This section defines an event-based drag-and-drop mechanism.
This specification does not define exactly what a drag-and-drop operation actually is.
On a visual medium with a pointing device, a drag operation could
be the default action of a mousedown
event that is followed by a
series of mousemove
events, and
the drop could be triggered by the mouse being released.
On media without a pointing device, the user would probably have to explicitly indicate his intention to perform a drag-and-drop operation, stating what he wishes to drag and where he wishes to drop it, respectively.
However it is implemented, drag-and-drop operations must have a starting point (e.g. where the mouse was clicked, or the start of the selection or element that was selected for the drag), may have any number of intermediate steps (elements that the mouse moves over during a drag, or elements that the user picks as possible drop points as he cycles through possibilities), and must either have an end point (the element above which the mouse button was released, or the element that was finally selected), or be canceled. The end point must be the last element selected as a possible drop point before the drop occurs (so if the operation is not canceled, there must be at least one element in the middle step).
This section is non-normative.
To make an element draggable is simple: give the element a draggable
attribute, and set an event
listener for dragstart
that
stores the data being dragged.
The event handler typically needs to check that it's not a text
selection that is being dragged, and then needs to store data into
the DataTransfer
object and set the allowed effects
(copy, move, link, or some combination).
For example:
<p>What fruits do you like?</p> <ol ondragstart="dragStartHandler(event)"> <li draggable="true" data-value="fruit-apple">Apples</li> <li draggable="true" data-value="fruit-orange">Oranges</li> <li draggable="true" data-value="fruit-pear">Pears</li> </ol> <script> var internalDNDType = 'text/x-example'; // set this to something specific to your site function dragStartHandler(event) { if (event.target instanceof HTMLLIElement) { // use the element's data-value="" attribute as the value to be moving: event.dataTransfer.setData(internalDNDType, event.target.dataset.value); event.dataTransfer.effectAllowed = 'move'; // only allow moves } else { event.preventDefault(); // don't allow selection to be dragged } } </script>
To accept a drop, the drop target has to have a dropzone
attribute and listen to the
drop
event.
The value of the dropzone
attribute specifies what kind of data to accept (e.g. "s:text/plain
" to accept any text strings, or
"f:image/png
" to accept a PNG image file) and what kind
of feedback to give (e.g. "move
" to indicate that the
data will be moved).
Instead of using the dropzone
attribute, a drop target can
handle the dragenter
event (to
report whether or not the drop target is to accept the drop) and the
dragover
event (to specify what
feedback is to be shown to the user).
The drop
event allows the actual
drop to be performed. This event needs to be canceled, so that the
dropEffect
attribute's value can be used by the source (otherwise it's
reset).
For example:
<p>Drop your favorite fruits below:</p> <ol dropzone="move s:text/x-example" ondrop="dropHandler(event)"> <-- don't forget to change the "text/x-example" type to something specific to your site --> </ol> <script> var internalDNDType = 'text/x-example'; // set this to something specific to your site function dropHandler(event) { var li = document.createElement('li'); var data = event.dataTransfer.getData(internalDNDType); if (data == 'fruit-apple') { li.textContent = 'Apples'; } else if (data == 'fruit-orange') { li.textContent = 'Oranges'; } else if (data == 'fruit-pear') { li.textContent = 'Pears'; } else { li.textContent = 'Unknown Fruit'; } event.target.appendChild(li); } </script>
To remove the original element (the one that was dragged) from
the display, the dragend
event
can be used.
For our example here, that means updating the original markup to handle that event:
<p>What fruits do you like?</p> <ol ondragstart="dragStartHandler(event)" ondragend="dragEndHandler(event)"> ...as before... </ol> <script> function dragStartHandler(event) { // ...as before... } function dragEndHandler(event) { // remove the dragged element event.target.parentNode.removeChild(event.target); } </script>
The data that underlies a drag-and-drop operation, known as the drag data store, consists of the following information:
A drag data store item list, which is a list of items representing the dragged data, each consisting of the following information:
The kind of data:
Text.
Binary data with a file name.
A Unicode string giving the type or format of the data, generally given by a MIME type. Some values that are not MIME types are special-cased for legacy reasons. The API does not enforce the use of MIME types; other values can be used as well. In all cases, however, the values are all converted to ASCII lowercase by the API.
Strings that contain space characters cannot be used with the dropzone
attribute, so authors are
encouraged to use only MIME types
or custom strings (without spaces).
There is a limit of one Plain Unicode string item per item type string.
A Unicode or binary string, in some cases with a file name (itself a Unicode string), as per the drag data item kind.
The drag data store item list is ordered in the order that the items were added to the list; most recently added last.
The following information, used to generate the UI feedback during the drag:
A drag data store mode, which is one of the following:
For the dragstart
event.
New data can be added to the drag data store.
For the drop
event. The list of
items representing dragged data can be read, including the data.
No new data can be added.
For all other events. The formats and kinds in the drag data store list of items representing dragged data can be enumerated, but the data itself is unavailable and no new data can be added.
A drag data store allowed effects state, which is a string.
When a drag data store is created, it must be initialized such that its
drag data store item list is empty, it has no
drag data store default feedback, its drag data
store elements list is empty, it has no drag data store
bitmap / drag data store hot spot coordinate,
its drag data store mode is protected mode, and its drag data
store allowed effects state is the string "uninitialized
".
