[whatwg] number-related feedback

[Jonas Sicking]

On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 4:59 AM, Ian Hickson <ian at hixie.ch> wrote:
> On Wed, 31 Dec 2008, Jonas Sicking wrote:
>> On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 3:17 AM, Jonas Sicking <jonas at sicking.cc> wrote:
>> > On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 11:37 AM, Ian Hickson <ian at hixie.ch> wrote:
>> >> On Fri, 22 Aug 2008, Shannon wrote:
>> >>> Either way I would recommend making a decision on minimum and maximum
>> >>> integer values an using them consistently. If not I can imagine the
>> >>> rapid adoption of 64-bit systems will cause unexpected errors when the
>> >>> same code is run on older 32-bit systems. There are valid arguments for
>> >>> letting each system use its native integer but if this is the case then
>> >>> perhaps the spec should require MIN_INT and MAX_INT be made available as
>> >>> constants.
>> >>
>> >> ECMAScript does define a range, and the limits of that range are exposed
>> >> to scripts. Are there cases where there are non-script limits that would
>> >> benefit from being exposed? Use cases would be helpful here.
>> >
>> > I thought ECMAScript defined the value to be a IEEE 754 64bit float.
>>
>> Ah, sorry, I missed that you didn't have a 'not' in your response :)
>>
>> There are in fact interop issues given the fact that ECMAScript allows
>> for a range bigger than a 32bit integer can fit. For example you could
>> do
>>
>> myInput.maxLength = 5000000000;
>>
>> This would is within the bounds and precision of ECMAScript, but won't
>> work in a 32bit integer implementation.
>
> WebIDL defines how to handle that, though, right? (Each DOM attribute has
> an explicit bit width.) The problem, if there is a problem, would be with
> the content attribute alone.

So how would something like

<input maxlength="5000000000">

be parsed? Is it defined in terms of setting the .maxLength DOM
attribute, so that its behavior depends on what WebIDL says? Or
something else?

/ Jonas