Question

Capturing Event's X/Y Coordinates in Netscape 6

Asked by: awalters

I want to capture x and y coordinates of a user?s click inside a graphic image (relative to its upper left corner) in Netscape 6. Making the graphic an image map would accomplish this, but I want to capture the coordinates without reloading the page.

It's easy in IE 5+, using event.offsetX, but this isn't available in Netscape 6. I used the following alternative in Netscape:

xPosition = event.clientX - (document.getElementById("clickfield").offsetLeft);

yPosition = event.clientY - (document.getElementById("clickfield").offsetTop);

However, this only works if the user doesn?t scroll before clicking. Here?s why:

event.clientY is the click event?s y-offset relative to the *browser* frame. This value is altered when the user scrolls.

document.getElementById("clickfield").offsetTop is the graphic's y-offset relative to the *page*. This value remains unchanged regardless of whether the user has scrolled.

Since the two values I rely on respond differently to scrolling, I only get the correct value if the user has not scrolled.

Points to anyone who can tell me how to do this in Netscape 6, in a manner that works even if the user has scrolled. Please also recommend any resources that provide information on event properties such as event.clientX and others in Netscape 6.

Thank you,

awalters

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Asked On: 2001-09-15 at 22:32:13ID20183355
Tags: coordinates
Topic: JavaScript
Participating Experts: 3
Points: 300
Comments: 9

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Answers

by: CJ_SPosted on 2001-09-16 at 03:38:12ID: 6485572

instead of offsetLeft, use scrollLeft. Same for offsetTope.

Regards,
CJ

by: awaltersPosted on 2001-09-16 at 08:14:47ID: 6485821

I'm using Netscape 6.1, and find that offsetTop/Left are undefined. See the following for the sample script in which I determined it was unavailable.

www.xmission.com/~dgoddard/dots/newdots_simple.html

The following is the contents of the page at the URL above:

<HTML><HEAD>
<SCRIPT language=JavaScript>
//This captures user's mouse clicks inside an image, both graphically by placing "dots" there, as well as via coordinates which are displayed in a form field.

var dots = ["dot0", "dot1", "dot2", "dot3", "dot4", "dot5", "dot6", "dot7", "dot8", "dot9", "dot10"];
var xycoords = ""; //Will hold coordinates string collected from mouse events

function placeDot(event)
{
xPosition = event.offsetX?(event.offsetX):event.clientX - (document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetLeft);
yPosition = event.offsetY?(event.offsetY):event.clientY - (document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetTop);

//Populate coords string.
if (!(xycoords=="")) {
xycoords=xycoords + ", ";
}
xycoords += (xPosition) + ',' + (yPosition);
document.getElementById("coords").value = xycoords;
window.status=xycoords;

// Loop until find first free dot for display, then give it the mouse event's coordinates.
found=false;
for (i=0; i<dots.length; i++) {
if (document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.visibility == "hidden") {
//window.status+=dots[i]+" "+xycoords;
found=true;
break;
}
}
if (found) {
document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.left = (xPosition) ;
document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.top = (yPosition) ;
document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.visibility = "visible" ;
//return ; //uncomment this to prevent the alert box below from showing
}

//The following is simply for testing, creating an alert that shows available and unavailable properties
alert('\n ?event.offsetY:'+event.offsetY+
'\n else event.clientY:'+event.clientY+
'\n minus document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetTop:'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetTop+
'\n my calculated yPosition:'+yPosition+
'\n document.getElementById("imgDiv").scrollTop:'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").scrollTop+
'\n event.target.offsetY:'+event.target.offsetY+
'\n event.offsetY:'+event.offsetY+
'\n event.offsetTop:'+event.offsetTop+
'\n clientY'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").clientY+
'\n clientTop'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").clientTop+
'\n clientLeft'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").clientLeft );

}

</SCRIPT>
</HEAD>
<BODY bgcolor="999999">
Click inside the grey box, then scroll a little and repeat.
<p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>

<FORM name="myform" method=post encType=multipart/form-data>
<INPUT size=100 name="coords" id="coords" value="">
<DIV id="imgDiv" style="POSITION:relative; visibility:visible; left:0; top:0;" width=300 height=300 onClick="placeDot(event)">
<IMG SRC="greybox.gif" width=300 height=300 border=1 id="clickfield" style="visibility:visible; left:0; top:0; z-index:1">
<script>
for (i=0;i<dots.length;i++) {
document.write('<img src="dot.gif" id='+dots[i]+' style="position:absolute; visibility:hidden; z-index:2;">');
}
</script>
</DIV>
<input type="Submit" name="submit" value="Submit">
</FORM>

<p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>
</BODY></HTML>

by: awaltersPosted on 2001-09-16 at 08:16:38ID: 6485826

Oops: In my first paragraph above, I meant to refer to scrollTop/Left being undefined instead of offsetTop/Left.

