Archive for the ‘Javascript Tutorials’ Category

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Mar 28 Creating Accessible “Quick Link” Menus Posted at 4:12 am | No Comments »

As many of you are aware, it is rather difficult to create an accessible “quick link” menu (sometimes also called “jump menus”) because most of them require javascript.

For those of you that don’t know what a quick link menu is, it’s generally a dropdown menu, made from a typical form “select” element. Then, when a user chooses one of the options within that select element, the page automatically redirects to the location associated with that option.

For instance, in the top corner of all HTMLCenter pages, there is a quick link menu called “Top Links”.

For a lot of users, these types of menus are extremely useful. Designers generally use quick link menus for one of two purposes: a) to provide a quick, easily locatable list of the top content on their Web site or b) to provide a list of the headers on a long page, allowing the users to quickly “jump” to the appropriate section of the page.

The problem, though, as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, is that they all require javascript in order to work properly. That’s great for the users that have javascript enabled, but it really can cause problems for those that don’t have javascript.

I have come up with a solution to that problem, though. With the solution described below, the “quick link” menu is initially written as an unordered list. Then, I use javascript to convert it to a standard “jump menu”. That way, if the user doesn’t have javascript within his/her browser, they get a nicely formatted unordered list of the links instead.

(more…)

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials, programming

Jan 21 Javascript Status Bar Posted at 9:32 pm | No Comments »

JavaScript gives you the ability to modify the status bar. For example it can be useful to display information about a link, when the user moves his mouse over it or you can display a small amount of information about the page the user is on in the status bar. You can also trick people into clicking a link, so be careful how you use it. If you play too many tricks on your visitors, they might not come back.

Status Bar Example:

<html>
<head>
<title>JavaScript Status Bar</title></head>
<body onLoad="window.status='Welcome!';return true">

</body>
</html>

onLoad tells the browser that as soon as your page finished loading, it will display in your current window’s status bar (window.status) the message “Welcome!”. The return true is necessary because with out, it won’t work.

Status Bar Example:

<html>
<head>
<title>JavaScript Status Bar</title></head>
<body>
  <a href="http://www.htmlcenter.com"
   onMouseOver="window.status='HTMLcenter';return true"
   onMouseOut="window.status='';return true">

  HTMLcenter

  </a>
</body>
</html>

Our second script listening shows how to modify the status bar using onMouseOver and onMouseOut with links. When the user moves his mouse over the link, it will display “HTMLcenter” in the status bar. When he moves his mouse away from the link the status bar will display nothing.

You could also have another message displayed in the status bar, when the user moves his mouse cursor away from the link. You have to change the onMouseOut statement in the link to for example: onMouseOut=”window.status=’You moved your cursor away from the link.’;return true”.

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript No Frames Posted at 9:31 pm | No Comments »

This script is very important for you, if you have problems protecting your own pages and their content. People will just link your page in a frameset and make it seem that it is their own work. To break out of their frameset we use the following script.

Break Out of Frames:

<html>
<head>
<title>JavaScript - Break out of frames</title>
<script>
<!-- Hide Script
	if (top.location != self.location) {
	  top.location = self.location
	}
//End Hide Script-->
</script>
</head>
<body>
  A very important page,
  which you don't want to
  have stolen.
</body>
</html>

if (top.location != self.location), the script checks if the location of the current (self) page is the top most in the browsers window hierarchy. If so, there’s no need to change anything.

But if it does not match, your script will assign self.location to top.location (top.location = self.location) and make the current window reload and display your page and your page only! You can see a nice working example, if you try to load CNN’s site in a frame. You will see that the page reloads and displays CNN only.

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Values Posted at 9:30 pm | No Comments »

A piece of information in JavaScript is a value. There are different kinds of values, for example numbers or string. A string value is a word or words enclosed in quotation marks.

Variables contain values. For example variable siteName is assigned the string ‘HTMLcenter’. Another way to express is siteName = HTMLcenter, where the equals means ’set to’, the variable siteName now contains the value HTMLcenter.

Keep in mind that JavaScript is case sensitive. Variable MyName is not the same as myName or myname. Variables can not contain spaces and you shouldn’t choose one of the JavaScript reserved words as name for a variable.

Values

TYPE

Number

String

Boolean

Null

Object

Function


DESCRIPTION

Any numeric value

Characters in quotes

True or False

Empty / No meaning

Any value associated with an object

Value returned by a function


EXAMPLES

1.23456789

“Hi, HTMLcenter!”

False

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Redirection Posted at 9:28 pm | No Comments »

The redirecting is a good way to check for the presence of JavaScript and in this case also for the version of JavaScript the user has.

window.location=”js_test_true.html”) resets the location property of the current browser window. In this case it sets it to “js_test_true.html”.

If the user doesn’t have the version of JavaScript required, which is JavaScript 1.1 in order to redirect, or JavaScript is turned off, it will display “Your browser doesn’t support JavaScript, it’s turned of in your browsers preferences or you don’t the latest version of JavaScript.”.

To specify the minimum requirement you just have to set language in the <script> tag as you can see in the Script Listening above. You can have different language versions in different scripts on your page, but there’s no way to say that for example our redirection script should only run with JavaScript 1.1, it will run with JavaScript 1.1 and greater.

Redirection Example:

<html>
<head>
<title>JavaScript Redirection</title>
<script language=javascript1.1>
<!-- Hide Script
	window.location="js_test_true.html")
//End Hide Script-->
</script>
</head>
<body>
  Your browser doesn't support JavaScript,
  it's turned off in your browsers preferences
  or you don't the latest version of JavaScript.
</body>
</html>

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Operators Posted at 9:26 pm | No Comments »

Operators are the symbols which are used to work with variables. You are already familiar with simple arithmetic operators, plus and minus.

