Comparing Strings and innerHTML results in IE

Hi,

I have this function which works great in Firefox, but doesn't work in IE. I can make it work in IE by breaking it in Firefox, but I'd like it to work in both.

Here's the function, with associated code:

function validate_check(input, message)
{
var par = input.parentNode;
var prev = input.previousSibling;

if(!input.checked) {
if(prev.innerHTML != message) {
var errmsg = document.createElement("p");
errmsg.innerHTML = message;
par.insertBefore(errmsg, input);
}

dosubmit = false;
} else if(prev.innerHTML == message) {
par.removeChild(prev);
}

}

var agree = document.getElementById('agree');
var agreemsg = 'Please make sure you agree to our <a href="/tou.php" target="_blank">Terms of Use</a> and <a href="/privacy.php" target="_blank">Privacy Policy</a> to add your listing.';

validate_check(agree, agreemsg);


For the two attributes the function accepts, input is a node from that document tree that is a checkbox, and message is a string.

If the checkbox is not checked the function inserts a <p> element immediately before the input. That part works fine in both. However, the 'prev.innerHTML == message' and 'prev.innerHTML != message' don't work properly in IE. I think it is because of the <a> tags in 'message'. However, when I try to use the String() function there are problems because the 'prev' object is not always set, (like, if a paragraph isn't written right before the checkbox).

Does anyone know how to make this work properly in both browsers?

Thanks a lot.

John

Why are you comparing the innerHTML to the string?

Perhaps IE isn't counting text nodes that only contain white space characters as the previousSibling but FF is.
After
var prev = input.previousSibling;add
while((prev.nodeType != 1) && prev.previousSibling) {
prev=prev.previousSibling;
}

What do you know - it works!

Thanks a lot.

John