DataTransfer
interfaceDataTransfer
objects are used to expose the
drag data store that underlies a drag-and-drop
operation.
interface DataTransfer {
attribute DOMString dropEffect;
attribute DOMString effectAllowed;
readonly attribute DataTransferItems items;
void setDragImage(in Element image, in long x, in long y);
void addElement(in Element element);
/* old interface */
readonly attribute DOMStringList types;
DOMString getData(in DOMString format);
void setData(in DOMString format, in DOMString data);
void clearData(in optional DOMString format);
readonly attribute FileList files;
};
dropEffect
[ = value ]Returns the kind of operation that is currently selected. If
the kind of operation isn't one of those that is allowed by the
effectAllowed
attribute, then the operation will fail.
Can be set, to change the selected operation.
The possible values are "none
", "copy
", "link
", and "move
".
effectAllowed
[ = value ]Returns the kinds of operations that are to be allowed.
Can be set, to change the allowed operations.
The possible values are "none
", "copy
", "copyLink
", "copyMove
", "link
", "linkMove
", "move
", "all
", and "uninitialized
",
items
Returns a DataTransferItems
object, with the drag data.
setDragImage
(element, x, y)Uses the given element to update the drag feedback, replacing any previously specified feedback.
addElement
(element)Adds the given element to the list of elements used to render the drag feedback.
types
Returns a DOMStringList
listing the formats that
were set in the dragstart
event. In addition, if any files are being dragged, then one of
the types will be the string "Files
".
getData
(format)Returns the specified data. If there is no such data, returns the empty string.
setData
(format, data)Adds the specified data.
clearData
( [ format ] )Removes the data of the specified formats. Removes all data if the argument is omitted.
files
Returns a FileList
of the files being dragged, if any.
DataTransfer
objects are used during the drag-and-drop events, and are only valid while
those events are being dispatched.
A DataTransfer
object is associated with a
drag data store while it is valid.
The dropEffect
attribute controls the drag-and-drop feedback that the user is given
during a drag-and-drop operation. When the DataTransfer
object is created, the dropEffect
attribute is
set to a string value. On getting, it must return its current value.
On setting, if the new value is one of "none
",
"copy
", "link
", or
"move
", then the attribute's current value
must be set to the new value. Other values must be ignored.
The effectAllowed
attribute is used in the drag-and-drop processing model to
initialize the dropEffect
attribute
during the dragenter
and dragover
events. When the
DataTransfer
object is created, the effectAllowed
attribute is set to a string value. On getting, it must return its
current value. On setting, if the new value is one of "none
", "copy
", "copyLink
", "copyMove
", "link
", "linkMove
", "move
", "all
", or "uninitialized
", then the attribute's current value
must be set to the new value. Other values must be ignored.
The items
attribute must return a DataTransferItems
object
associated with the DataTransfer
object. The same
object must be returned each time.
The setDragImage(element, x, y)
method must run the following
steps:
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, abort these steps.
Nothing happens.
If the drag data store's mode is not in the read/write mode, abort these steps. Nothing happens.
If the element argument is an
img
element, then set the drag data store
bitmap to the element's image (at its intrinsic size);
otherwise, set the drag data store bitmap to an image
generated from the given element (the exact mechanism for doing so
is not currently specified).
Set the drag data store hot spot coordinate to the given x, y coordinate.
The addElement(element)
method is an alternative way of
specifying how the user agent is to render the drag feedback. The method
must run the following steps:
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, abort these steps.
Nothing happens.
If the drag data store's mode is not in the read/write mode, abort these steps. Nothing happens.
Add the given element to the element's drag data store elements list.
The difference between setDragImage()
and
addElement()
is
that the latter automatically generates the image based on the
current rendering of the elements added (potentially keeping it
updated as the drag continues, e.g. if the elements include an
actively playing video), whereas the former uses the exact specified
image at the time the method is invoked.
The types
attribute must return a live DOMStringList
giving the strings that the following steps would produce. The same
object must be returned each time.
Start with an empty list L.
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, the
DOMStringList
is empty. Abort these steps; return the
empty list L.
For each item in the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string, add an entry to the list L consisting of the item's type string.
If there are any items in the drag data store item
list whose kind
is File, then add an entry to the list L
consisting of the string "Files
". (This value
can be distinguished from the other values because it is not
lowercase.)
The strings produced by these steps are those in the list L.
The getData(format, data)
method
must run the following steps:
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, return the empty
string and abort these steps.
If the drag data store's mode is in the protected mode, return the empty string and abort these steps.
Let format be the first argument, converted to ASCII lowercase.
Let convert-to-URL be false.
If format equals "text
", change it to "text/plain
".
If format equals "url
", change it to "text/uri-list
" and set convert-to-URL to true.
If there is no item in the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string and whose type string is equal to format, return the empty string and abort these steps.
Let result be the data of the item in the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string and whose type string is equal to format.
If convert-to-URL is true, then parse
result as appropriate for text/uri-list
data, and then set result to the first URL from the list, if any, or
the empty string otherwise. [RFC2483]
Return result.
The setData(format, data)
method
must run the following steps:
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, abort these steps.
Nothing happens.
If the drag data store's mode is not the read/write mode, abort these steps. Nothing happens.
Let format be the first argument, converted to ASCII lowercase.
If format equals "text
", change it to "text/plain
".
If format equals "url
", change it to "text/uri-list
".
Remove the item in the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string and whose type string is equal to format, if there is one.
Add an item to the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string, whose type string is equal to format, and whose data is the string given by the method's second argument.