Important: While the x++ and ++x operators both add one to x, they are not identical. x++ increments x after the assignment and ++x before. If x is 4, y = x++ results in y is 4 and x is 5. y = ++x sets y = 5 and x = 5. The x– and –x operators work similar.

If you mix numeric and string values when adding to values together, the result is a string. HTMLcenter + 69 results in HTMLcenter69.



Operators

OPERATOR

x + y (numbers)

x + y (string)

x - y

x * y

x / y

x % y

x++, ++x

x–, –x

-x


WHAT IT DOES

Adds x + y

Adds x and y string

Subtracts y from x

Multiplies x and y

Divides x by y

Remainder of x / y

Adds one to x

Subtracts one from x

Reverses the sign of x

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Image Rollovers Posted at 9:24 pm | 1 Comment »

An image rollover is basically two different images. One is displayed after the page loaded up, the other one is displayed only when the user moves his mouse over the first one. Image rollovers are often used for a site’s interface. Currently this is the most popular JavaScript function.

The following script listening shows you how create your own.

Image Rollover Examples:

<html>
<head>
<title>JavaScript Image Rollovers</title></head>
<body>
  <a href="link.html"
   onMouseOver="document.image1.src='onImage.gif'"
   onMouseOut="document.image1.src='outImage.gif'">

   <img src="outImage.gif" name="image1">

  </a>
</body>
</html>

This is the easiest rollover there is. onMouseOver=”document.image1.src=’onImage.gif’” replaces “outImage.gif” with “onImage.gif”. onMouseOut=”document.image1.src=’outImage.gif’” swapps “outImage.gif” back when the user moves his mouse away from it.

The image tag defines the source of the original image and contains the very important “name” option (name=”image1″).

The disadvantages of this kind of rollover are, that although it is simple, it produces an error message in older browsers, such as Netscape 2.0, Internet Explorer 3.0 and earlier and America Online 2.7 browser. Also, because the second image is downloaded from the server at the same time, there can be a delay when the user rolls over the first image, before it’s replaced with the second.

Rather than using the first method, we suggest you take a look on the next script and use this one.

Image Rollover Example:

<html>
<head>
<title>JavaScript Image Rollovers</title>
<script>
<!-- Hide Script
	function move_in(img_name,img_src) {
	document[img_name].src=img_src;
	}

	function move_out(img_name,img_src) {
	document[img_name].src=img_src;
	}
//End Hide Script-->
</script>
</head>
<body>
  <a href="link.html"
   OnMouseOver="move_in('image1','image_on.gif')"
   OnMouseOut="move_out('image1','image_out.gif')">

  <img src="image_out.gif"
   alt="Move your mouse over here!" name="image1">

  </a>
</body>
</html>

We define two functions, “move_in” and “move_out”. Inside those we set the parameters img_name (image name) and img_src (image source) to be able later to identify the image and its rollover.

Next we have to give our image a name (name=”image1″) in order to be able a apply an rollover to it. To complete the rollover we use onMouseOver, to call the function “move_in”, which includes the source for the rollover image, and onMouseOut, to call the function “move_out”, which includes the information for the initial image and kind of resets the situation, when you move your mouse away from the image.

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Events Posted at 9:22 pm | No Comments »

Events are actions that the user performs while visiting your site. Submitting a form or moving the mouse over an image are two examples for events.

JavaScript applies commands called Event Handlers to these events. An action of a user is recognized by an Event Handler in your script. For example, if the user clicks the button to abort loading your page, the Event Handler onAbort() will take a notice of it and perform whatever action you have assigned.

When you write a script you don’t have to define scenarios for every possible action there is. An image button will display just fine without using onMouseOver and onMouseOut. But if you want to add a little more excitement to your page’s interface, you should try it.


Event Handlers

EVENT

onAbort

onBlur

onChange

onClick

onError

onFocus

onLoad

onMouseOver

onMouseOut

onSelect

onSubmit

onUnload


WHAT IT HANDLES

User aborted page loading.

User left the object.

User changed the object.

User clicked on an object.

Script encountered an error.

User made an object active.

Object finished page loading.

Cursor moved over an object.

Cursor moved off an object.

User selected content of a page.

User submitted a form.

User left window.

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Comparisons Posted at 9:17 pm | No Comments »

Often you want to compare a value of one variable with one of another variable, or the value of a variable against a literal value, for example the value in an if-statement.

Example for a comparison is if you want to compare the value of the day of week to “Sunday”, you can do this by checking todaysDate == “Thursday”.

Don’t mix up ‘=’ with ‘==’, the first is an assignment, the second one is a comparison.

Comparisons

COMPARISON
x == y

x != y

x > y

x >= y

x < y

x <= y

x && y

x || y

!x
WHAT IT DOES
True if x and y are equal

True if x and y are not equal

True if x is greater than y

True if x is greater or equal to y

True if x is less than y

True if x is less or equal to y

True if x and y are true

True if x or y are true

True if x is false

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Posted in Javascript Tutorials

Jan 21 Javascript Assignments Posted at 9:16 pm | No Comments »

When you try to put a value in a variable you try to assign the value to the variable. To assign it, you have to use an assignment operator to get the job done. For example, use the equals to create an assignment, such as siteName = “HTMLcenter”.

Besides the equals sign, the other assignment operators serve as shortcuts for modifying the value of a variable. For example the shortcut for x = x + 5 is to use x += 5. If you don’t like the short way, just use the long version, it will not change the outcome, just a little more to type.

Assignments

ASSIGNMENT

x = y

x += y

x -= y

x *= y

x /= y

x %= y
WHAT IT DOES

Sets x to the value of y

x = x + y

x = x - y

x = x * y

x = z / y

x = x % y

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