537Chapter 23 .The (Web design online) Form and Related Objects while
537Chapter 23 .The Form and Related Objects while the maxLengthproperty of a text box makes perfect sense in limiting the number of characters that a user can type into it, the property has no bearing whatsoever on form controls that act as clickable buttons. Similarly, you can switch a radio button or checkbox on or off by adjusting the checked property; however, that property simply doesn t apply to a text box. As the document object models have evolved, they have done so in an increasingly object-oriented way. The result in this form-oriented corner of the model is that all elements created via the tag have a long list of characteristics that they all share by virtue of being types of INPUT elements they inherit the properties and methods that are defined for any INPUT element. To try to limit the confusion, I divide the chapters in this book that deal with INPUT elements along functional lines (clickable buttons in one chapter, text fields in the other), and only list and discuss those INPUT element properties and methods that apply to the specific control type. In the meantime, this chapter continues with details of the FORM element object. Properties acceptCharset Value: String Read/Write NN2 NN3 NN4 NN6 IE3/J1 IE3/J2 IE4 IE5 IE5.5 Compatibility . The acceptCharset property represents the ACCEPTCHARSET attribute of the FORM element in HTML 4.0. The value is a list of one or more recognized character sets that the server receiving the form must support. For a list of registered character set names, see ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/iana/assignments/ character-sets. Related Items: None. action Value: URL String Read/Write (see text) NN2 NN3 NN4 NN6 IE3/J1 IE3/J2 IE4 IE5 IE5.5 Compatibility . . . The action property (along with the method and targetproperties) primarily functions for HTML authors whose pages communicate with server-based CGI scripts. This property is the same as the value you assign to the ACTION attribute of a