do stuff
});

The above code gets called many times.

How can I unbind this event before binding it each time?

• javascript
• jquery

• I'm not sure what you're trying to achieve from the question. Do you wan't to bind the event so it occurs only once? Or simply unbind the event after it gets called at a particular point in your script? – hitautodestruct Commented Nov 5, 2012 at 10:36

4 Answers 4

You can use the unbind() method:

$('#dropdownlist').unbind('change');

You could use one instead of bind:

("#dropdownlist").one('change',function(){});

Use following logic:

var f = function () {

}

$('#xx').bind('change', f); // for bind function f
$('#xx').unbind('change', f); // for unbind unbind function f

Additionally jQuery supports namespaces.

For example say you have change handlers that do validation and change handlers that do help text hovering.

You could register:

$("#foo").bind("change.validation", doValidation() );

and

$("#foo").bind("change.helptext", toggleHelptext() );

and then you can unbind a specific set before re-adding validation, e.g.

$("#foo").unbind("change.validation");
$("#foo").bind("change.validation", doValidation() );

HTH Alex