The Document Object
The Document object represents the current HTML page in the browser. The Document object also represents any object on the HTML page, such as a link, a form, a button, or an ActiveX object. The properties and methods for the Document object must be fully qualified when used. The Document object supports many properties and methods that modify the HTML page. These properties and methods, such as LinkColor and Write, must be used inline
when the HTML page is loading. These properties and methods cannot be called after the HTML page is loaded because the Internet Explorer parses the HTML only during page load. VBScript code can be executed inline as the load occurs. The following code shows an example where text is being written to an HTML page and the background color is being set to white:
<SCRIPT LANGUAGE="VBScript">
Document.Write "<H2>Inline HTML modification</H2>"
Document.BGColor="#FFFFFF"
</SCRIPT>
Executing inline code to modify an HTML page while it loads is known as immediate execution. Immediate execution is a valuable technique because it allows you to create web pages that are different each time they are loaded. As a simple example, the following code displays the date of the last update for the web page:
Document.Write "<P><CENTER>"
Document.Write "Page last updated"
Document.Write Document.LastModified
Document.Write "</CENTER><P>"
This technique can be expanded to display new pictures or text on the basis of the current date, or even randomly.
Tables 3-6 and 3-7 describe the properties and methods of the Document object.
Table 3-6.Document Object Properties
| Property | Type | Description | Usage |
| LinkColor | String | Returns or sets the link color. Accepts a string input representing the hexadecimal color value or a specific color command | Document.LinkColor= "#FF0000" Document.LinkColor= "Red" |
| ALinkColor | String | Returns or sets the anchor color. Accepts a string input representing the hexadecimal color value or a specific color command. | Document.ALinkColor="#FF0000" Document.ALinkColor="Red" |
| VLinkColor | String | Returns or sets the visited link color. Accepts a string input representing the hexadecimal color value or a specific color command. | Document.VLinkColor="#FF0000" Document.VLinkColor="Red" |
| BGColor | String | Returns or sets the background color. Accepts a string input representing the hexadecimal color value or a specific color command. | Document.BGColor="#FF0000" Document.BGColor="Red" |
| FGColor | String | Returns or sets the foreground color. Accepts a string input representing the hexadecimal color value or a specific color command. | Document.FGColor = "#FF0000" Document.FGColor = "Red" |
| Anchors | Object | Returns an Anchors array. | Set MyObject= Document.Anchors(1) |
| Links | Object | Returns a Links array. | Set MyObject= Document.Links(1) |
| Forms | Object | Returns a Forms array. | Set MyObject= Document.Forms(1) |
| Location | String | Returns a string representing the complete URL for the current document. | MyVar= Document.Location |
| LastModified | String | Returns a string representing the date when the current page was last modified. | MyVar= Document.LastModified |
| Title | String | Returns the read-only title of the current HTML page. | MyVar= Document.Title |
| Cookie | String | Returns or sets the cookie for the current document. | MyVar= Document.Cookie |
| Referrer | String | Returns the URL of the referring document. | MyVar= Document.Referrer |
Table 3-7.Document Object Methods
| Method | Return Type | Description | Usage |
| Write | None | Writes the given string into the current document. | Document.Write "Hello" |
| WriteLn | None | Writes the given string into the current document with the addition of a newline character at the end. (This works only if the scripting section is surrounded by <PRE></PRE> tags.) | Document.WriteLn "Hello" |
| Open | None | Opens the document stream for output. | Document.Open |
| Close | None | Updates the screen to display all the strings written after the last Open method call. | Document.Close |
| Clear | None | Closes the document output stream and writes the data to the screen. | Document.Clear |