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by Ian Lloyd

title (HTML attribute)

Browser support full matrix
IE7 FF1+ Saf1.3+ Op9.2+
None Full Partial Full
Spec
Depr. Version
No HTML 4
title="string"

Example

The title attribute is applied to an acronym below:

<p>He marvelled at how fluid the <acronym title="Graphical User 
    Interface">GUI</acronym> was. It truly was a gooey GUI.</p>

Description

The abbreviation is expanded within the title attribute, which, while it’s not technically required for the acronym element, is advisable at least for the first instance of acronym; otherwise, you’d be indicating an abbreviation but not providing any further information about what it’s an abbreviation of.

Value

The content of this attribute is the fully expanded version of the content contained between the opening <acronym> and closing </acronym> tags.

Compatibility

IE5.5None
6.0Partial
7.0None
Firefox1.0Full
1.5Full
2.0Full
Safari1.3Partial
2.0Partial
3.0Partial
Opera9.2Full

Browser support is mixed for this attribute in this instance (note that title is used for other elements—the compatibility notes here relate only to its ability to draw attention to the presence of an acronym).

In the chart above, the support levels have been decided on this basis:

  • full where the browser displays the acronym with an underline and provides tooltip on mouseover
  • partial where the browser provides a tooltip on hover, but doesn’t display an underline (though it can be styled with CSS and accessed using JavaScript and the DOM)
  • none where no visual rendering is provided, and the attribute isn’t recognized in the DOM

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