The clearData()
method must run the following steps:
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, abort these steps.
Nothing happens.
If the drag data store's mode is not the read/write mode, abort these steps. Nothing happens.
If the method was called with no arguments, remove each item in the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string, and abort these steps.
Let format be the first argument, converted to ASCII lowercase.
If format equals "text
", change it to "text/plain
".
If format equals "url
", change it to "text/uri-list
".
Remove the item in the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string and whose type string is equal to format, if there is one.
The clearData()
method does
not affect whether any files were included in the drag, so the types
attribute's list might
still not be empty after calling clearData()
(it would
still contain the "Files
" string if any files
were included in the drag).
The files
attribute must return a live FileList
sequence consisting of File
objects representing the
files found by the following steps. The same object must be returned
each time. Furthermore, for a given FileList
object and
a given underlying file, the same File
object must be
used each time.
Start with an empty list L.
If the DataTransfer
object is no longer
associated with a drag data store, the
FileList
is empty. Abort these steps; return the
empty list L.
If the drag data store's mode is in the protected mode, abort these steps; return the empty list L.
For each item in the drag data store item list whose kind is File , add the item's data (the file, in particular its name and contents, as well as its type) to the list L.
The files found by these steps are those in the list L.
This version of the API does not expose the types of the files during the drag.
DataTransferItems
interfaceEach DataTransfer
object is associated with a
DataTransferItems
object.
interface DataTransferItems {
readonly attribute unsigned long length;
getter DataTransferItem (in unsigned long index);
deleter void (in unsigned long index);
void clear();
DataTransferItem add(in DOMString data, in DOMString type);
DataTransferItem add(in File data);
};
length
Returns the number of items in the drag data store.
Returns the DataTransferItem
object representing the indexth entry in the drag data store.
delete
items[index]Removes the indexth entry in the drag data store.
clear
()Removes all the entries in the drag data store.
add
(data)add
(data, type)Adds a new entry for the given data to the drag data store. If the data is plain text then a type string has to be provided also.
While the DataTransferItems
object's
DataTransfer
object is associated with a drag
data store, the DataTransferItems
object's
mode is the same as the drag data store mode.
When the DataTransferItems
object's
DataTransfer
object is not associated with a
drag data store, the DataTransferItems
object's mode is the disabled mode. The drag
data store referenced in this section (which is used only
when the DataTransferItems
object is not in the
disabled mode) is the drag data store with which
the DataTransferItems
object's
DataTransfer
object is associated.
The length
attribute must return zero if the object is in the disabled
mode; otherwise it must return the number of items in the
drag data store item list.
When a DataTransferItems
object is not in the
disabled mode, its supported property indices
are the numbers in the range
0 .. n-1,
where n is the number of items in the drag
data store item list.
To determine the value of
an indexed property i of a
DataTransferItems
object, the user agent must return a
DataTransferItem
object representing the ith item in the drag data store. The
same object must be returned each time a particular item is obtained
from this DataTransferItems
object. The
DataTransferItem
object must be associated with the
same DataTransfer
object as the
DataTransferItems
object when it is first created.
To delete an
existing indexed property i of a
DataTransferItems
object, the user agent must run these
steps:
If the DataTransferItems
object is not in the
read/write mode, throw an
INVALID_STATE_ERR
exception and abort these
steps.
Remove the ith item from the drag data store.
The clear
method,
if the DataTransferItems
object is in the read/write mode, must remove all the
items from the drag data store. Otherwise, it must do
nothing.
The add()
method
must run the following steps:
If the DataTransferItems
object is not in the
read/write mode, return null and
abort these steps.
Jump to the appropriate set of steps from the following list:
If there is already an item in the drag data store item
list whose kind is Plain Unicode string and whose type string is
equal to the value of the method's second argument,
converted to ASCII lowercase, then throw a
NOT_SUPPORTED_ERR
exception and abort these
steps.
Otherwise, add an item to the drag data store item list whose kind is Plain Unicode string, whose type string is equal to the value of the method's second argument, converted to ASCII lowercase, and whose data is the string given by the method's first argument.
File
Add an item to the drag data store item list
whose kind is
File, whose type string is the type
of the File
,
converted to ASCII lowercase, and whose data is the
same as the File
's data.
Determine the value
of the indexed property corresponding to the newly added
item, and return that value (a newly created
DataTransferItem
object).
DataTransferItem
interfaceEach DataTransferItem
object is associated with a
DataTransfer
object.
interface DataTransferItem { readonly attribute DOMString kind; readonly attribute DOMString type; void getAsString(in FunctionStringCallback callback); File getAsFile(); }; [Callback=FunctionOnly, NoInterfaceObject] interface FunctionStringCallback { void handleEvent(in DOMString data); };
kind
Returns the drag data item kind, one of: "string", "file".
type
Returns the drag data item type string.
getAsString
(callback)Invokes the callback with the string data as the argument, if the drag data item kind is Plain Unicode string.
getAsFile
()Returns a File
object, if the drag data item kind is File.
While the DataTransferItem
object's
DataTransfer
object is associated with a drag
data store and that drag data store's drag
data store item list still contains the item that the
DataTransferItem
object represents, the
DataTransferItem
object's mode is the same as
the drag data store mode. When the
DataTransferItem
object's DataTransfer
object is not associated with a drag data
store, or if the item that the DataTransferItem
object represents has been removed from the relevant drag data
store item list, the DataTransferItem
object's
mode is the disabled mode. The drag data
store referenced in this section (which is used only when the
DataTransferItem
object is not in the disabled
mode) is the drag data store with which the
DataTransferItem
object's DataTransfer
object is associated.
