The Dreamweaver DOM

The Dreamweaver DOM contains a subset of objects, properties, and methods from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) (www.w3.org/TR/REC-DOM-Level-1/) DOM Level 1, which are combined with some properties of the Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 DOM.

Objects, properties, and methods of the Dreamweaver DOM

The following table lists the objects, properties, methods, and events that the Dreamweaver DOM supports. Some properties are read-only when they are accessed as properties of a specific object. A bullet (•) indicates properties that are read-only when they are used in the listed context.

Object	Properties	Methods	Events
window	navigator • document • innerWidth • innerHeight • screenX • screenY •	alert() confirm() escape() unescape() close() setTimeout() clearTimeout() setInterval() clearInterval() resizeTo()	onResize
navigator	platform •	None	None
document	forms • (an array of form objects) images • (an array of image objects) layers • (an array of LAYER, ILAYER, and absolutely positioned DIV and SPAN objects) child objects by name • nodeType • parentNode • childNodes • documentElement • body • URL • parentWindow •	getElementsBy TagName() hasChildNodes()	onLoad
all tags/elements	nodeType • parentNode • childNodes • tagName • attributes by name innerHTML outerHTML	getAttribute() setAttribute() removeAttribute() getElementsByTagName() hasChildNodes()
form	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: tags:elements • (an array of button, checkbox, password, radio, reset, select, submit, text, file, hidden, image, and textarea objects) mmcolorbutton child objects by name •	Only those methods available to all tags	None
layer	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: visibility left top width height zIndex	Only those methods that are available to all tags	None
image	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: src	Only those methods that are available to all tags	onMouseOver onMouseOut onMouseDown onMouseUp
button reset submit	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: form •	In addition to the methods that are available for all tags: blur() focus()	onClick
checkbox radio	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: checked form •	In addition to the methods that are available for all tags: blur() focus()	onClick
password text file hidden image (field) textarea	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: form • value	In addition to the methods that are available for all tags: blur() focus() select()	onBlur onFocus
select	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: form • options • (an array of option objects) selectedIndex	In addition to the methods that are available for all tags: blur() (Windows only) focus() (Windows only)	onBlur (Windows only) onChange onFocus (Windows only)
option	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: text	Only those methods that are available to all tags	None
mmcolorbutton	In addition to the properties that are available for all tags: name value	None	onChange
array boolean date function math number object string regexp	Matches Netscape Navigator 4.0	Matches Netscape Navigator 4.0	None
text	nodeType • parentNode • childNodes • data	hasChildNodes()	None
comment	nodeType • parentNode • childNodes • data	hasChildNodes()	None
NodeList	length •	item()	None
NamedNodeMap	length •	item()	None

Properties and methods of the document object

The following table details the properties and methods of the document object that are taken from DOM Level 1 and used in Dreamweaver. A bullet (•) marks read-only properties.

Property or method	Return value
nodeType •	Node.DOCUMENT_NODE
parentNode •	null
parentWindow •	The JavaScript object that corresponds to the document's parent window. (This property is not included in DOM Level 1; however, Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 supports it.)
childNodes •	A NodeList that contains all the immediate children of the document object. Typically the document has a single child, the HTML object.
documentElement •	The JavaScript object that corresponds to the HTML tag. This property is shorthand for getting the value of document.childNodes and extracting the HTML tag from the NodeList.
body •	The JavaScript object that corresponds to the BODY tag. This property is shorthand for calling document.documentElement.childNodes and extracting the BODY tag from the NodeList. For frameset documents, this property returns the node for the outermost frameset.
URL •	The file://URL for the document or, if the file has not been saved, an empty string.
getElementsByTagName(tagName)	A NodeList that can be used to step through tags of type tagName (for example, IMG, DIV, and so on). If the tag argument is LAYER, the function returns all LAYER and ILAYER tags and all absolutely positioned DIV and SPAN tags. If the tag argument is INPUT, the function returns all form elements. (If a name attribute is specified for one or more tagName objects, it must begin with a letter, which the HTML 4.01 specification requires, or the length of the array that this function returns is incorrect.)
hasChildNodes()	true

Properties and methods of HTML tag objects

Every HTML tag is represented by a JavaScript object. Tags are organized in a tree hierarchy, where tag x is a parent of tag y, if y falls completely within x's opening and closing tags (<x>x content <y>y content</y> more x content.</x>). For this reason, your code should be well-formed.

The following table lists the properties and methods of tag objects in Dreamweaver, along with their return values or explanations. A bullet (•) marks read-only properties.

