Each of InvisibLink's parameters is explained below, with reference to the clickable example code in the left frame: you can click a parameter from the example code to jump to its explanation, or simply read this page from top to toe, clicking the red references to other parameters to skip between them as necessary.
Most of InvisibLink's parameters have default settings which are mentioned below. If the default setting is the option you'd like to use in your own implementation, you can leave that parameter out of your HTML code.
The 'Archive' attribute & 'CabBase' parameter
JAR (Java ARchive) and CAB (cabinet) files are archives containing Java class files in compressed form, making them easier to handle and quicker to download. Most modern browsers are able to read one or other of these formats, and the Archive attribute and CabBase parameter tell the browser the name of the archive file to open. The .JAR, .CAB and .CLASS files must all be in the same directory, and the CODEBASE= attribute is used in the normal way, if required, specifying the absolute or relative location of this directory. Older browsers that are unable to read either the JAR or the CAB file will instead read the loose CLASS files.
Width & Height
In general, the applet dimensions can be whatever you like. Obviously the width must be sufficient to display your Label at the chosen LabelFont size. If the applet is to act as a link, increasing the width of the applet will move the Link text further to the right, and increasing the height will move it further downward. To make the applet as small as possible, reduce the ButtonHeight as far as possible (ensuring that your Label is still readable), set VerticalOffset to zero, switch on AutoWrap and set LeftMargin and RightMargin to zero. Then reduce the applet height so that the Link is immediately below the last line of Text (if the applet acts as a link) or until the bottom of the applet is immediately below the last line of Text (if it doesn't).
TIP: When gauging applet dimensions, it can be useful to temporarily set the BgColor to something that stands out from your page background.
Copyright
This parameter must be included or the applet will not run, whether registered or unregistered. To prevent mistakes we recommend that you copy/paste it into your code from the Getting Started page: it is case-sensitive, single-spaced throughout and should appear on a single line. If there's a problem with this parameter, you'll see a status-bar message that reads "Copyright parameter missing or incorrect" which should lead you to the problem.
BgColor
The applet's background color as a hex triplet. For best results, set this to the same value as that of your page's body-background. The default is 000000 (black).
ButtonHeight
Sets the height of the area in which the arrow and the Label are placed. The default is 22. The Label is always positioned in the vertical center of this area. In most cases, you can leave this setting at its default. However you may want to reduce it if you need to minimize applet height or increase it to accommodate a larger LabelFont.
Label
The text to be displayed in the Label area. This will always be displayed on a single line. The default is blank (no Label). If ShowArrow is set to 'yes' (its default) the Label will be positioned slightly to the arrow's right; otherwise the Label will be placed at the extreme left of the applet. However, in either case it can be moved using the LabelIndent parameter .
LabelFont
A comma-delimited string giving the name, style and size of the font you want to use for the Label. The default settings are TimesRoman, in bold, at size 14, which would be written as TimesRoman,bold,14. Two important things to note: first, there must be no spaces in this entry; second, the three items must appear in the order name,style,size. Note that the style part of this setting can be plain, bold, italic or bolditalic, and these are not case-sensitive.
LabelStartColor
A hex triplet giving the starting color of the Label (the color when see when the applet first starts). By default, this will be the same as your chosen BgColor but it can be anything you like.
LabelEndColor
The color of the Label when it has finished fading up. The default is FF0000 (red).
Text
The text that should appear in the Text area of the applet. The default is blank (no text). By default the text will be autowrapped between the LeftMargin and RightMargin if it cannot fit onto a single line. There is no limit to the number of lines that can be displayed, provided your applet dimensions are sufficient to display them.
If you prefer to control line-breaks yourself, you can switch AutoWrap to 'no' and manually delimit the text by inserting delimiter symbols where you wish the line-breaks to occur, as explained in the Delimiter parameter.
TextFont
Another comma-delimited string giving the font to be used for the Text. This takes the default Helvetica,plain,11 and follows the same rules as the LabelFont parameter.
TextStartColor
A hex triplet giving the starting color of the Text (the color when see when the applet first starts). By default, this will be the same as your chosen BgColor but it can be anything you like.
TextEndColor
The color of the Text when it has finished fading up. The default is FF0000 (red).
ShowArrow
A simple yes or no to whether the arrow symbol should be displayed, with a default setting of yes. If the arrow is displayed, it acts as the main controller for the entire applet: moving the mouse over it will fade up the Label, Text and Link.
ArrowColor
Providing ShowArrow is set to 'yes' (its default), this parameter sets its color. The default is that it will match your chosen LabelEndColor. The arrow's color does not fade, so only one color is specified for it.
LabelReact
Another yes or no parameter with a default of no. If set to yes, the Label also acts as the main controller for the applet along with the arrow (giving users a bigger target to hit with the mouse, and making the applet more intuitive to use). If the ShowArrow parameter is set to 'no', LabelReact is automatically switched on to ensure that something can control the fading!
LabelIndent
By default, as mentioned earlier, the Label is positioned slightly to the right of the arrow (ShowArrow is on) or at the extreme left of the applet (if ShowArrow is off). This parameter allows the Label to be moved horizontally left or right by entering a positive or negative figure here (such as 12 or -2). The default is 0.
LeftMargin
This parameter specifies where the contents of the Text parameter will be aligned in relation to the left of the applet. The default is 20, indenting the Text 20 pixels from the left edge.
RightMargin
If AutoWrap is not used, this parameter has no effect. With AutoWrap switched on (its default), this parameter sets the point at which the contents of your Text parameter should be wrapped to a new line. The default is 10 pixels from the right-hand edge of the applet.