The kind
attribute
must return the empty string if the DataTransferItem
object is in the disabled mode; otherwise it must return the
string given in the cell from the second column of the following
table from the row whose cell in the first column contains the
drag data item kind of the item represented by the
DataTransferItem
object:
Kind | String |
---|---|
Plain Unicode string | "string "
|
File | "file "
|
The type
attribute
must return the empty string if the DataTransferItem
object is in the disabled mode; otherwise it must return
the drag data item type string of the item represented
by the DataTransferItem
object.
The getAsString(callback)
method must run the following
steps:
If the callback is null, abort these steps.
If the DataTransferItem
object is not in the read/write mode or the read-only mode, abort these steps. The
callback is never invoked.
If the drag data item kind is not Plain Unicode string, abort these steps. The callback is never invoked.
Otherwise, queue a task to invoke callback, passing the actual data of the item
represented by the DataTransferItem
object as the
argument.
The getAsFile()
method must run the following steps:
If the DataTransferItem
object is not in the read/write mode or the read-only mode, return null and abort
these steps.
If the drag data item kind is not File, then return null and abort these steps.
Return a new File
object representing the
actual data of the item represented by the
DataTransferItem
object.
DragEvent
interfaceThe drag-and-drop processing model involves several events. They
all use the DragEvent
interface.
interface DragEvent : MouseEvent {
readonly attribute DataTransfer dataTransfer;
void initDragEvent(in DOMString typeArg, in boolean canBubbleArg, in boolean cancelableArg, in any dummyArg, in long detailArg, in long screenXArg, in long screenYArg, in long clientXArg, in long clientYArg, in boolean ctrlKeyArg, in boolean altKeyArg, in boolean shiftKeyArg, in boolean metaKeyArg, in unsigned short buttonArg, in EventTarget relatedTargetArg, in DataTransfer dataTransferArg);
};
dataTransfer
Returns the DataTransfer
object for the event.
The initDragEvent()
method must initialize the event in a manner analogous to the
similarly-named method in the DOM Events interfaces, except that the
dummyArg argument must be ignored. [DOMEVENTS]
The dataTransfer
attribute of the DragEvent
interface represents the
context information for the event.
When a user agent is required to fire a DND event named e at an element, using a particular drag data store, the user agent must run the following steps:
If e is dragstart
, set the drag data
store mode to the read/write
mode.
If e is drop
, set the drag data store
mode to the read-only
mode.
Let dataTransfer be a newly created
DataTransfer
object associated with the given
drag data store.
Set the effectAllowed
attribute to the drag data store's drag data
store allowed effects state.
Set the dropEffect
attribute to
"none
" if e is dragstart
, drag
, or dragleave
; to the value
corresponding to the current drag operation if e is drop
or dragend
; and to a value based on the
effectAllowed
attribute's value and to the drag-and-drop source, as given by the
following table, otherwise (i.e. if e is dragenter
or dragover
):
effectAllowed |
dropEffect |
---|---|
"none " |
"none " |
"copy ", "copyLink ", "copyMove ", "all " |
"copy " |
"link ", "linkMove " |
"link " |
"move " |
"move " |
"uninitialized " when what is being dragged is a selection from a text field |
"move " |
"uninitialized " when what is being dragged is a selection |
"copy " |
"uninitialized " when what is being dragged is an a element with an href attribute |
"link " |
Any other case | "copy " |
Create a DragEvent
object and initialize it to
have the given name e, to bubble, to be
cancelable unless e is dragleave
or dragend
, and to have the detail
attribute set to zero,
the mouse and key attributes set according to the state of the
input devices as they would be for user interaction events, the
relatedTarget
attribute set to null, and the
dataTransfer
attribute set to dataTransfer, the
DataTransfer
object created above.
If there is no relevant pointing device, the object must have
its screenX
, screenY
,
clientX
, clientY
, and
button
attributes set to 0.
Dispatch the newly created DragEvent
object at
the specified target element.
Set the drag data store allowed effects state
to the current value of dataTransfer's effectAllowed
attribute.
Set the drag data store mode back to the protected mode if it was changed in the first step.
Break the association between dataTransfer and the drag data store.
When the user attempts to begin a drag operation, the user agent must run the following steps. User agents must act as if these steps were run even if the drag actually started in another document or application and the user agent was not aware that the drag was occuring until it intersected with a document under the user agent's purview.
Determine what is being dragged, as follows:
If the drag operation was invoked on a selection, then it is the selection that is being dragged.
Otherwise, if the drag operation was invoked on a
Document
, it is the first element, going up the
ancestor chain, starting at the node that the user tried to drag,
that has the IDL attribute draggable
set to true. If there is no
such element, then nothing is being dragged; abort these steps,
the drag-and-drop operation is never started.
Otherwise, the drag operation was invoked outside the user agent's purview. What is being dragged is defined by the document or application where the drag was started.
img
elements and a
elements with an href
attribute have their draggable
attribute set to true by default.
Create a drag data store. All the DND events fired subsequently by the steps in this section must use this drag data store.
Establish which DOM node is the source node, as follows:
If it is a selection that is being dragged, then the source node is the text node that the user started the drag on (typically the text node that the user originally clicked). If the user did not specify a particular node, for example if the user just told the user agent to begin a drag of "the selection", then the source node is the first text node containing a part of the selection.
