Acronym (thing)

Very similar to abbr, acronym is an HTML tag that is used to, specify an acronym within an HTML document. This seldom used tag, allows user agents, spell checkers, text-to-speech applications, translation programs, and search engines to utilize and navigate your web pages easier. (Please read the other writeups in this node if you do not know the definition of the word "acronym".)

See also: abbr

Attributes

While it technically does not have any required HTML attributes, it is fairly useless without the title attribute. The title attribute allows you to specify what the acronym actually stands for. Other attributes include:

• HTML Core Attributes
  • class (type: CDATA) - space separated list of classes
  • id (type: ID) - document-wide unique id
  • style (type: Style Sheet) - associated style information
  • title (type: Text) - advisory title/amplification; this information is usually displayed through tooltips
     
• HTML International Attributes (I18N)
  • dir (type: Custom) - specifies the direction of weak or neutral text; valid values include ltr (left to right) or rtl (right to left)
  • lang (type: Custom) - specifies the Language Code of the language used in the acronym
     
• HTML Event Attributes
  • onclick (type: Script) - a pointer button was clicked
  • ondblclick (type: Script) - a pointer button was double clicked
  • onkeydown (type: Script) - a key was pressed down
  • onkeypress (type: Script) - a key was pressed and released
  • onkeyup (type: Script) - a key was released
  • onmousedown (type: Script) - a pointer button was pressed down
  • onmousemove (type: Script) - a pointer was moved within
  • onmouseout (type: Script) - a pointer was moved away
  • onmouseover (type: Script) - a pointer was moved onto
  • onmouseup (type: Script) - a pointer button was released

Usage

To use the acronym tag, simply place opening and closing HTML tags around the letters, and use the title attribute to specify the long description of what each of the letters stand for (it's a good idea to also add the "lang" attribute). For example:

The <acronym lang="en-us" title="North Atlantic Treaty Organisation">NATO</acronym> airplane uses <acronym lang="en-us" title="RAdio Detection And Ranging">RADAR</acronym> to navigate.

On browsers that support this tag, this will typically cause a tooltip to appear containing the title attribute when the mouse is placed over the words "NATO" or "RADAR".

Everything2 Support?

E2 does provide limited support for the acronym tag. In addition to the tag itself, Everything2 allows the use of the "lang" and "title" attributes. It should be noted that there is a bug in how E2 parses the title attribute for some tags (including acronym), so if your title contains spaces, you may only see the first word. Below is how your browser displays the example above here on Everything2:

The NATO airplane uses RADAR to navigate.

If you would like to see how the example above would work without the E2 bug, copy and paste it into your Notelet Nodelet.

Common Browser Implementations*

Most web browsers support this tag, as it has been around for several years and is part of the W3C's HTML 4 specification. In addition to tooltips, Mozilla and Netscape display a dotted line under the acronym. Opera provides a similar implementation. Internet Explorer simply provides a tooltip, but provides no visual clue that there is something special about the word(s).

Previous HTML Tag: abbr
Next HTML Tag: address (next E2 supported HTML tag: b)
See Also: HTML tags and HTML attributes

* Please feel free to send me information about how other browsers implement this tag.