Re: SVG 1.2 questions: editable text

From: Andreas Neumann <neumann@karto.baug.ethz.ch>
> * should there also be an attribute indicating whether a text is
> "selectable" (true|false)? There are cases where you want text elements
> to react to events, but not be selectable. Setting "pointer-events" to
> "none" also turns of the ability to react to mouse-events, such as
> "onclick". I think, such an addition might be useful. Of course, 
> setting
> "selectable" to false would also turn off "editable".

	I would second this. The problem is in cases where one has draggable 
interface elements, such as scrollbars, next to text content that still 
needs to respond to events such as mouseup and mousedown. Today, if the 
mouse is moved over a text element while dragging, the text is selected 
and in some cases the drag operation is cancelled.
	In traditional GUIs scrollbars are often near text labels. When a drag 
is detected the UI programmer must have an easy way to turn off text 
selectivity for all applicable elements, and turn selectivity back on 
again when the drag operation is finished. Note also that the UI may be 
dynamic and change depending on the display size, etc. so these text 
elements may change over time and be added to or removed from the DOM 
as the layout changes, as in the case of certain word processor or page 
layout interfaces.
	It may be easiest to do this using a CSS property, in which case this 
becomes a CSS, and not an SVG, issue.
	Today, if I want to make non-selectable text I can drag over that also 
responds to mouse ups and downs, as in the case of drop-down menu 
widgets or a drag-and-drop cut-and-paste text feature, I must create 
multiple layers with 0 opacity to handle events and highlights. This is 
a time-consuming elementally verbose process that also requires a good 
deal of otherwise unnecessary code.
	The ability to toggle selectivity via CSS (using classes or IDs) 
sounds like the most flexible solution to me. With that you also give 
Web page designers the ability to specify certain text as being 
non-selectable as well. This is useful in the case of allowing people 
to select and copy only the relevant textual content of Web pages 
without also inadvertently selecting navigational and other UI-specific 
text, without having to shut off event listening.

	-- Kevin Hughes

Received on Monday, 1 November 2004 03:21:03 UTC