[whatwg] inputmode feedback

[Ian Hickson]

On Thu, 6 Jun 2013, Jonas Sicking wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 6, 2013 at 2:08 PM, Ian Hickson <ian at hixie.ch> wrote:
> > On Fri, 15 Feb 2013, Jonas Sicking wrote:
> >>
> >> Using semantic names might give us the warm fuzzies, but is there 
> >> really any semantic use we will get out of these that we wouldn't by 
> >> using "lowercase", "titlecase" or "autocapitalized"?
> >
> > The reason I used the more "semantic" names is that the names like 
> > "lowercase", "titlecase" or "autocapitalized" aren't accurate. For 
> > example, you can hit shift in "lowercase" mode to get uppercase. You 
> > can have a "titlecase" mode that doesn't capitalise every word (e.g. 
> > it recognises the "van" in "van Kesteren"). A value that is explicitly 
> > for names can use a different dictionary than one that is just for 
> > capitalised text (e.g. derived from the user's contact list). And so 
> > on.
> >
> >> I take it verbatim and name would disable any spelling corrections, 
> >> and name would also titlecase? But the difference between text and 
> >> prose seems really hard to understand.
> >
> > In the spec, "verbatim" does not correction at all, e.g. passwords; 
> > "latin" is for human-to-computer communications, e.g. free-form text 
> > search fields, and would do spelling correction and automatically 
> > inserting spaces between words in swiping keyboards, etc; and 
> > "latin-prose" is intended for human-to-human communications, with 
> > aggressive automatic typing correction, e.g. text prediction and 
> > automatic capitalisation at the start of sentences.
> 
> I think a really important question is if this is understandable to 
> authors. There's also a big risk that if these modes aren't noticeably 
> different in initial implementations, it will be hard to add such 
> differences later.

I agree that those are concerns. I don't know how to resolve them. I'm 
certainly open to clearer names. I don't think "titlecase" is a better
name, as it either implies that we only capitalise every first letter and 
forego much of the potential helpfulness that "latin-name" can provide. I 
don't think "autocapitalized" should imply "autocorrect" in the way that 
"latin-prose" should.

"latin-prose" vs "latin-name" seem straight-forward enough; I agree that 
"latin" is confusing in that context, though once you explain that "latin" 
is the basis of "latin-prose" and "latin-name", I think it becomes clear.

Other suggestions welcome.

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _\  ;`._ ,.
Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.'