[whatwg] Spec comments, section 4.8

[Kevin Benson]

On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 10:34 AM, Aryeh Gregor
<Simetrical+w3c at gmail.com<Simetrical%2Bw3c at gmail.com>
> wrote:

> On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 6:45 AM, Kevin Benson<kevin.m.benson at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > Their purpose is described later in 4.8.10.5 Loading the media
> > resource at step 20:
>
> Yes, but maybe a different character could be chosen, if this one
> doesn't consistently display in browsers.


 Agreed.
Maybe the symbol being used for the Resource Fetch Algorithm steps, (further
down) where it reads "resource fetch algorithm for a media element and a
given absolute URL":

↪ 'RIGHTWARDS ARROW WITH HOOK' (U+21AA)

would work better (for marking the "Steps in synchronous sections") as an
intermediary pointer symbol that follows the step number and precedes the
step description because there is precious little whitespace between,
whereas the "resource fetch algorithm" subsections have no numbering scheme
to deal with _and_ all whitespace to the left of the steps'
descriptions. (ie. Any bulleting symbol would suffice and serve the
purpose.)

Or it could be browser- and font-agnostic enough to even facilitate display
in IE :)
Something like, maybe common math symbols such as:

≈ 'ALMOST EQUAL TO' (U+2248)
or
± 'PLUS-MINUS SIGN' (U+00B1)

or whatever. (Just thinking aloud.)


>
> > Sentence #1 Recommends unobtrusive implementation of UI features (for
> > author's sake).
> > Sentence #2 Permits override of boolean attribute for implementation
> > of UI features. (for UA's sake)
>
> But ends with a colon, which together with "the following" suggests a
> list of some sort was meant to come after it.


Yeah, I missed that colon, but the features _are_ listed after these
sentences. It just doesn't stand out as _a list_ .


>
>
> > Sentence #3 Recommends unobtrusive implementation of UI features (for
> > client's sake).
>
> Which duplicates sentence #1, even though that was only two sentences
> before.  So again it looks to me like there was originally something
> in between that made this look less redundant.  As it stands it
> definitely reads strangely to me, anyway.
>
> (I looked in the version history, but it didn't explain much.  The
> paragraph was added as-is in r678 commented out, then uncommented in
> r697.)
>

I agree that the intent was probably superseded by the result. I almost get
the sense that the pairs of sentences were originally reversed (or the
alternating sentences were). Anyways, words and sentences can _always_ be
condensed and combined. Clarity remains the objective and redundancy the
enemy.

-- 
-- 
  --
      --
      ô¿ô¬
   K e V i N
  /¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯\
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