Re: PROPOSAL FOR A MULTI-COLUMN SELECT ELEMENT WITHIN A FORM

A question, and two thoughts?

If PRE formatting (fixed-width, preservation of whitespace, etc) passed 
through to FORM input element text content (INPUT and SELECT), would this 
provide the required MSELECT funcionality?  IF so, then this might be 
an easier implementation path.

I do like the idea of using Java applets to render complex FORM-like
interfaces, but note the major problems this approach would present for 
users with non-graphical browsers. This may be a small minority of users
but not one I wish not to ignore. 

Instead, I believe it would be best to establish an easy-to-author form 
interface description language (perhaps as part of HTML). There is then
no reason one  browser could not render FORM element-like content using 
an applet or a java-based plugin module,  while another uses some other 
mechanism to do so (e.g. another java plugin, designed for another interface, 
or a coded-in interpreter, as is done now). This would be a bit like the
so-called "HTML Layout Controls" that Microsoft implements using ActiveX,
but more flexible in terms of the interface.

Ian
--
Ian Graham ............................................ ian.graham@utoronto.ca
Information Commons                                          Tel: 416-978-4548
University of Toronto                                        Fax: 416-978-0440




> 
> At 11:25 PM 9/3/96 +0100, Stewart Brodie wrote:
> >I've just gone around to another lab where there is a machine with
> >Netscape 3 on it to look at the helper application thing and don't see
> >anything with multiple columns in it ... unless you mean the single list
> >with three manually aligned fields in it?
> 
> That's it. But since HTML doesn't have a way to manually align the fields, a
> new element, or new extension to the existing one is probably required. All
> he wants is a reliable way to represent multiple column options in a listbox.
> 
>  Paul Prescod
>

Received on Friday, 6 September 1996 10:15:47 UTC