October 15, 2001 - Out-of-Window Positioning

October 15, 2001 Out-of-Window Positioning Tips: October 2001 Yehuda Shiran, Ph.D. Doc JavaScript

The style object's position property can have three values: "static", "absolute", and "relative". One obvious difference between relative and absolute positioning is in the way out-of-window situation is handled. When you use absolute positioning and your object gets placed outside the current window, a scroll bar will appear (or extend) in the proper direction, to allow its viewing. When you use relative positioning, on the other hand, and your object gets placed outside the current window, you won't be able to see the object. Scroll bars won't be created or extended to include the object in the viewable area. Play around with the three links below and see their effect on the following layout:

This is a paragraph of text as well.

Make it static | Make it absolute | Make it relative We set oDiv.style.top to 1700 so it won't be included in your current window. When you ask for relative positioning, the yellow paragraph won't be visible. When you ask for absolute positioning, the yellow paragraph will be shown, by extending (or creating) the vertical scroll bar.

Here is the code:

<STYLE>
.divstatic {position: static}
</STYLE>
<DIV ID=oDiv CLASS="divstatic" STYLE="background-color:yellow;width:60">
This is a paragraph of text in a DIV.</DIV>
<SCRIPT LANGUAGE="JavaScript">
<!--
oDiv.style.left = 100;
oDiv.style.top = 1700;
// -->
</SCRIPT>
<P>This is a paragraph of text as well.</P>

<A HREF="javascript:void(oDiv.style.position = 'static')">Make it static</A> |
<A HREF="javascript:void(oDiv.style.position = 'absolute')">Make it absolute</A> |
<A HREF="javascript:void(oDiv.style.position = 'relative')">Make it relative</A>