Access elements of parent window from iframe

Have the below js inside the iframe and use ajax to submit the form.

$(function(){

   $("form").submit(e){
        e.preventDefault();

       //Use ajax to submit the form
       $.ajax({
          url: this.action,
          data: $(this).serialize(),
          success: function(){
             window.parent.$("#target").load("urlOfThePageToLoad");
          });
       });

   });

});

You can access elements of parent window from within an iframe by using window.parent like this:

// using jquery    
window.parent.$("#element_id");

Which is the same as:

// pure javascript
window.parent.document.getElementById("element_id");

And if you have more than one nested iframes and you want to access the topmost iframe, then you can use window.top like this:

// using jquery
window.top.$("#element_id");

Which is the same as:

// pure javascript
window.top.document.getElementById("element_id");

I think the problem may be that you are not finding your element because of the "#" in your call to get it:

window.parent.document.getElementById('#target'); 

You only need the # if you are using jquery. Here it should be:

window.parent.document.getElementById('target');