Re: font features in CSS

Stephen Zilles wrote:
> Comments inline below
> 
> Steve Zilles
> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Jonathan Kew [mailto:jonathan@jfkew.plus.com]
>> Sent: Wednesday, October 28, 2009 10:05 PM
>> To: Stephen Zilles
>> Cc: Håkon Wium Lie; www-style; www-font
>> Subject: Re: font features in CSS
>>
>> On 28 Oct 2009, at 22:27, Stephen Zilles wrote:
>>
>>> So, I do not propose, as the above prior proposals did, that we add
>>> a bunch of properties. I do, however, propose that we add a registry
>>> that gives long names (understandable and suggestive names) that map
>>> to one or more 4 letter codes.
>> I'm not sure how you are intending this to be used? Do you mean a
>> registry that authors would refer to, in order to know what 4-letter
>> tags to include in their CSS? Or would the "long names" be used in the
>> stylesheet itself, and the UA would then use the registry to map these
>> to the 4-letter tags?
> 
> [SZ] I meant that CSS would use the long names and implementers would
> use the registry to find the related OT tag value.

Yes, we should choose names that match the style of the other keywords
in CSS. No need to copy the naming style of OpenType or other font formats.

Moreover, I don't think it is a requirement that CSS supports all OT
features. A handful of the more common ones is enough. If a designer
wants a specific feature of a specific font, he can make a new font (or
a virtual font) in which that feature is turned on. That's what we have
 @font-face for.

We don't provide ways either to replace colors in a JPEG or change a
circle to a square in an SVG. The designer just makes a new image with a
new URL. That's a more flexible and modular solution.

I think we should provide keywords for small caps (already done) and
oldstyle figures, and maybe one or two more. But if a font has half a
dozen different ampersands and the designer really wants the fourth
variant, he should make a font with that glyph. (Or maybe he actually
meant to use an image?)



Bert
-- 
  Bert Bos                                ( W 3 C ) http://www.w3.org/
  http://www.w3.org/people/bos                               W3C/ERCIM
  bert@w3.org                             2004 Rt des Lucioles / BP 93
  +33 (0)4 92 38 76 92            06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex, France

Received on Friday, 30 October 2009 12:28:49 UTC