Re: Cascading HTML style sheets -- a proposal

Dave Raggett (dsr@hplb.hpl.hp.com)
Tue, 1 Nov 94 14:33:43 GMT


Bert writes (Mon, 17 Oct):

> I would classify the above as follows:

> keep in HTML: remove to HSSL:
> ------------- ---------------
> UL WRAP=VERT TABLE BORDER
> UL PLAIN CAPTION ALIGN=TOP
> P NOWRAP H1 ALIGN=CENTER

I don't agree with you here. What the style sheet is good for
is to specify the appearence of the table border rather than its
presence of absence for specific tables.

In my view, style sheets should allow authors to specify how the
document is formatted at a range of window sizes, taking into
account user preferences and platform limitations. The basic
mechanism is to define style info as production rules.

The left hand side of the production operates on:

a) attribute values and tag names

b) the context in which some element appears

c) other parameters such as the age of the
document and the current window size

d) available resources, e.g. font name/size.

The right hand side of the production specifies:

a) nodal properties such as font name/size for
some element, plus color and margin indents

b) spatial relationships like above, below,
left-of, right-of

The production is also associated with a weight following H&kon Lie's
suggestion for cascading style sheets. I will be working with H&kon to
refine this approach and implement it as part of the W3O testbed browser.
We believe that it can be implemented efficiently and will lead to the
ability to handle arbitrary SGML DTDs.

--
Best wishes,

Dave Raggett ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hewlett Packard Laboratories email: dsr@hplb.hpl.hp.com Filton Road, Stoke Gifford tel: +44 272 228046 Bristol BS12 6QZ fax: +44 272 228003 United Kingdom