File select

In HTML, a file-select control is a component of a web form with which a user can select a file from his local machine. When the form is submitted (perhaps together with other form data), the file is uploaded to the web server. There, when the file arrives, some action usually takes place, such as saving the file on the web server. However, the particular action that takes place is determined by the server-side script to which the form is submitted.

Code example
Here is a code example of a web form with a file-select control. It is the  element with   that creates the file-select control.

Rendering






When it comes to the rendering on the screen of a file-select control, there is some variation among web browsers. Typically, on a windows-based platform, user agents will render a file-select control as a text field, together with a "Browse" button. When the "Browse" button is pressed, a file dialog opens, with which actual file selection on one's platform can take place. After selection, the filename of the selected file is displayed in the text field, with its full path. Alternatively, instead of using the "Browse" button, the filename can be entered directly in the text field.

Some browsers, notably Firefox, no longer allow a filename to be typed directly in. This is a security measure - it is possible to trick the user into uploading confidential information.

Functionality
The mechanism for form-based file upload was originally proposed in RFC 1867 (published November 1995), as an extension to HTML 2.0 (RFC 1866), after its publication. Form-based file upload then was incorporated in HTML 3.2, which explicitly refers to RFC 1867 for further information on form-based file upload.

HTML 4.01 does not, in itself, describe how the file-select control is supposed to work, but it does list RFC 2388 and RFC 1867 as references.

Multiple file selection
The intention in RFC 1867 is that a single file-select control should allow selection of multiple files. This intention seems reflected in HTML 4.01, which, for the file-select control- type, states This control type allows the user to select files so that their contents may be submitted with a form. The INPUT element is used to create a file select control. It has been noted that the plural "files" in the above quote is an indication that, in HTML 4.01, a single-file select-control still was supposed to handle selection of multiple files and not just a single file.

Accept attribute
RFC 1867 also introduced the  attribute for the   element. This would enable file-type filtering based on MIME type for the file-select control. In addition, it is proposed that the INPUT tag have an ACCEPT attribute, which is a list of comma-separated media types. If an ACCEPT attribute is present, the browser might constrain the file patterns prompted for to match those with the corresponding appropriate file extensions for the platform. Thus, a user-agent may restrict file selection, as, for example, in the following, restricted to GIF and PNG images: On a Windows platform, this might mean that the user agent would show files only of the types specified in the browse-file dialog.

Browser limitations
Basic support for the file-select control was adopted quickly by browser vendors. For example, already Internet Explorer 4, Netscape Navigator 2.0 and Opera 3.5 recognized the  element of   as a file-select control.

However, most modern browsers still do not implement the file-select control as it was intended, or lack certain features.

Cannot select multiple files
Generally, support is lacking for form-based upload of multiple files with a single file-select control. One source states that Opera supports multiple-file selection through a single file-select control. This was true for Opera versions starting from 3.5, in which the file-upload feature was introduced. However, with the first beta release of Opera 7 line, this function was no longer available. Firefox version 3.6 started supporting multiple-file selection, allowing the developer some limited access to the files themselves prior to being uploaded to the server, via the HTML5 File API. This feature also allows users to drag-and-drop files from external applications (such as Windows Explorer) directly into the web application. One notable example of support for this feature is Gmail allowing attachments to be added in this way.

JavaScript alternative
One solution is to use client-side scripting such as JavaScript for generating an extra file-select control for each file the user selects for upload. Using CSS, these extra file-select controls may be set not to display. An example of this technique is demonstrated in the Multiple File Upload plugin for jQuery. In this manner, the multiple-file upload problem is solved by providing as many file-select controls as the user has files to upload.

Accept attribute has no effect
Most browsers make no use of the accept attribute, currently Opera seems to be the only browser supporting a file type filter defined this way. .

Alternative technologies
The lack of support for multiple-file selection has led developers to search for alternative solutions. These solutions have in common that they do not use the  element.

One solution is to use a Java Applet. An example of this is JUpload. It allows selection of multiple files within its file browser as well as offering a file-type filter.

Two Flash-based file-upload utilities are FancyUpload (MooTools) and Uploadify (jQuery). Both allow selection of multiple files as well as offering a file-type filter.

Several implementations of Flash-based file-upload utilities stopped working for users as they upgraded to Adobe Flash Player 10 released October 2008.