Webpage Workshop: Home » XHTML 1.0 language reference » Form control label

Form control label

This element is used to associate a description with a form control. It can either enclose the associated form control(s), or reference them in its attributes.

<label
    accesskey="key"
    class="class name(s)"
    dir="ltr | rtl"
    for="identifier"
    id="unique identifier"
    lang="language code"
    style="style information"
    title="text"
>
</label>

Key:
‡ = Required attribute
** = Transitional only

Explanation of attributes

accesskey: used to define a key on the keyboard that can be used to select this element. This generally depends on the browser and operating system being used.

class: used to state which class(es) the element belongs to. It is possible to indicate more than one class for an element by separating each class name with a space character. This attribute is normally used in combination with a stylesheet in order to associate the elements with particular styles defined within the stylesheet.

dir: used to set the direction of the text in combination with the language set in the lang attribute. The available values are "ltr" (left to right) and "rtl" (right to left), with the default value being "ltr".

for: this attribute is used to specify which form control the label is describing. It should contain the value of the id attribute of the associated form control, with the following exception; if the form control associated with the label is enclosed within the label element, then this attribute is not required. It is possible to use more than one value within this attribute in order to associate the label with more than one form control.

id: used to specify a unique alphanumeric identifier to the element. This is usually used in combination with stylesheets in order to apply a style to one particular instance of an element. Only one element, regardless of type, can be given a particular id.

lang: used to indicate the language being used in the text contained within the element. The value of this attribute takes on the form of the ISO standard lanuage abbreviations found in RFC 3066. A list of these codes can be found on the ISO language codes page.

style: used to specify an inline style to apply to the element. The styles defined here override the styles declared in the header section.

title: used to define an advisory text that may be displayed as a tooltip when a mouse is used to hover over the element.

Event handlers

The following event handlers are defined for this element:

Compatibility

Description: Support of form control label and attributes in various browsers
Test Internet Explorer 6+ Netscape 4 Mozilla and Netscape 6+ Opera 6+ MSN TV (WebTV) Konqeuror 3.0+
Basic element support  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  Yes 
Attribute: accesskey  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  ? 
Attribute: class  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  ? 
Attribute: dir  Yes  No  Yes  No  No  ? 
Attribute: for  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  Yes 
Attribute: id  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  ? 
Attribute: lang  Yes  No  Yes  No  No  ? 
Attribute: style  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  ? 
Attribute: title  Yes  No  Yes  Yes  No  Yes 

Key:
The browser icons are explained in the below list:
Internet Explorer 6+ = Microsoft Internet Explorer 6+
Netscape 4 = Netscape Communicator 4
Mozilla and Netscape 6+ = Mozilla and Netscape Navigator 6+
Opera 7+ = Opera 7+
MSN TV (WebTV) = MSN TV (aka. WebTV)
Konqeuror 3.0+ = Konqueror 3.0+