Help Needed - Text Area of dynamic size

[mshahMCS]

I am getting a block of text from a database, and would like to display it. I want the users to be able to see that entire block of text without scrolling up or down. I am using text area right now because my text has newline characters on it "\n", and the textarea supports it. I want the textarea to change in size depending on how large the text is....is this possible?

If not, how do I display a large amount of text without users having to scroll (they can scroll the page up and down, just not the box). Remember that it needs to suppost the "\n" character.

Any help is appreciated.

[Iguana]

I can't think of an easy way to it with a Textarea.

Your scripting language should be able to replace the '\n' with a <BR> eg. in VBScript sText=Replace(sText, chr(13), "<BR>") - or something close to that. Then you can use a DIV to display the text and it will set its height according to the length of the text.

[mshahMCS]

Ive never really used CSS.

Could you just give the syntax I would use to display text?

I used Coldfusion to replace the \n with <BR>

How do I display it with <div> now?

Thanks for the help.

[Iguana]

<DIV>text</DIV> just simple HTML (its just a block element - the css only comes into play when you start to use absolute positioning).

If you want to control the display of the text then try
<DIV style="font-size:x-small; background-color: cyan">text</DIV>

[mshahMCS]

THis is how I am displaying it right now:

<cfset internal=Replace(internal,"\n","<BR>","all")> <DIV><cfoutput>#internal#</cfoutput></DIV>

And it doesnt show the \n or the <BR>...its just a jumble.

[Iguana]

Sounds like the replace isn't working - maybe its looking for the string \n rather than the newline character.