Otherwise, if it is an element that is being dragged, then the source node is the element that is being dragged.
Otherwise, the source node is part of another document or application. When this specification requires that an event be dispatched at the source node in this case, the user agent must instead follow the platform-specific conventions relevant to that situation.
Multiple events are fired on the source node during the course of the drag-and-drop operation.
Determine the list of dragged nodes, as follows:
If it is a selection that is being dragged, then the list of dragged nodes contains, in tree order, every node that is partially or completely included in the selection (including all their ancestors).
Otherwise, the list of dragged nodes contains only the source node, if any.
If it is a selection that is being dragged, then add an item to the drag data store item list, with its properties set as follows:
text/plain
"Otherwise, if any files are being dragged, then add one item per file to the drag data store item list, with their properties set as follows:
application/octet-stream
" otherwise.Dragging files can currently only happen from outside a browsing context, for example from a file system manager application.
If the drag initiated outside of the application, the user agent must add items to the drag data store item list as appropriate for the data being dragged, honoring platform conventions where appropriate; however, if the platform conventions do not use MIME types to label dragged data, the user agent must make a best-effort attempt to map the types to MIME types, and, in any case, all the drag data item type strings must be converted to ASCII lowercase.
Run the following substeps:
Let urls be an empty list of absolute URLs.
For each node in the list of dragged nodes:
If urls is still empty, abort these substeps.
Let url string be the result of concatenating the strings in urls, in the order they were added, separated by a U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN U+000A LINE FEED character pair (CRLF).
Add one item to the drag data store item list, with its properties set as follows:
text/uri-list
If it is an element that is being dragged, then set the drag data store elements list to contain just the source node.
Otherwise, update the drag data store default feedback as appropriate for the user agent (if the user is dragging the selection, then the selection would likely be the basis for this feedback; if the drag began outside the user agent, then the platform conventions for determining the drag feedback should be used).
Script can use the addElement()
method to
add further elements to the list of what is being dragged. (This
list is only used for rendering the drag feedback.)
Fire a DND event named dragstart
at the source
node.
If the event is canceled, then the drag-and-drop operation should not occur; abort these steps.
Since events with no event listeners registered are, almost by definition, never canceled, drag-and-drop is always available to the user if the author does not specifically prevent it.
Initiate the drag-and-drop operation in a manner consistent with platform conventions, and as described below.
The drag-and-drop feedback must be generated from the first of the following sources that is available:
From the moment that the user agent is to initiate the drag-and-drop operation, until the end of the drag-and-drop operation, device input events (e.g. mouse and keyboard events) must be suppressed. In addition, the user agent must track all DOM changes made during the drag-and-drop operation, and add them to its undo transaction history as one atomic operation once the drag-and-drop operation has ended.
During the drag operation, the element directly indicated by the user as the drop target is called the immediate user selection. (Only elements can be selected by the user; other nodes must not be made available as drop targets.) However, the immediate user selection is not necessarily the current target element, which is the element currently selected for the drop part of the drag-and-drop operation.
The immediate user selection changes as the user selects different elements (either by pointing at them with a pointing device, or by selecting them in some other way). The current target element changes when the immediate user selection changes, based on the results of event listeners in the document, as described below.
Both the current target element and the immediate user selection can be null, which means no target element is selected. They can also both be elements in other (DOM-based) documents, or other (non-Web) programs altogether. (For example, a user could drag text to a word-processor.) The current target element is initially null.
In addition, there is also a current drag operation,
which can take on the values "none
", "copy
", "link
", and "move
". Initially, it has the value "none
". It is updated by the user agent as described
in the steps below.
User agents must, as soon as the drag operation is initiated and every 350ms (±200ms) thereafter for as long as the drag operation is ongoing, queue a task to perform the following steps in sequence:
If the user agent is still performing the previous iteration of the sequence (if any) when the next iteration becomes due, abort these steps for this iteration (effectively "skipping missed frames" of the drag-and-drop operation).
Fire a DND event named drag
event at the source
node. If this event is canceled, the user agent must set
the current drag operation to "none
" (no drag operation).
If the drag
event was not
canceled and the user has not ended the drag-and-drop operation,
check the state of the drag-and-drop operation, as follows:
If the user is indicating a different immediate user selection than during the last iteration (or if this is the first iteration), and if this immediate user selection is not the same as the current target element, then update the current target element as follows:
Set the current target element to null also.
Set the current target element to the immediate user selection.
Fire a DND event named dragenter
at the
immediate user selection.
If the event is canceled, then set the current target element to the immediate user selection.
Otherwise, run the appropriate step from the following list:
textarea
, or an input
element whose type
attribute is in the Text state) or an
editable element, and the drag data store
item list has an item with the drag data item
type string "text/plain
" and the
drag data item kind Plain Unicode stringSet the current target element to the immediate user selection anyway.
dropzone
attribute
that matches the
drag data storeSet the current target element to the immediate user selection anyway.
Leave the current target element unchanged.
Fire a DND event named dragenter
at the body
element, and set the current target
element to the body element, regardless
of whether that event was canceled or not.
If the body element is null,
then the event will be fired at the Document
object (as required by the definition of the body
element), but the current target element
would be set to null, not the Document
object.
If the previous step caused the current target
element to change, and if the previous target element was
not null or a part of a non-DOM document, then fire a DND
event named dragleave
at the previous target
element.
