HTML Goodies: Script Tip: Week 2

     In Script Tip #1 we talked quickly about objects and methods. You remember that objects are things that already exist (according to JavaScript) while methods are things that act upon those objects.

     In this tip we’ll quickly discuss the use of those objects in what I call a hierarchy statement. Here’s a very bare-bones image flip script:

     We’ll actually use this script for this and the next Script Tip. The portion of this script I am interested in most is this one “document.pic1.src=’menu1on.gif“.

     Remember from the last tip that document is an object? Well, it is. Here we’re using the document object to set up a hierarchy statement. Hierarchy statements are listings of elements under a specific object. This statement, for instance, is under the object document–the HTML document.
     Always in these statements, it’s biggest to smallest in stature reading left to right. So in this case, the statement is saying:

• The document…
• that contains something called pic1…
• receives this source (denoted by src)…
• an image called menu1on.gif.

     Notice it’s always a dot (.) that separates the items in the hierarchy statements. I should say here that the pic1item is the name of the image command. See that in the full code above?

     So now you have a general idea of what is happening when you see long lists of elements in JavaScripts. You’re seeing a hierarchy statement denoting a specific portion of an object.

Next Week:This image flip script further explained.