Terminology of Appendix E (Stacking order)

I've tried to explain painting order in-depth, in the process identifying
the parts of Appendix E which might be confusing to readers, in an article I
wrote. Perhaps this will be of help on this list, in efforts to discuss
proposed revisions to Appendix E. In particular, the issue of how the
stacking order may be different than that listed in the appendix depending
on the z-index value (with some stages left out as they only apply to
positioned elements), and the resulting weakness of the term "stacking
context".
http://classroom306.com/tutorials/z-index.html
A summary of the discourse on Appendix E, on this list over the last year
and a half:
- Nov 07: A few msg's, starting with one by Ian Hickson re: painting alg.
Proposed change to 2.1 accepted.
- Dec 07: 1 msg, from Ingo Chao.
- It was replied to in Jan 08, though not via an actual RE: email, by
fantasai. Then another reply from Chao.
- May 08: Anton Prowse replied, though not via actual RE: emails, to both
the Nov 07 correspondence and the Jan 08 correspondence. Both these replies
are for some reason archived under May 19, not 20. Prowse's
paper<http://dev.moonhenge.net/css21/spec/z-index/>is first introduced
in his reply to Chao.
- July 08: fantasai added Prowse's paper to wiki. Then some correspondence
between Chao and fantasai, off-list but available in a July 14 msg from
Prowse. fantasai resolves to bring up issue at meeting.
- Oct 08: Hickson replied to Prowse's May msg but not vie RE: email. Issue
was discussed at meeting, but only 1 small change will be made to 2.1 - rest
will be kept in mind for CSS3. Then there's some more correspondence with
Prowse et al, which at one point references July msg's.
- The issue has since been brought up a few times in 09 - initially
regarding more specific behaviours but then leading back to a discussion of
the more general problem, with Prowse even re-iterating his case for a
terminology change in a Feb 11 msg. But there hasn't been much feedback on
Prowse's solution or how else to deal with the problem.

Justin Poirier