Drop-down lists

Often we need to have visitors make a choice from a list. For this purpose, we can use the <select> element in combination with the <option> tag for every inpidual choice. The text portion of the <option> element is what will be displayed, and the value of the value attribute is what will be passed on for processing. It is very useful to make the first option the one that is not to be chosen, as in the following example:

<select name="colorlist" id="colorlist">
<option value="0">Choose a color</option>
<option value="red">Red</option>
<option value="blue">Blue</option>
<option value="green">Green</option>
<option disabled value="orange">Orange</option>
</select>

The disabled attribute

Both the <select> and the <option> support disabled in case you want to enable an option (or the entire drop-down list) to be displayed but not selectable.

The selected attribute

If you want to preselect one of the choices, use the selected attribute of <option>.