Re: ISSUE-65: Should Window spec add parentWindow property to documents?

On Apr 5, 2006, at 1:59 PM, Jonas Sicking wrote:

>
> Anne van Kesteren wrote:
>
>> On Wed, 05 Apr 2006 11:30:49 +0200, Jonas Sicking  
>> <jonas@sicking.cc> wrote:
>>> I can't say that I feel strongly about it, but having both seems  
>>> sort of  redundant. What is the advantage over having just one of  
>>> the two? If we  add both only opera is going to be conforming in  
>>> this regard, if we just  add one then the number of browsers that  
>>> work out of the box is going to  be greater.
>> Well, it would depend on which one we pick... I favor both as  
>> well,  although parentWindow is a very confusing name...
>
> If we pick both it will only work in opera, if we pick parentWindow  
> it will work in IE and Opera, if we pick defaultView it will work  
> in Firefox and Opera. So no matter which we pick it'll work better  
> if we just pick one.

In Safari both will work relatively soon (currently neither really  
works right). I'm hoping other browsers will also update. For any  
browser, supporting both is better for handling the widest range of  
existing content, regardless of what the spec says, and if we think  
that is the best practice for implementors, we should so specify.

So I am still in favor of both, because defaultView can't be removed  
(it is from DOM Level 2 Views) and IE is somewhat less likely to  
change than other browsers, so everyone implementing parentWindow  
will be best for interoperability. I wouldn't necessarily use that  
reasoning for features where the cost of duplication is higher.

Regards,
Maciej