If the current target element is a DOM element,
then fire a DND event named dragover
at this current
target element.
If the dragover
event is
not canceled, run the appropriate step from the following
list:
textarea
, or an input
element
whose type
attribute is in
the Text state) or an
editable element, and the drag data store
item list has an item with the drag data item type
string "text/plain
" and the drag data
item kind Plain Unicode stringSet the current drag operation to either
"copy
" or "move
",
as appropriate given the platform conventions.
dropzone
attribute
that matches the
drag data store and specifies an
operationSet the current drag operation to the
operation specified by the
dropzone
attribute of the
current target element.
dropzone
attribute
that matches the
drag data store and does not specify an
operationSet the current drag operation to "copy
".
Reset the current drag operation to "none
".
Otherwise (if the dragover
event is
canceled), set the current drag operation based on
the values of the effectAllowed
and
dropEffect
attributes of the DragEvent
object's dataTransfer
object as
they stood after the event dispatch finished, as per the
following table:
effectAllowed |
dropEffect |
Drag operation |
---|---|---|
"uninitialized ", "copy ", "copyLink ", "copyMove ", or "all " |
"copy " |
"copy " |
"uninitialized ", "link ", "copyLink ", "linkMove ", or "all " |
"link " |
"link " |
"uninitialized ", "move ", "copyMove ", "linkMove ", or "all " |
"move " |
"move " |
Any other case | "none " |
Otherwise, if the current target element is not a DOM element, use platform-specific mechanisms to determine what drag operation is being performed (none, copy, link, or move), and set the current drag operation accordingly.
Update the drag feedback (e.g. the mouse cursor) to match the current drag operation, as follows:
Drag operation | Feedback |
---|---|
"copy " |
Data will be copied if dropped here. |
"link " |
Data will be linked if dropped here. |
"move " |
Data will be moved if dropped here. |
"none " |
No operation allowed, dropping here will cancel the drag-and-drop operation. |
Otherwise, if the user ended the drag-and-drop operation (e.g.
by releasing the mouse button in a mouse-driven drag-and-drop
interface), or if the drag
event
was canceled, then this will be the last iteration. Run the
following steps, then stop the drag-and-drop operation:
If the current drag operation is "none
" (no drag operation), or, if the user ended
the drag-and-drop operation by canceling it (e.g. by hitting the
Escape key), or if the current target
element is null, then the drag operation failed. Run
these substeps:
Let dropped be false.
If the current target element is a DOM
element, fire a DND event named dragleave
at it; otherwise, if
it is not null, use platform-specific conventions for drag
cancellation.
Otherwise, the drag operation was as success; run these substeps:
Let dropped be true.
If the current target element is a DOM
element, fire a DND event named drop
at it; otherwise, use
platform-specific conventions for indicating a drop.
If the event is canceled, set the current drag
operation to the value of the dropEffect
attribute
of the DragEvent
object's dataTransfer
object
as it stood after the event dispatch finished.
Otherwise, the event is not canceled; perform the event's default action, which depends on the exact target as follows:
textarea
, or an input
element whose type
attribute is in the Text state) or an
editable element, and the drag data store
item list has an item with the drag data item
type string "text/plain
" and the
drag data item kind Plain Unicode stringInsert the actual data of the first item in the
drag data store item list to have a drag data item type
string of "text/plain
" and a drag data item kind
that is Plain Unicode string into the text field or
editable element in a manner consistent with
platform-specific conventions (e.g. inserting it at the
current mouse cursor position, or inserting it at the end of
the field).
Reset the current drag operation to
"none
".
Fire a DND event named dragend
at the source
node.
Run the appropriate steps from the following list as the
default action of the dragend
event:
textarea
, or an input
element
whose type
attribute is in
the Text state), and
dropped is true, and the current drag
operation is "move
", and the
source of the drag-and-drop operation is a selection in the
DOMtextarea
, or an input
element
whose type
attribute is in
the Text state), and
dropped is true, and the current drag
operation is "move
", and the
source of the drag-and-drop operation is a selection in a text
fieldUser agents are encouraged to consider how to react to drags near the edge of scrollable regions. For example, if a user drags a link to the bottom of the viewport on a long page, it might make sense to scroll the page so that the user can drop the link lower on the page.
This model is independent of which
Document
object the nodes involved are from; the events
are fired as described above and the rest of the processing model
runs as described above, irrespective of how many documents are
involved in the operation.
This section is non-normative.
The following events are involved in the drag-and-drop model.
Event Name | Target | Cancelable? | Drag data store mode | dropEffect |
Default Action |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
dragstart |
Source node | ✓ Cancelable | Read/write mode | "none " |
Initiate the drag-and-drop operation |
drag |
Source node | ✓ Cancelable | Protected mode | "none " |
Continue the drag-and-drop operation |
dragenter |
Immediate user selection or the body element | ✓ Cancelable | Protected mode | Based on effectAllowed value |
Reject immediate user selection as potential target element |
dragleave |
Previous target element | — | Protected mode | "none " |
None |
dragover |
Current target element | ✓ Cancelable | Protected mode | Based on effectAllowed value |
Reset the current drag operation to "none" |
drop |
Current target element | ✓ Cancelable | Read-only mode | Current drag operation | Varies |
dragend |
Source node | — | Protected mode | Current drag operation | Varies |
Not shown in the above table: all these events bubble, and the
effectAllowed
attribute always has the value it had after the previous event was
fired, defaulting to "uninitialized
" in the
dragstart
event.
draggable
attributeAll HTML elements may have the draggable
content attribute set. The
draggable
attribute is an
enumerated attribute. It has three states. The first
state is true and it has the keyword true
. The second state is false and it has
the keyword false
. The third state is
auto; it has no keywords but it is the missing value
default.
