Introduction to Touch Events API

However, developing touch-enabled applications can be challenging, especially if you’re unfamiliar with the necessary tools and techniques. That's where the Touch Events API comes in.

Touch Events API

The Touch Events API is a Web API that allows you to handle touch-based user interactions on your websites. With the Touch Events API, you can easily create touch-enabled applications that provide a smooth user experience across various devices.

Basic Concepts

This API provides various event types, properties, and phases that you can use to build touch-enabled applications. Let's take a closer look at each of these components:

Interfaces

The Touch Events API provides several event interfaces corresponding to different touch-based user interactions. These event interfaces include:

• touchstart: This event is triggered when a finger touches the screen. Here is an example of how to use the touchstart event to display a message when a user touches an element:

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const element = document.getElementById('myElement');
element.addEventListener('touchstart', function(event) {
  event.preventDefault();
  console.log('Touch started');
});

• touchmove: This event is triggered when a finger moves on the screen.

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element.addEventListener('touchmove', function(event) {
  // Handle touchmove event
});

• touchend: This event is triggered when a finger is lifted off the screen.

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element.addEventListener('touchend', function(event) {
  // Handle touchend event
});

• touchcancel: This event is triggered when a touch is interrupted, such as when a pop-up window appears.

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element.addEventListener('touchcancel', function(event) {
  // Handle touchcancel event
});

Properties

The Touch Events API also provides various properties that we can use to get information about touch-based interactions. These properties include:

• touches: This property provides information about all the touches currently on the screen.

• targetTouches: This property provides information about the touches currently on the target element.

• changedTouches: This property provides information about the touches that triggered the current touch event.

Browser Support

Most modern web browsers, including Chrome for Android, Safari for iOS, Firefox for Android, etc, support the Touch Events API. However, some older browsers may need to support the Touch Events API fully or may have bugs or limitations that can affect the functionality of touch-based web applications. It is recommended to test it on multiple devices and browsers.

Wrap Up

That’s all for this guide. The Touch Events API provides a variety of touch-related events such as touchstart, touchmove, and touchend, which can be used to track and respond to user touch gestures.

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