Easy as A,B,C – dynamic A to Z indexes - Customizing the script

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The script needs several classes in the CSS and the appropriate IDs on the HTML element to add the effect. This was done to allow complete control over the look and feel without changing the JavaScript. The IDs make the script a lot faster as we can access elements by their ID rather than looping through all of them.

The IDs are:

atoz	The A to Z list navigation; this can be in any format, as the script loops through the links contained within it. The best option is an unnumbered list, though.
contents	The element containing all the different sections from A to Z, normally a DIV.

The classes are:

hidden	hides the section to which it is applied
shown	shows the section that was previously hidden
current	applied to the current link
dohover	applied to the atoz element to indicate that the effect should be applied when you mouse over it, and not only when you click it.

All these settings can be changed in the first few lines of the script:

            // check if necessary elements are available

            var n=document.getElementById('atoz');

            var c=document.getElementById('contents');

            // Define the classes in use to show and hide the elements

            var hc='hidden';

            var sc='shown';

            var cc='current';

            var mc='dohover';

Saving even more screen estate

Long lists are boring to look at, and the need to scroll the screen can be very annoying. We aligned our A to Z navigation horizontally; why not do the same with the content lists? All we need to add is a style that defines a width for each of the list elements and floats them to the left:

#contents.columns li{

            float:left;

            width:10em;

}

The link pointing back to the navigation needs to clear each float, otherwise following sections might be indented:

#contents.columns p.back2{

            clear:both;

}

Now we have a dynamic A to Z index that takes up the least possible screen estate (example:columnatoz.html). The list items do get arranged horizontally, not vertically. If we wanted to arrange them vertically, we’d need to resort to more excessive use of CSS and messy HTML suffering from “classitis” (the overuse of classes in the HTML, effectively mixing structure with presentation). There is an article on the subject of multicolumn lists explaining all the ins and outs at Community MX [2].

Links

[1] http://www.jimthatcher.com/skipnav.htm - Internet explorer bug concerning anchors and keyboard navigation.

[2] http://www.communitymx.com/content/article.cfm?cid=27F87  - Multi column lists with CSS.

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Comments On: Easy as A,B,C – dynamic A to Z indexes

· Very neat article. I should have loved to get a little more about the javascript,...   >>> Post your comment now!