Martha's COIN 74 Week 10

Martha's COIN 74 Week 10 Exercises

Day Two - Layer Options

SOURCE: Robert D. Cormia's online text
my comments in blue

You can set default layer options by going to the Preferences window for Layers. Edit>Preferences and click on the Layers Category. In Mac, the Preferences are in the Application Menu: Dreamweaver>Preferences.

Layer Preferences

The options for the Visibility dropdown menu in the Layers Preferences are default, inherit, visible, and hidden.

invisibility dropdown menu

Default: no visibility property is assigned and most browsers inherit the visibility of the parent object.
Inherit: inherits the visibility of the parent object.
Visible: displays the layer's content regardless of the parent's value.
Hidden: the layer content will be transparent regardless of the parent's value.

Why would you want to change the visibility of a layer?

In the example page, I used hidden and visible layers to hide and show layers based on interaction of the user. Hiding and showing layers enables you to "create dynamic content in response to user interaction". - Page, DW MX: Training from the Source

Much of what you set in the Layers Preferences can also be set for each individual layer in the Property Inspector for that layer. You can set the width and height to pixels or percentages.

Property Inspector view of layers

The options for the Overflow dropdown menu in the PI for the Layer are visible, hidden, scroll, and auto.

dropdown-overflow_options

Like table cells, layers expand to fit content. If you've assigned specific width and height attributes for a layer and then fill the layer with contents that exceed your specifications, the Overflow settings will determine how the content is displayed.

Visible: displays the entire content and causes the layer to expand down and to the right to accommodate the contents.
Hidden: displays only the content that fits within your specified width and height and clips or hides whatever does not fit in your specified width and height.
Scroll: displays scroll bars even if there is not enough content to require scrolling.
Auto: displays scroll bars only if the contents are greater than your specified width and height.

You can set the Left, Right, Top, and Bottom Clip values to define a clipping area. The clipping area defines the visible part of the layer. The areas outside of the clipping area are hidden regardless of the Overflow settings.

clipping areas

Click Link to continue to Part B of Lesson 10