Overview
By wrapping and image inside a hyperlink the image becomes a clickable link. This is often uses to allow the user to view a larger version of the image. It can also be used to create images representing various sections of your website, and when clicked the user is taken to the intended location.
<a href = "https://www.1smartchicken.com">
<img decoding="async" src="/images/logo.png" alt="1SMARTchicken Logo" width="100" height="85" />
</a>ImageMaps
Another type of image link is the ImageMap. An image map is basically an image with specified sections mapped to accept a different link. So we have one image, but it can have multiple placed it can be clicked with multiple links to different target locations.
In the following, the image is first placed and given the usemap attribute. Then it is mapped using the map tag (on line 4) and using a name attribute to match the usemap attribute in the image. This is how they’re connected. Finally, inside the map, areas are defined to use as clickable regions.
<img src = /images/logo.png alt = "1SMARTchicken Logo" usemap = "#logo" />
<!-- create map -->
<map name = "logo">
<area shape="rect" coords="15,15,60,60" alt="Link to Contact Us page" href="/pages/contact-us.html" />
<area shape="circle" coords="60,60,30" alt="Link to Home page" href="index.html" />
<area shape="poly" coords="40,21,60,76,14,34,76,222" alt="Link to About Us page" href="/pages/about-us.html" />
</map>Attributes
There are three “shapes” we can use to define our clickable area.
| Shape | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
| rect | Defines a rectangular region | The first two numbers are the top left point of the rectangle and the last two numbers are the bottom right point of the rectangle |
| circle | Defines a circular region | The first two numbers represent the location of the center of the circle; the third number is the radius of the circle. |
| poly | Defines a polygonal region | The poly shape uses many sets of x/y coordinates to create any kind of shape by connecting all the points with straight lines |
There are also a number of area attributes (much like link attributes) that can be used in the <area> tag.
| Attribute | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| alt | text | Specifies an alternate text for the area (required) |
| coords | coordinates | Specifies the coordinates of the area |
| download | filename | Specifies that the target will be downloaded when a user clicks on the hyperlink |
| href | URL | Specifies the hyperlink target for the area |
| hreflang | language_code | Specifies the language of the target URL |
| media | media query | Specifies what media/device the target URL is optimized for |
| referrerpolicy | no-referrer no-referrer-when-downgrade origin origin-when-cross-origin same-origin strict-origin-when-cross-origin unsafe-url | Specifies which referrer information to send with the link |
| rel | alternate author bookmark help license next nofollow noreferrer prefetch prev search tag | Specifies the relationship between the current document and the target URL |
| shape | default rect circle poly | Specifies the shape of the area |
| target | _blank _parent _self _top framename | Specifies where to open the target URL |
| type | media_type | Specifies the media type of the target URL |
HTML Notes:
- In our HTML section the term “tag” and “element” are often used interchangeably to refer to both the tag used to create a page element and the element created by the tag (<p> tag = <p> element = paragraph on the page)
- HTML5 is not case sensitive; so <P> is the same as <p>, <H1> is the same as <h1>
- Global attributes can be used with all HTML tags and are therefore not mentioned on every tag page
- To write clean, readable HTML code, it is best to use indentation whereas elements within elements are indented (tabbed or spaces) to create something that looks like a project outline
- The browser will automatically remove any extra spaces and lines in your HTML code when the page is displayed
- Double quotes or single quotes can be used around HTML attribute values, but when the attribute value itself contains one form of quote, it will be necessary to use the other around the attribute
We’d like to acknowledge that we learned a great deal of our coding from W3Schools and TutorialsPoint, borrowing heavily from their teaching process and excellent code examples. We highly recommend both sites to deepen your experience, and further your coding journey. We’re just hitting the basics here at 1SMARTchicken.