why does this code execute my function soon as the document is loaded?

Question

I'm trying to understand why this code below executes my function as soon as the document is loaded:

var list = document.getElementsByTagName('li');

function yep() {

    window.alert('yep');

}

list[0].onclick = yep();

But this does not:

list[0].onclick = yep;

Why does

()

make a difference when executing a function in this situation?

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Answer 1

The parenthesis () execute function immediately. On your second line you are assigning the value of list[0].onclick to the function name but not executing it.

why does this code execute my function soon as the document is loaded?

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