VerticalOffset
The default for this parameter is 4 pixels. This means that the first line of your Text will be placed 4 pixels below the area containing the Label and arrow (defined by the ButtonHeight parameter). Increasing the VerticalOffset moves the Text downward. Setting it to 0 moves it about as close to the label area as you're likely to want it. However, you can enter a negative figure here (such as -6) to move the text upwards into the label area, and even overlap the Label itself if you really want to!
AutoWrap
A yes or no parameter specifying whether InvisibLink's automatic text-wrapping should be used, taking a default of yes. Autowrapping reads the contents of your Text parameter and breaks it into lines according to the size of TextFont you chose and your Left and Right margin settings. Wrapping takes place in real time, ensuring that your text will always be displayed perfectly on any Java-capable platform.
Delimiter
The AutoWrap feature is a trouble-free way to display multiple lines of text, but it doesn't allow you to insert paragraph breaks or indent single lines by adding hard spaces, etc. To do this, set AutoWrap to 'no' and insert delimiter symbols wherever a line break should occur so that you handle the wrapping yourself. This parameter allows you to specify the symbol that InvisibLink should identify as an 'end-of-line' symbol. By default the symbol used is | (the pipe symbol). This was chosen as being the symbol you're least likely to want to actually display, so most of the time you won't need to include this parameter. However, if you need to display the pipe symbol within your Text, you'll need to include this parameter to specify a different symbol to be used.
As an example of delimited text, your Text parameter might look like this:
which would be displayed as:
(provided that your applet is wide enough for these lines).
Delimiting text in this way can be a slow process. The easiest way is to set your LeftMargin as desired and enter your text into the Text parameter without any delimiters. Then look at the result in your browser. The text will vanish off the right of the applet, so insert the first delimiter after the last fully-visible word. Save the file, refresh the browser to take another look, and insert the second delimiter where the second lines vanishes, and so on.
NOTE: A delimiter symbol must always follow a valid character (such as a letter, number or space). It cannot immediately follow another delimiter. So to create a paragraph break, enter two delimiters separated by a space.
FadeSpeed
This is essentially a delay parameter for the fading effect, where lower figures result in faster fades. The default is 25. Speeds are very finely-tuned, so anything between 1 (for an immediate fade with little graduality) and 100 or higher (for a slow fade) might be effective.
UseHandCursor
A yes or no parameter that determines whether or not a typical 'web-style' hand cursor is used when the mouse moves over the Link. The default value is yes, so you need include this parameter only if you want to set it to 'no' and stick to the default pointer. This feature is applied only when an applet is running in a Java 1.1-compatible browser (Internet Explorer 4x or higher, Netscape Navigator 4.07 or higher). In other browsers, this parameter is ignored and the default pointer will be used.
URL1, URL2, URL3, URL4
The URL(s) of up to 4 Web pages or other resources you want the applet to fetch when clicked. If one or more of these parameters is included, InvisibLink switches into Link mode putting the remaining parameters below into operation. Without a URL parameter, the following parameters are ignored.
Any of these URLs may be absolute URLs (http://www.travelers.com/mute) or relative URLs (../../MyPage.htm). If you wish to link to fewer than the maximum 4 files, simply leave out the unnecessary URL parameters and their corresponding Target parameters.
When using more than a single URL parameter, bear in mind that these parameters are processed in numerical order. In most cases, this will make no difference. However, it does become important if you wish to change the contents of the frame containing the InvisibLink applet: this must be the last URL to be processed! If, for example, you were using all four parameters, and trying to load something over the applet's frame in URL2, the files referenced by URL3 and URL4 would not be loaded because InvisibLink would have been stopped before these parameters could be processed.
Note that although Java does support #name anchors appended to URLs (to link to particular parts of a page), not all browsers will react correctly to it, so its use is generally best avoided.
As an aid to color and position/size testing, you can prefix your URL parameters' values with the dollar sign $ to prevent InvisibLink linking anywhere when clicked.
Target1, Target2, Target3, Target4
A text-string specifying the name of the frame or window in which you want the correspondingly-numbered URL to be opened. The default is _top. Remember that frame/window names are case-sensitive. If you specify a name that doesn't match that of a current frame or window, a new window will be opened and assigned this new name.
Link
Provided one or more URLs have been specified, this parameter lets you choose the clickable text you want the applet to display as the link. This text can be any length (providing that you applet width is sufficient to display it) and is always placed 10 pixels from the right and bottom of the applet. The default text for the Link is Go!.
LinkFont
A comma-delimited string giving the font to be used for the Link. This takes the default Helvetica,plain,12 and follows the same rules as the LabelFont parameter.
LinkStartColor
A hex triplet giving the starting color of the Link (the color when see when the applet first starts). By default, this will be the same as your chosen BgColor but it can be anything you like. Note that although you might choose a color that makes the Link visible when the applet starts, it will not function as a link until the applet fades up.
LinkEndColor
The color of the Link when it has finished fading up. The default is FF0000 (red).
LinkBlurColor
When the mouse moves over or clicks the Link, a copy of the text is shown behind it, slightly offset, using the LinkBlurColor. The default is a lighter version of your LinkEndColor, but as this won't be suitable for all backgrounds and color setups, you can enter any color you like here as a hex triplet (including making this the same as the BgColor to prevent its display).
LinkMessage
An optional message to be displayed in the browser statusbar when the mouse enters the Link area. The default is blank (no message).
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