Re: list-item alignment in CSS

Todd Fahrner wrote:
> Note the alignment of the asterisks in the ascii-rendering. The style
has
> gone from floating "outside" the block to "inside", yet it is the
block,
> rather than the marker that has shifted. This can't be right. I say
this
> should be corrected to:
> 
> ---
> 
>   * first list item
>     comes first
> 
>   * second list item
>     comes second
> 
> 
>     * first list
>     item comes first
> 
>     * second list
>     item comes second

I agree that would be a more useful interpretation, but it doesn't jive
with the spec as I read it. The above interpretation requires an
implicit floated :list-marker (or :before) pseudo-element and a
positive margin on LI. The "outside" example above would require the
list-marker to have a negative left margin equal to the positive left
margin of LI. And to accommodate NSN's treatment of ordered lists (with
numbers flush right in a column), the list-marker pseudo-elements would
need a fixed width equal to the margin.

List-item behavior can be defined without a 'block-indent' property,
but parts of the spec would need serious editing. My view is that the
addition of block-indent doesn't disrupt current spec because the
current spec implies that the list-marker -- not the list-item content
-- is flush to the list-item's margin.

It's too late to argue against implementation of the current list-item
spec. Keep the current spec for backward compatibility but define it in
terms of more general properties such that future enhancements aren't
full of unnecessary 'applies to' exceptions.

David Perrell

Received on Tuesday, 3 June 1997 21:25:12 UTC