Re: list-style-type idea

Bert Bos <bert@w3.org> writes
>I have a proposal...

I have read through fairly carefully, and will read through again.  But 
my initial comment would be that I was looking for something simple for 
authors to use, and I don't think this is quite it!  (The JavaScript 
would seem more simple.)  If this kind of thing could be going on in the 
background, with a way of triggering it in a style sheet, that would be 
better.

(I think there may be some general principles here: style sheets 
shouldn't be expected to simulate an entire GUI environment via the 
mechanisms available *within* them, they should be able to *call upon* 
elements that are considered common to all GUIs.

How individual browsers implement style sheet suggestions shouldn't be a 
matter for the W3C recommendations, even though in the case of Mozilla 
it may be that they really are implemented by applying some internal 
mechanisms that look like CSS.  Internally, browsers like Mozilla 
should, ISTM, be using some kind of replacement mechanism, so that 
'simple-looking' CSS can be 'deconstructed' into a practical layout rule 
involving, say, positioning and, perhaps, 'state' (as per your 
suggestion).

But other browsers should be free to implement things using native 
widgets, as is done on many browsers with HTML form controls.  In this 
way, there is both a simple language for authors to deal with, and the 
possibility that the user's browsing experience will be made easier by 
commonality with the GUI they are using.)

I realise there are some difficulties with my original proposal on its 
own as to what is to be displayed when the element is collapsed. 
Perhaps the idea would have been better tackled with a new HTML 
attribute; that could more easily have fitted with the way user-agent 
CSS works right now.

A few small points to do with your examples: implementations I've seen 
of the collapsible list usually require either a double-click, or a 
single click on a plus symbol.  (He said desperately trying to speak in 
a non-Windows-centric way!).  And I would want the usual method of 
implementation to be that the first-child of the element was the thing 
that needed to be double-clicked, so that all the important text was 
there as content in the document, not lost in attribute values or - 
worse - in a style sheet.

thanks for the response
-- 
George

Received on Thursday, 19 September 2002 06:09:54 UTC