Availability

DOM Level 2 Views

Also Implements

ViewCSS

If the DOM implementation supports the CSS module, any object that implements the AbstractView interface also implements the ViewCSS interface. For convenience, the method defined by the ViewCSS interface is listed under "Methods."

Properties

readonly Document document

The Document object that is displayed by this View object. This Document object also implements the DocumentView interface.

Methods

getComputedStyle( ) [DOM Level 2 CSS]

This ViewCSS method returns a read-only CSSStyleDeclaration that represents the computed style information for a specific document element.

Description

In the DOM, a view is an object that displays a document in some way. The Window object of client-side JavaScript is such a view. This AbstractView interface is a very preliminary step toward standardizing some of the properties and methods of the Window object. It simply specifies that all View objects have a property named document that refers to the document they display. In addition, if an implementation supports CSS style sheets, all View objects also implement the ViewCSS interface and define a getComputedStyle( ) method for determining how an element is actually rendered in the view.

The document property gives every view a reference to the document it displays. The reverse is true also: every document has a reference to the view that displays it. If a DOM implementation supports the View module, the object that implements the Document interface also implements the DocumentView interface. This DocumentView interface defines a defaultView property that refers to the window in which the document is displayed.

This interface has the word "Abstract" in its name to emphasize the fact that it is merely the beginning of a standardized window interface. In order to be useful, future levels of the DOM standard will have to introduce a new interface that extends AbstractView and adds other properties or methods.

See Also

Document.defaultView

Type of

Document.defaultView