Posted by Benjamin Niemann on 09/19/06 08:25

Hello,

lambertb@gmail.com wrote:
> Darin McGrew wrote:
>> lambertb@gmail.com wrote:
>> >>> Hi, is this possible to achieve this, and how?
>> >>> http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/779/derrrvw2.png
>>
>> lambertb@gmail.com wrote:
>> > I'd need this because the image I provided is just for sample. My
>> > select contains fairly large strings, and I don't have enough space on
>> > my page to set the width of my select wide enough to see all text.

You need a larger monitor. ;)

>> > So I
>> > was wondering if even the select element is somewhat small, it was
>> > possible to at least expand the box to a width so we see all text in
>> > the box that shows all elements when we click on the select.

But the text will be cropped, when the SELECT is not expanded, and the user
has to click on it, in order to read it - not a good idea.

>> It sounds to me like a SELECT element isn't the most appropriate choice.
>> Have you considered radio buttons or checkboxes, which would allow label
>> text that could wrap to multiple lines as necessary?
>
> no, really, select is the correct choice, believe me

Unless you provide more context, we have to guess and rely on our
experiences. And this experience tells us that in 99.9% the question is
not "How do I implement XYZ?", but "How do I construct a document so I
don't have to do XYZ?".

To me, this sounds like your layout is much too rigid, and you are suffering
from the consequences of this approach. You can't control how large the
browser window, font size, ... is anyway. If there is enough space to have
the (wide) select and submit button side-by-side, fine. When there is not
enough horizontal space, nobody gets hurt, if the submit button is placed
below the select and the user has to scroll a bit in order to see the
complete document (which is less efford than clicking on the select
control(s) in order to see which option is active).


HTH

--
Benjamin Niemann
Email: pink at odahoda dot de
WWW: http://pink.odahoda.de/

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