removeNamedItem

removeNamedItem is a method of the NamedNodeMap interface in the Document Object Model (DOM). It removes the node identified by name from the map and returns the removed node. In practice, this is most commonly used with an element’s attribute map (element.attributes), allowing you to remove an attribute by name.

The method signature in JavaScript is: NamedNodeMap.removeNamedItem(name). The name parameter is a string naming the item to remove. When successful, it returns the Node that was removed (typically an Attr node representing the attribute). If no item with the specified name exists, a DOM exception is raised.

Exceptions commonly associated with removeNamedItem include NOT_FOUND_ERR, which is thrown if the map does not contain an item with the given name. Depending on the context, NO_MODIFICATION_ALLOWED_ERR may be raised if the map or its parent is read-only. Behavior can also be affected by how the node was obtained or the specific DOM implementation.

Usage example: to remove an attribute named "class" from an element, one can call element.attributes.removeNamedItem('class'); The returned value is the removed Attr node, and the attribute is no longer present on the element after the call.

Related methods in the same interface include getNamedItem(name) to retrieve an item without removing it, setNamedItem(node) or setNamedItemNS for inserting or replacing nodes, and removeNamedItemNS(namespaceURI, localName) for namespace-aware removal. The NamedNodeMap API is implemented in most modern browsers and is commonly used when manipulating an element’s attributes or other collections of nodes.