The true state means the element is draggable; the false state means that it is not. The auto state uses the default behavior of the user agent.
draggable
[ = value ]Returns true if the element is draggable; otherwise, returns false.
Can be set, to override the default and set the draggable
content attribute.
The draggable
IDL
attribute, whose value depends on the content attribute's in the way
described below, controls whether or not the element is
draggable. Generally, only text selections are draggable, but
elements whose draggable
IDL
attribute is true become draggable as well.
If an element's draggable
content attribute has the state true, the draggable
IDL attribute must return
true.
Otherwise, if the element's draggable
content attribute has the
state false, the draggable
IDL attribute must return
false.
Otherwise, the element's draggable
content attribute has the
state auto. If the element is an img
element,
or, if the element is an a
element with an href
content attribute, the draggable
IDL attribute must return
true.
Otherwise, the draggable
DOM
must return false.
If the draggable
IDL attribute
is set to the value false, the draggable
content attribute must be
set to the literal value false
. If the draggable
IDL attribute is set to the
value true, the draggable
content attribute must be set to the literal value true
.
dropzone
attributeAll HTML elements may have the dropzone
content attribute set. When
specified, its value must be an unordered set of unique
space-separated tokens that are ASCII
case-insensitive. The allowed values are the following:
copy
Indicates that dropping an accepted item on the element will result in a copy of the dragged data.
move
Indicates that dropping an accepted item on the element will result in the dragged data being moved to the new location.
link
Indicates that dropping an accepted item on the element will result in a link to the original data.
s:
")Indicates that items with the drag data item kind Plain Unicode string and the drag data item type string set to a value that matches the remainder of the keyword are accepted.
f:
")Indicates that items with the drag data item kind File and the drag data item type string set to a value that matches the remainder of the keyword are accepted.
The dropzone
content
attribute's values must not have more than one of the three feedback
values (copy
, move
, and link
) specified. If none are
specified, the copy
value is
implied.
A dropzone
attribute matches a drag data store if
the dropzone
processing
steps result in a match.
A dropzone
attribute specifies an operation if
the dropzone
processing
steps result in a specified operation. The specified
operation is as given by those steps.
The dropzone
processing
steps are as follows. They either result in a match or not,
and separate from this result either in a specified operation or
not, as defined below.
Let value be the value of the dropzone
attribute.
Let keywords be the result of splitting value on spaces.
Let matched be false.
Let operation be unspecified.
For each value in keywords, if any, in the order that they were found in value, run the following steps.
Let keyword be the keyword.
If keyword is one of "copy
", "move
", or "link
", then: run the following
substeps:
If operation is still unspecified, then let operation be the string given by keyword.
Skip to the step labeled end of keyword below.
If keyword is shorter than three characters in length, then skip to the step labeled end of keyword below.
If the second character in keyword is not a U+003A COLON character (:), then skip to the step labeled end of keyword below.
Let kind code be the first character in keyword, converted to ASCII lowercase.
Jump to the appropriate step from the list below, based on the value of kind code:
Let kind be Plain Unicode string.
Let kind be File.
Skip to the step labeled end of keyword below.
Let type be the string consisting of all but the first two characters of keyword, converted to ASCII lowercase.
If there exist any items in the drag data store item list whose drag data item kind is the kind given in kind and whose drag data item type is type, then let matched be true.
End of keyword: Go on to the next keyword, if any, or the next step in the overall algorithm, if there are no more.
The algorithm results in a match if matched is true, and does not otherwise.
The algorithm results in a specified operation if operation is not unspecified. The specified operation, if one is specified, is the one given by operation.
The dropzone
IDL
attribute must reflect the content attribute of the
same name.
In this example, a div
element is made into a drop
target for image files using the dropzone
attribute. Images dropped
into the target are then displayed.
<div dropzone="copy f:image/png f:image/gif f:image/jpeg" ondrop="receive(event, this)"> <p>Drop an image here to have it displayed.</p> </div> <script> function receive(event, element) { var data = event.dataTransfer.items; for (var i = 0; i < data.length; i += 1) { if ((data[i].kind == 'file') && (data[i].type.match('^image/'))) { var img = new Image(); img.src = window.createObjectURL(data[i].getAsFile()); element.appendChild(img); } } } </script>
User agents must not make the data added to the
DataTransfer
object during the dragstart
event available to scripts
until the drop
event, because
otherwise, if a user were to drag sensitive information from one
document to a second document, crossing a hostile third document in
the process, the hostile document could intercept the data.
For the same reason, user agents must consider a drop to be
successful only if the user specifically ended the drag operation
— if any scripts end the drag operation, it must be considered
unsuccessful (canceled) and the drop
event must not be fired.
