serialize() behaves inconsistently for fieldset

[mikecapp]

I have a large-ish form already organized into fieldsets, and I want to serialize a subset of those fields for an AJAX call. The obvious approach was $("#somefieldset").serialize(), but while this works in Chrome it returns nothing in IE7. It's not clear from the docs whether this *should* work, but if not the results should at least be consistent.

$("#somefieldset input").serialize() is fine as a workaround, so this isn't the end of the world.

Fiddle: ​http://jsfiddle.net/mikecapp/rSwUW/

Chrome output: core1=one&core2=two

IE7 output: nothing!

[dmethvin]

The method is consistent with its documentation. There's no mention of handling the <fieldset> container element.

The .serialize() method can act on a jQuery object that has selected individual form elements, such as <input>, <textarea>, and <select>. However, it is typically easier to select the <form> tag itself for serialization

It can take either a <form> element (in which case it will serialize the form.elements property) or a jQuery set of form inputs. It may be possible to pass in other things and get outputs but they're not documented.

[gibson042]

#15191 is a duplicate of this ticket.