:-)

by: awaltersPosted on 2001-09-16 at 08:18:17ID: 6485832

Note: make sure you use Netscape (6) to look at the URL I provided, as IE produces errors.

by: ahosangPosted on 2001-09-17 at 16:00:05ID: 6489032

Do you want the coordinates relative to the image div or relative to the original unscrolled page?

by: ahosangPosted on 2001-09-17 at 16:16:08ID: 6489061

If you want the coords relative to the image div alone, her's the code - I had to clean up some string termination errors(maybe EE wrapping) and make a multi-line comment at the top. Check Tasks-->Tools-->Javascript Console in NS 6 for any errors:
<HTML><HEAD>
<SCRIPT language=JavaScript>
/* This captures user's mouse clicks inside an image, both graphically by placing "dots" there, as well
as via coordinates which are displayed in a form field.
*/

var dots = ["dot0", "dot1", "dot2", "dot3", "dot4", "dot5", "dot6", "dot7", "dot8", "dot9", "dot10"];
var xycoords = ""; //Will hold coordinates string collected from mouse events

function placeDot(event)
{
xPosition = event.offsetX?(event.offsetX):event.pageX-document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetLeft;
yPosition = event.offsetY?(event.offsetY):event.pageY-document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetTop;

//Populate coords string.
if (!(xycoords=="")) {
xycoords=xycoords + ", ";
}
xycoords += (xPosition) + ',' + (yPosition);
document.getElementById("coords").value = xycoords;
window.status=xycoords;

// Loop until find first free dot for display, then give it the mouse event's coordinates.
found=false;
for (i=0; i<dots.length; i++) {
if (document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.visibility == "hidden") {
//window.status+=dots[i]+" "+xycoords;
found=true;
break;
}
}
if (found) {
document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.left = (xPosition) ;
document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.top = (yPosition) ;
document.getElementById(dots[i]).style.visibility = "visible" ;
//return ; //uncomment this to prevent the alert box below from showing
}

//The following is simply for testing, creating an alert that shows available and unavailable properties
alert('\n ?event.offsetY:'+event.offsetY+
'\n else event.clientY:'+event.clientY+
'\n minus document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetTop:'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").offsetTop+
'\n my calculated yPosition:'+yPosition+
'\n document.getElementById("imgDiv").scrollTop:'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").scrollTop+
'\n event.target.offsetY:'+event.target.offsetY+
'\n event.offsetY:'+event.offsetY+
'\n event.offsetTop:'+event.offsetTop+
'\n clientY'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").clientY+
'\n clientTop'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").clientTop+
'\n clientLeft'+document.getElementById("imgDiv").clientLeft );

}

</SCRIPT>
</HEAD>
<BODY bgcolor="999999">
Click inside the grey box, then scroll a little and repeat.
<p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>

<FORM name="myform" method=post encType=multipart/form-data>
<INPUT size=100 name="coords" id="coords" value="">
<DIV id="imgDiv" style="POSITION:relative; visibility:visible; left:0; top:0;" width=300 height=300
onClick="placeDot(event)">
<IMG SRC="greybox.gif" width=300 height=300 border=1 id="clickfield" style="visibility:visible;
left:0; top:0; z-index:1">
<script>
for (i=0;i<dots.length;i++) {
document.write('<img src="dot.gif" id='+dots[i]+' style="position:absolute;visibility:hidden;z-index:2;">');
}
</script>
</DIV>
<input type="Submit" name="submit" value="Submit">
</FORM>

<p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>
<img src="spacer.gif" width="1" height="500" border="0">
</BODY></HTML>

by: awaltersPosted on 2001-09-17 at 17:52:36ID: 6489179

Fantastic!!

What's the best documentation source for identifying event capabilities like this?

by: awaltersPosted on 2001-09-17 at 17:53:52ID: 6489181

Thank you very much!

by: anywastePosted on 2005-08-01 at 16:23:06ID: 14575212

Couldn't be bothered to read all that. Here is an easy solution:

<blockquote>
element.style.left=e.clientX+document.body.scrollLeft;
element.style.top=e.clientY+document.body.scrollTop;
</blockquote>

Works in both IE and Gecko.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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Capturing Event's X/Y Coordinates in Netscape 6

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coordinates

JavaScript

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