Re: CSS

On Tue, 28 Mar 2000 00:57:39 -0500 (EST), NAOMI
<webmaster@NNCreations.com> wrote:

>Many authors, are complaining about the way margins and borders
>are defined within CSS.

Why? It's dead simple...

The suggested total size of an element is the sum of the width/height
for...

  margin + border + padding + content

...once explained I don't find that so difficult, right?

>It is well known that margins and borders are not well supported
>by one or the other browser (MSIE and Netscape generally talking).

Yea, well, that would be browser errors, right?
Think about it, is it really motivated to "dumb down" a close to correct
specification just to cater for "soon to be dead" dumb browsers?

>it would be a great and appreciated if, somehow,
>all margins-and-borders-like attributes would be simplified
>or even better clarified.

I find that a correct understanding of HTML markup principles helps a
great deal to get good CSS suggested renderings. Maybe that's where the
real problem lies in catering for old "tag soup slurpers"?

>Also http://www.utoronto.ca/ian/style/cssbugs/home.html shows as (and
>not only) how many CSS are not used because they don't look good in,
>again, one or the other browser(s).

And then there's a new generation browsers on the market that can make
use of CSS at a very good level. Should they be "dumbed down" too?
Not in my eyes, better let them take over from the current crop of
ignorance based browsers.

>However this is a general note talking about facts which I'm sure
>we all know and see everyday.

Not me really, I'm a devoted O'man, that makes for a difference on both
"traditional tag soup" and CSS based sites in fact.

>I'm just trying to keep alive this idea of complaining about code which
>even if _there_ authors avoid to use. And if so, what's the use of it.

It would be supported by at least Opera, Mozilla, and just today MSIE5
for Mac, just to name a few, and I think the specs should stay as they
are, so that other browser producers can get a chance to understand and
comply to them too.

And there may be strong forces to get one self "retrained to specs" too,
rumor has it that AOL is to incorporate Mozilla as their std account
browser. Not using correct markup and CSS practices might stand for big
losses in potential site visitors if/when that happens.

-- 
Jan Roland Eriksson <jrexon@newsguy.com>
<URL:http://member.newsguy.com/%7Ejrexon/>

Received on Tuesday, 28 March 2000 11:27:35 UTC