float Attribute | styleFloat Property

Sets or retrieves on which side of the object the text will flow.

Syntax

HTML	{ float : sFloat }
Scripting	object.style.styleFloat [ = sFloat ]

Possible Values

sFloat

String that specifies or receives one of the following values. none Default. Object displays where it appears in the text. left Text flows to the right of the object. right Text flows to the left of the object.

The property is read/write for all objects except the following, for which it is read-only: currentStyle. The property has a default value of none. The Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) attribute is not inherited.

Expressions can be used in place of the preceding value(s), as of Microsoft® Internet Explorer 5. For more information, see About Dynamic Properties.

Remarks

With a value of left or right, the object is treated as block-level—that is, the display property is ignored. For example, floating paragraphs allow the paragraphs to appear side-by-side on a page.

Objects following a floating object move in relation to the position of the floating object.

The floating object is moved left or right until it reaches the border, padding, or margin of another block-level object.

div and span objects must have a width set for the float attribute to render. In Microsoft® Internet Explorer 5, div and span objects are assigned a width by default and will render if a width is not specified.

Examples

This example shows how the float attribute affects the flow of the text. The sphere image floats to the left of the text, and the cone floats to the right.

<img src="sphere.jpg" style="float:left">
<img src="cone.jpg" style="float:right">

This feature requires Microsoft® Internet Explorer 4.0 or later. Click the following icon to install the latest version. Then reload this page to view the sample.

This example uses inline scripting and the styleFloatproperty to swap images when the mouse moves over the button.

<IMG ID=oSphere SRC="sphere.jpeg" STYLE="float:left">
<IMG ID=oCone SRC="cone.jpeg" STYLE="float:right">
:
<BUTTON onmouseover="oSphere.style.styleFloat='right';
oCone.style.styleFloat='left'"
onmouseout="oSphere.style.styleFloat='left';
oCone.style.styleFloat='right'">
Flip-flop images.
</BUTTON> 

This feature requires Microsoft® Internet Explorer 4.0 or later. Click the following icon to install the latest version. Then reload this page to view the sample.

Standards Information

This property is defined in Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), Level 1 (CSS1) .

Applies To

A, ADDRESS, APPLET, B, BIG, BLOCKQUOTE, BUTTON, CENTER, CITE, CODE, currentStyle, CUSTOM, DD, defaults, DFN, DIR, DIV, DL, DT, EM, EMBED, FIELDSET, FORM, hn, HR, I, IFRAME, IMG, INPUT type=button, INPUT type=checkbox, INPUT type=file, INPUT type=image, INPUT type=password, INPUT type=radio, INPUT type=reset, INPUT type=submit, INPUT type=text, ISINDEX, KBD, LABEL, LEGEND, LI, LISTING, MARQUEE, MENU, OBJECT, OL, P, PRE, RT, RUBY, runtimeStyle, S, SAMP, SELECT, SMALL, SPAN, STRIKE, STRONG, style, SUB, SUP, TABLE, TEXTAREA, TT, U, UL, VAR, XMP