HTML ondragstart Event Attribute

Description

The ondragstart HTML event attribute is fired when the user starts to drag an element or text selection. It is one of several events that are used to implement drag-and-drop functionality in HTML.

To make an element draggable, you must set the draggable attribute to true. Once you have done this, you can use the ondragstart event attribute to execute JavaScript code when the user begins to drag the element.

The ondragstart event handler function receives an Event object as its parameter. This object contains information about the event, such as the coordinates of the mouse pointer and the element that is being dragged.

You can use the Event object to prevent the default behavior of the drag-and-drop operation, or to modify it in some way. For example, you could use the Event object to change the appearance of the dragged element, or to restrict the area of the screen where the element can be dropped.

Here is an example of how to use the ondragstart event attribute:

<div id="draggable" draggable="true" ondragstart="myDragStartFunction()">
  This is a draggable element.
</div>

<script>
function myDragStartFunction(event) {
  // Prevent the default behavior of the drag-and-drop operation.
  event.preventDefault();

  // Change the appearance of the dragged element.
  event.target.style.backgroundColor = "red";
}
</script>

When the user starts to drag the draggable element in this example, the myDragStartFunction() function will be executed. This function will prevent the default behavior of the drag-and-drop operation and change the background color of the dragged element to red.

In HTML5, seven event attributes were added that are used at various stages of the drag and drop operation:

Events that occur with the drag object:

ondragstart (triggered at the beginning of an item drag operation).
ondrag (triggered when an item is dragged).
ondragend (triggered when the user has finished dragging and dropping the item).

Events that occur with the object being dragged onto:

ondragenter (when the item will be transferred to the specified zone (target for transfer)).
ondragover (triggered when an element is moved over a valid transfer zone).
ondragleave (triggered when an element leaves an acceptable zone for transfer).
ondrop (triggered after the dragged item descends on the drag object).

Syntax

<element ondragstart="script">

Values

scriptThe name of the script to use when the event has been triggered.

Example

Consider an example in which the <p> element can be moved between two <div> blocks. To do this, we will set four event attributes on the <div> blocks and three on the moveable <p> paragraph.

When we start moving the <p> element, two events are triggered: the first is triggered at the beginning of the operation of dragging the element with the mouse (ondragstart), on which we installed a script that allows you to store data and its type (setData method), the second ondrag event fires at the moment the drag started and informs us of this in the <p id="info"> </p> element.

By default, items cannot be placed in other items. To make this accessible (canceling the default browser) we use the preventDefault() method, which is triggered when an element is moved over a valid zone for transfer (the ondragover event attribute)

ondragenter event occurs when the element is moved to the specified zone, and a script is triggered that sets the background color to yellow and the dashed border to black. When an element leaves a given zone, the border and background style values are returned to their original form (ondragleave event)

The example uses two more event attributes: the first is ondrop, which is triggered when an element descends onto a drag object, a script is launched that allows you to receive data (getData method) and the second attribute of events is ondragend, which is triggered when the user has finished dragging and dropping the element and runs a script that informs us about the completion of the drag and drop procedure in the <p id="info"> </p> element.

HTML

<!DOCTYPE html> 

  <html> 

  <head>

    <title>Attributes for mouse events.  Drag and drop.</title> 

    <style> 

    .dragndrop {

      width: 200px;

      height: 50px;

      border: 3px solid orange;

      padding: 30px;

      text-align: center;

      background: cornsilk;

      float: left;

      margin-right: 20px;

    }

    </style> 

  </head> 

  <body> 

  <p>Move the HTML &lt;p&gt; element between the two rectangles:</p> 

  <div class="dragndrop" ondragenter="dragEnter(event)" ondragleave="dragLeave(event)" ondrop="drop(event)" ondragover="allowDrop(event)"> 

  <p ondragstart="dragStart(event)" ondrag="dragging(event)" ondragend="dragEnd(event)" draggable="true" id="anyid">Move me!</p> 

  </div> 

  <div class="dragndrop" ondragenter="dragEnter(event)" ondragleave="dragLeave(event)" ondrop="drop(event)" ondragover="allowDrop(event)"> </div> 

  <p id="info"> </p> 

<script>

function dragStart ( event ) { 

  event.dataTransfer.setData( "Text" , event.target.id);  

} 

function dragging ( event ) { 

  document.getElementById("info").innerHTML = "The &lt;p&gt; element is being dragged (ondrag)"; 

} 

function allowDrop ( event ) { 

  event.preventDefault();  

} 

function dragEnter ( event ) { 

  if (event.target.className == "dragndrop") { 

    event.target.style.background = "yellow"; 

    event.target.style.border = "3px dotted black"; 

  } 

} 

function dragLeave ( event ) { 

  if (event.target.className == "dragndrop") { 

    event.target.style.background = ""; 

    event.target.style.border = ""; 

  } 

} 

function drop ( event ) { 

  var data = event.dataTransfer.getData ("Text");

  event.target.appendChild(document.getElementById(data));

} 

function dragEnd ( event ) { 

  document.getElementById("info").innerHTML="Draggable &lt;p&gt; element dropped onto the drag object (ondragend)"; 

}

</script> 

  </body> 

</html>

Result

Editor

Browser Support

The following information will show you the current browser support for the HTML ondragstart event attribute. Hover over a browser icon to see the version that first introduced support for this HTML event attribute.