Test if Element Supports Attribute

Not all browsers support all attributes on all elements. There are a number of new attributes in HTML5, so the idea of testing to see what kind of browser environment you are in becomes every increasingly important.

function elementSupportsAttribute(element, attribute) {
  var test = document.createElement(element);
  if (attribute in test) {
    return true;
  } else {
    return false;
  }
};

Usage

if (elementSupportsAttribute("textarea", "placeholder") {

} else {
   // fallback
}