For Bootstrap 3:

var url = window.location;// Will only work if string in href matches with location$('ul.nav a[href="'+ url +'"]').parent().addClass('active');// Will also work for relative and absolute hrefs$('ul.nav a').filter(function() {    return this.href == url;}).parent().addClass('active');

Update

For Bootstrap 4:

var url = window.location;// Will only work if string in href matches with location$('ul.navbar-nav a[href="'+ url +'"]').parent().addClass('active');// Will also work for relative and absolute hrefs$('ul.navbar-nav a').filter(function() {    return this.href == url;}).parent().addClass('active');

We managed to fix in the end:

/*menu handler*/$(function(){  function stripTrailingSlash(str) {    if(str.substr(-1) == '/') {      return str.substr(0, str.length - 1);    }    return str;  }  var url = window.location.pathname;    var activePage = stripTrailingSlash(url);  $('.nav li a').each(function(){      var currentPage = stripTrailingSlash($(this).attr('href'));    if (activePage == currentPage) {      $(this).parent().addClass('active');     }   });});

You don't really need any JavaScript with Bootstrap:

 <ul class="nav">     <li><a data-target="#" data-toggle="pill" href="#accounts">Accounts</a></li>     <li><a data-target="#" data-toggle="pill" href="#users">Users</a></li> </ul>

To do more tasks after the menu item is selected you need JS as explained by other posts here.

Hope this helps.