[whatwg] Canvas element

Dean Edwards dean at edwards.name
Wed Apr 20 15:18:18 PDT 2005


dolphinling wrote:
> +1
> 
> 
> I would ask what semantics canvas has. ol means the content is an 
> ordered list, em means the content is emphasized, span and div mean the 
> content is different, but in a way not associated with any element. Even 
> img and object mean the content is external, (usually) with non-html 
> semantics.
> 
> At best I can see canvas being equivelant to img and object, but without 
> the use case of the content being external. But even so, they come with 
> default semantics (the image or whatever else is being represented in 
> them) whereas canvas doesn't, it has to be scripted in.
> 
> So am I missing something here? What semantics does canvas have?
> 

I see the CANVAS element as analogous to the IMG element. It has similar 
content (it's ultimately an image) but that content is defined 
differently (using script).

I can certainly see the advantage of having a programmable image. One 
use may be for generating avatars. It would be easier to combine skin 
tone, hair colour, eyes etc programmatically than have thousands of 
images sitting on the server.

I agree that it may be open to abuse but I've never been convinced that 
this is a good reason to disallow anything.

-dean




More information about the whatwg mailing list