W3C

Cascading Style Sheets, level 2 revision 1
CSS 2.1 Specification

W3C Working Draft 2 August 2002

This version:
http://www.w3.org/TR/2002/WD-CSS21-20020802
Latest version:
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21
Previous version:
http://www.w3.org/TR/1998/REC-CSS2-19980512
Editors:
Bert Bos <bert @w3.org>
Tantek Çelik <tantekc @microsoft.com>
Ian Hickson <ian @hixie.ch>
Håkon Wium Lie <howcome @opera.com>

This document is also available in these non-normative formats: plain text, gzip'ed tar file, zip file, gzip'ed PostScript, PDF. See also translations.


Abstract

This specification defines Cascading Style Sheets, level 2 revision 1 (CSS 2.1). CSS 2.1 is a style sheet language that allows authors and users to attach style (e.g., fonts, spacing, and aural cues) to structured documents (e.g., HTML documents and XML applications). By separating the presentation style of documents from the content of documents, CSS 2.1 simplifies Web authoring and site maintenance.

CSS 2.1 builds on CSS2 [CSS2] which builds on CSS1 [CSS1]. It supports media-specific style sheets so that authors may tailor the presentation of their documents to visual browsers, aural devices, printers, braille devices, handheld devices, etc. It also supports content positioning, table layout, features for internationalization and some properties related to user interface.

CSS 2.1 corrects a few errors in CSS2 (the most important being a new definition of the height/width of absolutely positioned elements, more influence for HTML's "style" attribute and a new calculation of the 'clip' property). But most of all CSS 2.1 represents a "snapshot" of CSS usage: it consists of all CSS features that were implemented interoperably at the date of publication.

Status of this document

This document is produced by the CSS working group (part of the Style Activity, see summary). This is a W3C Last Call Working Draft. "Last call" means that the working group believes that this specification is ready and therefore wishes this to be the last call for comments. If the feedback is positive, the working group plans to submit it for consideration as a W3C Candidate Recommendation. Comments can be sent until the 30th of August, 2002.

The (archived) public mailing list www-style@w3.org (see instructions) is preferred for discussion of this and other drafts in the Style area.

Patent disclosures relevant to CSS may be found on the Working Group's public patent disclosure page.

A list of current W3C Recommendations and other technical documents can be found at http://www.w3.org/TR.

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