[whatwg] Default (informal) Style Sheet

[Asbjørn Ulsberg]

On Mon, 02 Apr 2007 09:59:50 +0200, Sander Tekelenburg <st at isoc.nl> wrote:

> Defining preseantation up to *that* level is no problem IMO.

Great! Then let's.

> The current (HTML 4) spec already does so, and in fact this is no
> more than a translation of HTML's distinction between block and inline
> level elements to CSS terminology.

That translation already leads to a plethora of different results,  
CSS-wise. Is the whitespace around a <p> margin or padding? What is the  
default style of <li> elements? Do they have outside or inside alignment?  
Padding or margin or both? What is their line-height? Please see my  
example of <hr> as well, in my reply to Anne. The list goes on and on.

> I didn't get the impression from the OP though that the aim was to  
> restrict specifying of presentational defaults to this level.

That's up to us to dicsuss. What level of presentation default we choose  
to specify is not yet specified. ;-) Having some defaults is either way  
better than having none, imho.

> (The OP said "informal" and "within limits", but didn't define that.)

I didn't define it for a reason.

> As I asked before: how does an author provided 'CSS zapper' not do that?

Should the HTML or CSS specification then encourage HTML and CSS authors  
to use such a "zapper" to get expected visual results across browsers?

> How in fact does requiring default presentations remove the need for
> authors to provide 'CSS zappers'?

You can't require anything with informal (non-normative) language. It's  
just the normative part of the specification that can be required and  
enforced. I proposed it as "informal fragments" for a reason, and even if  
the browser vendors aren't required to implement it, I assume having the  
styles defined will over time improve interoperability and as Anne points  
out, make it easier for browser startups to get ahead of existing  
implementations.

-- 
Asbjørn Ulsberg           -=|=-        asbjorn at ulsberg.no
«He's a loathsome offensive brute, yet I can't look away»