Opaque Backgrounds

[Hierophant]

I know you can assign a background color or image to almost any element. I also know you can assign a transparent background to almost any element.

Is there any way to control the level of transparency of higher index elements?

I haven't seen any but haven't kept up with newer developments in the CSS world.

Basically what I want to do is create a navigation bar with a 50% opaque colored background over a graphical background. The graphical background doesn't tile (it is 1000 X 640 pixels in size) and the element itself is liquid so creating a new background image for this element won't work.

[Adam P.]

Try this maybe:

style="filter:alpha(opacity=75)"

[boredboi]

i'm not sure, but i think that's IE-only.
it might work in netscape 6 though

another alternative would be to create a background image for the nav bar, which has alternating opaque and transparent pixels.. but it doesn't look very good.

but if there's no other way, you could have it such that you use css for IE, and the half-transparent background image for NS.

[Technosailor]

All of those developments are IE-only. I don't even think the new Netscape implements them. I like the opacity look though. It's one kudos for Microsoft!

Sketch

[Technosailor]

try this in IE

filter: alpha(opacity=50);

try this in NEtscape 6

-moz-opacity: 0.5;

Let me know if this works as I just pulled this stragiht from the internet.

Sketch

[JMulder]

It's being used at the Network bar (the horizontal one) of my site. It looks pretty nice but you don't need to worry that much about browser compatibility. If you have a white background set to 60%, then IE would show it correct but Netscape (and Opera?) would just show 100%. So in many cases it just doesn't mather, the visitors think it should look like that

EDIT: I've also noticed my CSS doesn't seem to work correct in every IE version, the transperancy (sp?) doesn't work on my system but does work on my school's system. Wierd :|

[Chris Hester]

OK, transparency works in IE5, IE5.5 and IE6. But if you upgrade Direct X to 8, it stops working in IE5.5!! So you need the service pack upgrade SP2, or upgrade to IE6.

Netscape 6.0 works, but NOT 6.1. Agh!

[creole]

This page:
http://www.glish.com/hiatus.asp

uses transparency for the text area at the top right.