[WEB4LIB] WRAP Attribute for Forms

[William Moore]

Well the wrap attribute will work in Netscape Navigator 2.0 or higher and
Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 or higher. In creating pages I have noticed
that IE will automatically wrap text in a text area box to prevent it from
scrolling on a single line, while Netscape would only wrap the text if told to
with wrap=virtual or physical.

As far as this being a W3C standard seeing as it is not listed in the specs it
most likely is not, if anything it is probably something that Netscape had
added to their browser to aid in usability for form data.

In my mind any multi row text box should automatically wrap at the rightmost
column, otherwise why offer such a feature? True it allows the user to insert
carriage returns, however why would you want the user to format the data for
you? With that in mind it may be more up to the specific browser to handle the
wrapping of the text in this field and as such not required in the overall
standards.

                        _________________________________
________________________|        William Moore
|_______________________
   LETS Web Developer      william_moore at umanitoba.ca         204.474.6523

                  http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/units/lets
      486F6D6F 73756D3A 68756D616E69 6E696C 61 6D65 616C69656E756D 7075746F


-> -----Original Message-----
-> From: web4lib at webjunction.org
-> [mailto:web4lib at webjunction.org]On Behalf Of peterson at amigos.org
-> Sent: Monday, July 10, 2000 1:23 PM
-> To: Multiple recipients of list
-> Subject: [WEB4LIB] WRAP Attribute for Forms
->
->
-> There probably is an easy answer for this, but I can't seem to find it.
-> I'm getting ready to teach the creation of forms for librarians.  I was
-> re-checking the standard and ran into a brick wall.  I see references in
-> books and on web sites for WRAP being used in the <TEXTAREA> tag.  However,
-> I can't verify that it is a legitimate attribute.  I couldn't find it
-> listed in the current HTML specification:
->
-> http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/
->
-> I've tried some of the more well-known HTML reference sites; some use it as
-> if it were part of the specification and some don't mention it.  I've
-> checked to see if it is part of either Netscape and Microsoft extensions --
-> no luck.
->
-> Can someone shed some light on this for me?  Is it part of HTML 4.01 or
-> not?  Any help would be appreciated!
->
-> Christine Peterson
-> Library Liaison Officer
-> Amigos Library Services
-> 14400 Midway Road
-> Dallas, TX  75244-3509
-> 800/843-8482
-> www.amigos.org
-> peterson at amigos.org
->
->