Re: INPUT enhancements - was Re: SELECT NEST proposal

On Wed, 12 Mar 1997, Simon Cox wrote:

> > Silders and dials I think would be very useful.  
> 
> I suggest <INPUT TYPE="range" NAME=string>
> but there are quite a few attributes that are needed, at least:  
> 1.  variable type - float, int, ?alpha
> 2.  limits - min & max, and
> 3.  granularity/quanta
> 4.  selector type - slider|dial - though perhaps this is a client issue
> ...
> 5.  selector scaling - linear (default), logarithmic, ?reciprocal,
> ?square etc
> 6.  discontinuous ranges?

I'm sure there are uses for logarithmic etc. scaling, but I can't think of
them at the moment ...

However you could use VALUE to specify the range (and hence
comma-separated discontinuous ranges). I _think_ this makes sense.
Variable type of float or int could easily be deduced from granularity. I
personally think that selector type would be a client / stylesheet issue.

> Introducing these all as additional attibutes for INPUT begins to
> overload it somewhat.  Suggestions?

INPUT has 16 attributes (plus 5 script ones) according to the copy of the
3.5 DTD I have. Even if you knock off the five %attrs; (id, class, style,
lang, dir) plus the two tab control attributes, and TITLE, none of which
appear in 3.2 you've still got a lot already.
I don't really see a problem with adding another in order to add a whole
new input type - it would certainly be worse to add an entire new tag.
Taking the VALUE use I suggested above you'd only need a QUANTA attribute,
and possibly a SCALING one (if there really is sufficient need to justify 
it).

> (NB  I think that "alt" may not be valid within INPUT, but I _always_
> try 
> to give alt's for images, and I think this may have been an oversight?)

I've always been slightly confused by the difference between ALT and
TITLE. In a case such as <IMG>, or <INPUT TYPE=SUBMIT> (which we say IMAGE
counts as, which makes sense), I assume it gives a window title for the
next page, if it can't supply one itself. However why does LABEL have a
TITLE attribute? This is something that's crept into the 3.5 draft I have
(admittedly not a particularly recent one), and I'm bemused as to what it
means in that case. Ho hum.

Cheers,
James

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Received on Tuesday, 11 March 1997 22:11:39 UTC