Re: layout sheet proposal

Franklin Einspruch wrote to <www-style@w3.org> on 25 December 2002 in
"layout sheet proposal" (<mid:200212241828.27011.franklne@gate.net>),
proposing what he called layout sheets to control the block placement
of documents:

> p {font-family:"Verdana", "sans-serif"; color:"#000000";
>  font-size:13px; line-height:15px  }
> a, a:visited, a:link {color:"#444444"; font-weight:normal;
> text-decoration:underline }

You have a string where a keyword was intended, strings where color
HASH tokens are needed, and some rather inadvisable 'px' units.  I
suggest background reading; the CSS2 specification
(<http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2>) and the CSS Pointers Group
(<http://www.css.nu>) would be good starters.

> The layout sheet would look like this:

> <table>
> <tr>
> <td>#navigation</td>
> <td>#content</td>
> <td>#links</td>
> </tr>
> </table>
[...]
> I hope this is a viable idea.

I do not see an advantage to forcing the separation of layout and text
styling.  With CSS as is, an author or organization can choose to
separate layout and text styling but people who wish to keep all
styles in the same resource may do so.

The big problem with your proposal is, well, that it is a proposal. In
other words, before we see stable, widely used implementations of your
idea, we would have to proceed through several working drafts, review
and commentary, further refinements of specification, final
publication, and software development.

CSS already has a table model.  Let's stick with that model,
clarifying it and adding to it as necessary, and pushing for
implementation support.  This route will bring us to generally usable
layout capabilities more quickly than adopting your proposal.

-- 
Etan Wexler <mailto:ewexler@stickdog.com>

Received on Wednesday, 25 December 2002 05:35:16 UTC