User agents should take care to not start drag-and-drop operations in response to script actions. For example, in a mouse-and-window environment, if a script moves a window while the user has his mouse button depressed, the UA would not consider that to start a drag. This is important because otherwise UAs could cause data to be dragged from sensitive sources and dropped into hostile documents without the user's consent.
execCommand
(commandId [, showUI [, value ] ] )Runs the action specified by the first argument, as described in the list below. The second and third arguments sometimes affect the action. (If they don't they are ignored.)
queryCommandEnabled
(commandId)Returns whether the given command is enabled, as described in the list below.
queryCommandIndeterm
(commandId)Returns whether the given command is indeterminate, as described in the list below.
queryCommandState
(commandId)Returns the state of the command, as described in the list below.
queryCommandSupported
(commandId)Returns true if the command is supported; otherwise, returns false.
queryCommandValue
(commandId)Returns the value of the command, as described in the list below.
The execCommand(commandId, showUI, value)
method on the
HTMLDocument
interface allows scripts to perform
actions on the current selection or at the current caret position.
Generally, these commands would be used to implement editor UI, for
example having a "delete" button on a toolbar.
There are three variants to this method, with one, two, and three arguments respectively. The showUI and value parameters, even if specified, are ignored except where otherwise stated.
When execCommand()
is invoked, the user agent must run the following steps:
A document is ready for editing host commands if it has a selection that is entirely within an editing host, or if it has no selection but its caret is inside an editing host.
The queryCommandEnabled(commandId)
method, when invoked, must
return true if the condition listed below under "Enabled When" for
the given commandId is true, and false
otherwise.
The queryCommandIndeterm(commandId)
method, when invoked, must
return true if the condition listed below under "Indeterminate When"
for the given commandId is true, and false
otherwise.
The queryCommandState(commandId)
method, when invoked, must
return the value expressed below under "State" for the given commandId.
The queryCommandSupported(commandId)
method, when invoked, must
return true if the given commandId is in the
list below, and false otherwise.
The queryCommandValue(commandId)
method, when invoked, must
return the value expressed below under "Value" for the given commandId.
The possible values for commandId, and their corresponding meanings, are as follows. These values must be compared to the argument in an ASCII case-insensitive manner.
bold
b
element (or, again,
unwrapped, or have that semantic inserted or removed, as defined by
the UA).b
element. False otherwise.true
"
if the expression given for the "State" above is true, the string
"false
" otherwise.createLink
a
element (or, again,
unwrapped, or have that semantic inserted or removed, as defined by
the UA). If the user agent creates an a
element or
modifies an existing a
element, then if the showUI argument is present and has the value false,
then the value of the value argument must be
used as the URL of the link. Otherwise, the user agent
should prompt the user for the URL of the link.false
".delete
false
".formatBlock
formatBlock
candidate, does nothing.Action: The user agent must run the following steps:
If the value argument wasn't specified, abort these steps without doing anything.
If the value argument has a leading U+003C LESS-THAN SIGN character (<) and a trailing U+003E GREATER-THAN SIGN character (>), then remove the first and last characters from value.
If value is (now) an ASCII
case-insensitive match for the tag name of an element
defined by this specification that is defined to be a
formatBlock
candidate, then,
for every position in the selection, take the nearest
formatBlock
candidate
ancestor element of that position that contains only
phrasing content, and, if that element is
editable, is not an editing host, and
has a parent element whose content model allows that parent to
contain any flow content, replace it with an
element in the HTML namespace whose name is value, and move all the children that were in it
to the new element, and copy all the attributes that were on it
to the new element.
If there is no selection, then, where in the description above refers to the selection, the user agent must act as if the selection was an empty range (with just one position) at the caret position.
false
".forwardDelete
false
".insertImage
img
element (or, again,
unwrapped, or have that semantic inserted or removed, as defined by
the UA). If the user agent creates an img
element or
modifies an existing img
element, then if the showUI argument is present and has the value false,
then the value of the value argument must be
used as the URL of the image. Otherwise, the user
agent should prompt the user for the URL of the image.false
".insertHTML
Action: The user agent must run the following steps:
If the document is an XML
document, then throw an INVALID_ACCESS_ERR
exception and abort these steps.
If the value argument wasn't specified, abort these steps without doing anything.
If there is a selection, act as if the user had requested that the selection be deleted.
Invoke the HTML fragment parsing algorithm
with an arbitrary orphan body
element owned by the
same Document
as the context element
and with the value argument as input.
Insert the nodes returned by the previous step into the document at the location of the caret, firing any mutation events as appropriate.
false
".insertLineBreak
false
".insertOrderedList
ol
element (or unwrapped, or, if
there is no selection, have that semantic inserted or removed
— the exact behavior is UA-defined).false
".insertUnorderedList
ul
element (or unwrapped, or, if
there is no selection, have that semantic inserted or removed
— the exact behavior is UA-defined).false
".insertParagraph
false
".insertText
false
".italic
i
element (or, again,
unwrapped, or have that semantic inserted or removed, as defined by
the UA).i
element. False otherwise.true
"
if the expression given for the "State" above is true, the string
"false
" otherwise.redo
false
".selectAll
false
".subscript
sub
element (or, again,
unwrapped, or have that semantic inserted or removed, as defined by
the UA).sub
element. False otherwise.true
"
if the expression given for the "State" above is true, the string
"false
" otherwise.superscript
sup
element (or unwrapped, or, if
there is no selection, have that semantic inserted or removed
— the exact behavior is UA-defined).sup
element. False otherwise.true
"
if the expression given for the "State" above is true, the string
"false
" otherwise.undo
false
".unlink
a
elements that have href
attributes and that are partially
or completely included in the current selection.a
element that has an href
attribute.false
".unselect
false
".vendorID-customCommandID
vendorID-customCommandID
so as to prevent clashes between extensions from different vendors
and future additions to this specification.false
".