Buttons

Buttons

The buttons referred to here are those that Dreamweaver inserts into dialog boxes for objects, behaviors, and commands. You have no control over how these buttons look, other than to specify the text labels that appear in command buttons.

Buttons In Objects and Behaviors

For dialog boxes belonging to objects and behaviors, OK and Cancel buttons are supplied automatically by Dreamweaver. A Help button will be supplied automatically if you include the displayHelp() function in your code. Because you have no control over any of these, there are no user interface guidelines for them.

Buttons In Commands

For commands, Dreamweaver places whatever buttons you specify along the right edge of the dialog box. Because you determine which buttons appear and in which order, they are subject to interface requirements and suggestions. In particular:

• The OK button should always come first, at the top of the dialog box. The OK button doesn't have to actually say OKif a different name is more appropriate, use itbut there should always be an OK button.

  note

  It can be tempting to create fun-sounding alternate names for buttons, but don't do so lightly! Everyone knows what OK, Save, Done, Open, Import, and such mean; and they're transparent enough to be useful without being annoying. Do It, Go For It, Go Get It, and the like may be confusing to some users and will probably annoy others after a while.

  
  

• If there's an Apply button, it should come next . (This button executes all or part of the command, but does not close the dialog box.) If there is more than one apply-type button for applying different parts of the command, they should all come immediately after the OK button.

• The Cancel button should come next. There should always be a Cancel button.

• If there's a Help button, it should come last.

Any button whose purpose is to help the user set values in the form (for instance, a Browse button) should be defined as part of the form, and should appear next to the field it's associated with. Figure B.17 shows various buttons in command dialog boxes. (Note that OK is not always the appropriate value for the OK button.)

Figure B.17. Several command dialog boxes, showing the types of buttons appropriate to this extension type.

Buttons In Property Inspectors/Floating Panels

No buttons are automatically created for either Property inspectors or floating panels. All buttons must therefore be defined as part of the form, using the <input> tag. If a button is associated with a particular form element, such as a text field, place it next to that item. If the button is to be created from an image, use <input type="image"> .