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CSS How to Make a Website Adding Pages to a Website Add and Style Icons

Roald Larsen
Roald Larsen
7,421 Points

When to use class.element or element.class

Hi all,

I was doing some code challenges and saw the following:

.contact-info a{ display:block; }

ul.contact-info { font-size: 0.9em; margin:0 auto; padding:0; list-style:none; }

In some cases I use this order element followed by class -> element.class and in others I have to use this order class.element. Can someone explain me what the logic is behind it? Many thanks in advance.

3 Answers

Michaล‚ Jarosz
Michaล‚ Jarosz
2,037 Points

Hello,

.contact-info a applies for all <a> elements inside elements with a class contact-info (can be anything with class contact-info, for example<div class="contact-info">, <ul class="contact-info">...

ul.contact-info applies for all <ul> elements with class contact-info so style will be applied only to such elements <ul class="contact-info">

Roald Larsen
Roald Larsen
7,421 Points

Many Thanks for the link James.

Especially the comments of the article make it clear what the difference is.

In resumรฉ:

  • element.class -> selects all direct children
  • .class element -> all the descendants of .class with element (so deeper in the structured tree)
James Barnett
James Barnett
39,199 Points

Roald Larsen -

> element.class -> selects all direct children

That's incorrect, element.class any element with that class

element > class selects all direct children