SHARE THIS PAGE

JS & DOM Reference

Overview

JavaScript Objects

JS Array JS Boolean JS Date JS Math JS Number JS String JS RegExp JS Global

Browser Objects

Window Navigator Screen History Location

Core DOM Objects

DOM Node DOM NodeList DOM NamedNodeMap DOM Document DOM Element DOM Attr

HTML DOM Objects

DOM Document DOM Events DOM Elements
DOM Anchor DOM Area DOM Base DOM Body DOM Button DOM Form DOM Frame/IFrame DOM Frameset DOM Image DOM Input Button DOM Input Checkbox DOM Input File DOM Input Hidden DOM Input Password DOM Input Radio DOM Input Reset DOM Input Submit DOM Input Text DOM Link DOM Meta DOM Object DOM Option DOM Select DOM Style DOM Table DOM td / th DOM tr DOM Textarea

Meta httpEquiv Property

Meta Object

Definition and Usage

The httpEquiv property sets or returns an HTTP header for the information in the content attribute.

The http-equiv attribute can be used to simulate an HTTP response header.

The value of the http-equiv attribute depends on the value of the content attribute.

Note: If the name attribute is set, the http-equiv attribute should not be set.

Syntax

Set the httpEquiv property:

linkObject.httpEquiv="HTTP-header"

Return the httpEquiv property:

linkObject.httpEquiv

Some commonly used HTTP-header values are:

Value	Description
cache-control	Controls the caching mechanism to use for the document. Available values: public - cached in public shared caches private - cached in private cache no-cache - not cached no-store - cached but not archived Example: <meta http-equiv="cache-control" content="no-cache">
content-language	Specifies the natural language(s) of the document (used by search engines to categorize pages by language). Example: <meta http-equiv="content-language" content="en-US">
content-type	Specifies the character set for the contents of the document. Tip: It is recommended to always specify the character set. Example: <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
date	Specifies the date and time when the page was created. Example: <meta http-equiv="date" content="Wed, 16 Feb 2011 22:34:13 GMT">
expires	Specifies the date and time when the page will expire. Example: <meta http-equiv="expires" content="Fri, 30 Dec 2011 12:00:00 GMT">
last-modified	Specifies the last modification date. Example: <meta http-equiv="last-modified" content="Mon, 03 Jan 2011 17:45:57 GMT">
location	Redirects the visitor to another location. Example: <meta http-equiv="location" content="URL=http://www.w3schools.com">
refresh	Defines a time interval for the document to refresh itself. Example: <meta http-equiv="refresh" content="300">
set-cookie	Creates a cookie with specified name,expires date and value. Example: <meta http-equiv="set-cookie" content="w3scookie=myContent;expires=Fri, 30 Dec 2011 12:00:00 GMT; path=http://www.w3schools.com">
window-target	Specifies the name of the frame where the current document must be loaded

Browser Support

The httpEquiv property is supported in all major browsers.

Example

Display the HTTP header for the information in the content attribute:

<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8">

<script>
function displayResult()
{
var x=document.getElementsByTagName("meta")[0].httpEquiv;
alert(x);
}
</script>

</head>
<body>

<button type="button" onclick="displayResult()">Display HTTP-Equiv</button>

</body>
</html>

Try it yourself »

Meta Object