Property or method	Return value
nodeType •	Node.ELEMENT_NODE
parentNode •	The parent tag. If this is the HTML tag, the document object returns.
childNodes •	A NodeList that contains all the immediate children of the tag.
tagName •	The HTML name for the tag, such as IMG, A, or BLINK. This value always returns in uppercase letters.
attrName	A string that contains the value of the specified tag attribute. tag.attrName cannot be used if the attrName attribute is a reserved word in the JavaScript language (for example, class). In this case, use getAttribute() and setAttribute().
innerHTML	The source code that is contained between the opening tag and the closing tag.For example, in the code <p><b>Hello</b>, World!</p>, p.innerHTML returns <b>Hello</b>, World!. If you write to this property, the DOM tree immediately updates to reflect the new structure of the document. (This property is not included in DOM Level 1, but Internet Explorer 4.0 supports it.)
outerHTML	The source code for this tag, including the tag. For the previous example code, p.outerHTML returns <p><b>Hello</b>, World!</p>. If you write to this property, the DOM tree immediately updates to reflect the new structure of the document. (This property is not included in DOM Level 1, but Internet Explorer 4.0 supports it.)
getAttribute(attrName)	The value of the specified attribute if it is explicitly specified; null otherwise.
gettranslatedAttribute(attrName)	The translated value of the specified attribute or the same value that getAttribute() returns if the attribute's value is not translated. (This property is not included in DOM Level 1; it was added to Dreamweaver 3 to support attribute translation.)
setAttribute(attrName, attrValue)	Does not return a value. Sets the specified attribute to the specified value: for example, img.setAttribute("src", "image/roses.gif").
removeAttribute(attrName)	Does not return a value. Removes the specified attribute and its value from the HTML for this tag.
getElementsByTagName(tagName)	A NodeList that can be used to step through child tags of type tagName (for example, IMG, DIV, and so on). If the tag argument is LAYER, the function returns all LAYER and ILAYER tags and all absolutely positioned DIV and SPAN tags. If the tag argument is INPUT, the function returns all form elements. (If a name attribute is specified for one or more tagName objects, it must begin with a letter, which the HTML 4.01 specification requires, or the length of the array that this function returns is incorrect.)
hasChildNodes()	A Boolean value that indicates whether the tag has any children.
hasTranslatedAttributes()	A Boolean value that indicates whether the tag has any translated attributes. (This property is not included in DOM Level 1; it was added to Dreamweaver 3 to support attribute translation.)

Properties and methods of text objects

Each contiguous block of text in an HTML document (for example, the text within a P tag) is represented by a JavaScript object. Text objects never have children. The following table describes the properties and methods of text objects that are taken from DOM Level 1 and used in Dreamweaver. A bullet (•) marks read-only properties.

Property or method	Return value
nodeType •	Node.TEXT_NODE
parentNode •	The parent tag
childNodes •	An empty NodeList
data	The actual text string. Entities in the text are represented as a single character (for example, the text Joseph & I is returned as Joseph & I).
hasChildNodes()	false

Properties and methods of comment objects

A JavaScript object represents each HTML comment. The following table details the properties and methods of comment objects that are taken from DOM Level 1 and are used in Dreamweaver. A bullet (•) marks read-only properties.

Property or method	Return value
nodeType •	Node.COMMENT_NODE
parentNode •	The parent tag
childNodes •	An empty NodeList array
data	The text string between the comment markers (<!-- and -->)
hasChildNodes()	false

The dreamweaver and site objects

Dreamweaver implements the standard objects that are accessible through the DOM and adds two custom objects: dreamweaver and site. These custom objects are widely used within the APIs and in writing extensions. For more information on the methods of the dreamweaver and site objects, see the Dreamweaver API Reference.

Properties of the dreamweaver object

The dreamweaver object has two read-only properties, which are described in the following list:

• The appName property has the value "Dreamweaver".

• The appVersion property has a value of the form "versionNumber.releaseNumber.buildNumber [languageCode] (platform)".

As an example, the value of the appVersion property for the Swedish Windows version of Dreamweaver 8 is "8.0.XXXX [se] (Win32)"; the value for the English Macintosh version is "8.0.XXXX [en] (MacPPC)".

NOTE

You can find the version and build number by selecting the Help > About menu item.

The appName and appVersion properties were implemented in Dreamweaver 3 and are not available in earlier versions of Dreamweaver. You might want to check that the user of your extension has Dreamweaver version 3 or later by checking for the existence of the appVersion or appName property.

To find the specific version of Dreamweaver, check first for the existence of appVersion and then for the version number, as shown in the following example:

 if (dreamweaver.appVersion && dreamweaver.appVersion.indexOf('3.01') != -1){   // execute code } 

The dreamweaver object has a property called systemScript that lets you query the language of the user's operating system. Use this property if you need to include special cases in your extension code for localized operating systems, as shown in the following example:

 if (dreamweaver,systemScript && (dreamweaver.systemScript.indexOf('ja')!=-1){ SpecialCase } 

The systemScript property returns the following values for localized operating systems:

Language	Value
Japanese	ja
Korean	ko
TChinese	zh_tw
SChinese	zh_cn

Operating systems for all European languages return 'en'.

The site object

The site object has no properties. For information about the methods of the site object, see the Dreamweaver API Reference.