meta

NN 6 IE 4 DOM 1

The meta object reflects the meta element.

HTML Equivalent

<meta>

Object Model Reference

[window.]document.getElementById("elementID")

Object-Specific Properties

charset

content

httpEquiv

name

scheme

url

Object-Specific Methods

None.

Object-Specific Event Handler Properties

None.

charset	NN n/a IE 4 DOM n/a
	Read/Write
Indicates the character encoding of the content in the file associated with the href attribute. This property does not change the setting of the charset attribute of a name/value pair contained by the content attribute or property. For now the charset property has little or no effect on a document.

Example

if (document.all.myMeta.charset == "csISO5427Cyrillic") { // process for Cyrillic charset }

Value
Case-insensitive alias from the character set registry (ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/iana/assignments/character-sets).

Default
Determined by browser.

content	NN 6 IE 4 DOM 1
	Read/Write
This is the equivalent of the value of a name/value pair. The property's corresponding content attribute is usually accompanied by either a name or http-equiv attribute, either of which acts as the name portion of the name/value pair. Specific values of the content attribute vary with the value of the name or http-equiv attribute. Sometimes the content attribute value contains multiple values. In such cases, the values are delimited by a semicolon. Some of these multiple values may be name/value pairs in their own right, such as the content for a refresh meta element. The first value is a number representing the number of seconds of delay before loading another document; the second value is a name/value pair indicating a URL of the document to load after the delay expires.

Despite the following example, changing the content property on a loaded document may not produce the desired effect if the browser relies on the incoming value as the document loads.

Example

document.getElementById("refreshMeta").content = "5,http://www.giantco.com/basicindex.html";

Value
String.

Default
None.

httpEquiv	NN 6 IE 4 DOM 1
	Read/Write
This is the equivalent of the name of a name/value pair. The property's corresponding http-equiv attribute is usually accompanied by a content attribute, which acts as the "value" portion of the name/value pair. The author may elect to use the name attribute instead of the http-equiv attribute, but only one may be set. Adjust only the property corresponding to the attribute used in the meta element's tag. Then be sure to set the content property with a value that makes sense with the httpEquiv or name property.

Example

document.getElementById("refreshMeta").httpEquiv = "expires";

Value
String.

Default
None.

name	NN 6 IE 4 DOM 1
	Read/Write
This is an identifier for the name/value pair that constitutes the meta element. The value is typically a plain-language term that denotes the purpose of the meta element, such as "author" or "keywords". Either the name or httpEquiv properties can have a value, but not both, in the same meta element.

Example

document.getElementById("detailMeta").name = "keywords";

Value
String.

Default
None.

scheme	NN 6 IE 5(Mac)/6(Win) DOM 1
	Read/Write
Reflects the scheme attribute, but as yet has no particular functionality in current browsers. See the scheme attribute of the meta element in Chapter 8 for information about the intended purpose of this property.

Value
String.

Default
None.

url	NN n/a IE 4 DOM n/a
	Read/Write
Although implemented in IE browsers, this property no longer appears to be officially supported.