[whatwg] several messages about <ol>, <ul>, <dl>, and related subjects

[Tab Atkins Jr.]

> ::snip several emails about reverse-ordered lists::

Given that this is a feature with an obvious use case (Top 10 Lists!) and no
easy work-around, this is definitely something that belongs in the spec.
Thanks, Ian!

A few thoughts:

> ::stuff on incremental rendering::

As noted by Jonas Sicking, reverse-ordered lists will require a browser to
read the entire list in before numbering, or else update on the fly (not
acceptable).  However, as Ian notes, this isn't a problem with
variable-width tables.  We accept that certain classes of tables can't be
displayed until the entire thing has been read and computed, and we will
just have to accept that with reverse-ordered lists as well.

The exception would be if we adopted the rule, suggested by Simon Pieters,
that the start= attribute apply to the first *lexical* element in the list,
rather than the first *ordinal* element.  This would allow browsers to
render reversed lists immediately when it is present.  I like this
compromise.

> ::stuff about step= attribute::

I can't think of any use cases for a step= attribute currently, at least
none that wouldn't be served best by *arbitrary* number generation.  Frex,
numbering a list with the successive squares or primes.  While fancy, these
are just cute tricks, and not actually generally useful as far as I can
tell.  The same would be true for the step= attribute.




~TJ Atkins
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