Autocomplete: Trigger change event when return is pressed

The change events for the autocomplete widget are subtly different from a plain text box.

A text box raises change events if:

• the content is changed and focus leaves the control
• the content is changed and return is pressed (just before the submit event of the form)

The autocomplete control only raises a change event when focus leaves the control.

This can be seen in the following jsfiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/pl_fidessa/24yzmq1a/. The bottom div displays the events that are triggered, so just type into a control and press return to see what events are raised.

Note that the behaviour in IE9 seems to be a bit different (although I'd argue still incorrect). As far as I can tell pressing return moves focus away from the control, so you see a submit event for the form, then a change event for the autocomplete control.

What I'd like is for the behaviour of the autocomplete widget to be the same as the text box. i.e. if you change the value then press return (without having focus on the dropdown menu), then a change event is triggered immediately. If that's something you're willing to consider than I can format up a patch and submit a pull request.

Version information:

Tested with:

• JQuery 2.1.0
• JQuery 1.11.2 (though the code in the mainline is the same as far as I can tell)
• Chrome 40.0.2214.111 m on Windows 7 (similar behaviour seen in Firefox, IE9 behaviour differs as described above)

Many thanks,

Paul.