Re: [csswg-drafts] [css-values-5] The `<random-value-sharing>` options for `random()` are confusing (#13132)

> The effect of adding an identifier seems inconsistent to me: with `property-shared` or `element-shared` it just subdivides sharedness without affecting the behavior, while otherwise it adds sharedness.

This is what I was originally concerned with, but I do agree with Bramus that it flows naturally in usage. `random(--foo, ...)`, no other keywords, sure *looks* like it should match every other `random(--foo, ...)` on the page, as that's related to the sort of behavior that giving something a name usually has in CSS. That just means that, if you supply *just* an ident, it *implies* both of the sharing keywords.

The alternative, being strict about keyword usage, would mean that using just an ident would *just* set the ident portion of the key; you'd go from `(null, "width 0", element ID)` to `("--foo", "width 0", element ID)`. The behavior difference between those two caching keys is *almost nil*; in practice the only use-case for it, I think, would be for script to force a random value on a given element to a *new* random value, by changing the ident. (But the script could just... generate a random value itself at that point.) And then the reasonably common case of wanting a "global" random value would be pretty verbose to spell.

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Received on Wednesday, 4 February 2026 22:20:00 UTC