After all of the prefatory material in the head portion of an HTML file, the body element contains the genuine content of the page that the user sees in the browser window (or may hear from browsers that know how to speak to users). Before style sheets, the body element was the place where page authors could specify document-wide color and background schemes. A great many favorite attributes covering these properties are deprecated in HTML 4, in favor of style sheet rules that may be applied to the body element. Support for all these attributes, however, will remain in mainstream browsers for years to come.

The body element is also where window object event handler attributes are placed. For example, a window object as defined in most document object models has an onload event handler that fires when a document has finished loading into the current window or frame. Assigning that event handler as an element attribute is done in the body element.

Although it may appear from a variety of implications that the body element is the document object, this is not true. The document object has additional properties (such as the document.title) that are defined outside of the body element in an HTML document. In a W3C-DOM-aware browser, the document node tree puts more distance between the root document node and the body element: the document node is the parent of the html element; the html element is the parent of both the head and body elements.

Establishes the color of a hypertext link when it is activated (being clicked on) by the user. This is one of three states for a link: unvisited, active, and visited. The color is applied to the link text or border around an image or object embedded within an a element. This attribute is deprecated in favor of the CSS :active pseudo-class style rule for an a element, as described in Chapter 11.

Specifies an image file that is used as a backdrop to the text and other content of the page. Unlike normal images that get loaded into browser content, a background image loads in its original size (without scaling) and tiles to fill the available document space in the browser window or frame. Smaller images usually download faster but are obviously repeated more often in the background. Animated GIFs are also allowable but very distracting to the reader. When selecting a background image, be sure it is very muted in comparison to the main content so that the content stands out clearly. Background images, if used at all, should be extremely subtle or occupy space free of other content.

This attribute is deprecated in HTML 4 in favor of the background style attribute.

Establishes a fill color (behind the text and other content) for the entire document. If you combine a bgcolor and background, any transparent areas of the background image let the background color show through. This attribute is deprecated in HTML 4 in favor of the background-color style attribute.

An Internet Explorer attribute that lets you define whether the background image (set with the background attribute or style sheet) remains in a fixed position or scrolls as a user scrolls the page. This can provide both intriguing and odd effects for the user. When the background image is set to remain in a fixed position, scrolled content flows past the background image very much like film credits roll past a background image on the screen.

Establishes the amount of blank space between the very end of the content and the bottom of a scrollable page. The setting has no visual effect if the length of the content or size of the window does not cause the window to scroll. The default value is for the end of the content to be flush with the end of the document, but in the Macintosh version of Internet Explorer, there is about a 10-pixel margin visible even when the attribute is set to zero. Larger sizes are reflected properly. This attribute offers somewhat of a shortcut to setting the margin-bottom style sheet attribute for the body element.

The language being used for the element's attribute values and content. A browser can use this information to assist in proper rendering of content with respect to details such as treatment of ligatures (when supported by a particular font or required by a written language), quotation marks, and hyphenation. Other applications and search engines might use this information to aid the selection of spell-checking dictionaries and the creation of indices.

Establishes the amount of blank space between the left edge of the content area of a window and the left edge of the content. This attribute offers somewhat of a shortcut to setting the margin-left style sheet attribute for the body element. As the outermost parent container in the renderable element hierarchy, this attribute setting fixes the left margin context for all nested elements in the document.

Establishes the color of a hypertext link that has not been visited (i.e., the URL of the link is not in the browser's cache). This is one of three states for a link: unvisited, active, and visited. The color is applied to the link text or border around an image or object embedded within an a element. This attribute is deprecated in favor of the :link pseudo-class style rule for an a element, as described in Chapter 11).

Shortcut attributes to set the body's margins in lieu of CSS style sheets. Setting marginheight to a pixel value establishes a margin setting above and below the body content; marginwidth sets margins to the left and right of the body.

Controls whether wide content should wrap within the body width.

Establishes the amount of blank space between the right edge of the content area of a window and the right edge of the content. This attribute offers somewhat of a shortcut to setting the margin-right style sheet attribute for the body element. As the outermost parent container in the renderable element hierarchy, this attribute setting fixes the right margin context for all nested elements in the document. Be aware that IE on the Mac does not let content come as close to the right edge of the window as the Windows version.

Controls the presence of scrollbars when the content space exceeds the size of the current window. Without scrollbars, if you want your users to move around the page, you have to provide some scripted method of adjusting the scroll of the window. Be aware that Internet Explorer for the Mac always shows scrollbars when the document is too large for the window, even when the scroll attribute is set to no. For more modern control over scrollbars, use the overflow CSS attribute (plus IE-specific overflowX and overflowY attributes).

Establishes the color of body content in the document. Colors of individual elements within the document can override the document-wide setting. Because the default background color of browsers varies widely with browser brand, version, and operating system, it is advisable to set the bgcolor attribute (or equivalent style sheet rule) in concert with the document's text color. This attribute is deprecated in favor of the color style sheet attribute.

Establishes the amount of blank space between the top edge of the content area of a window and the top edge of the content. This attribute offers somewhat of a shortcut to setting the margin-top style sheet attribute for the body element. As the outermost parent container in the renderable element hierarchy, this attribute setting fixes the top margin context for all nested elements in the document. Setting the topmargin attribute to zero or an empty string ("") pushes the content to the very top of the document content region.

Establishes the color of a hypertext link after it has been visited by a user (and the destination page is still in the browser's cache). This is one of three states for a link: unvisited, active, and visited. The color is applied to the link text or border around an image or object embedded within an a element. This attribute is deprecated in favor of the :visited pseudo-class style rule for an a element, as described in Chapter 11).