[Bug 23961] New: inputmode values contain orthogonal aspects

https://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=23961

            Bug ID: 23961
           Summary: inputmode values contain orthogonal aspects
           Product: HTML WG
           Version: unspecified
          Hardware: PC
                OS: Linux
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: HTML5 spec
          Assignee: dave.null@w3.org
          Reporter: ben.bucksch@beonex.com
        QA Contact: public-html-bugzilla@w3.org
                CC: mike@w3.org, public-html-admin@w3.org,
                    public-html-wg-issue-tracking@w3.org

Latin and kana are orthogonal to things like "autocorrect off".
Likewise, "email" belongs in type, and is already standardized and accepted
cross-browser there, but inputmode has it as well - again: orthogonal.
So, the current spec has 3 or more orthogonal aspects in the same field:
1. script/language (latin, kana...)
2. data type (text, numbers, email, url)
3. typing aids
3.1. completion / text prediction
3.2. correction
3.3. capitalization
3.4. spell checking

They are orthogonal, because I can have completion, correction and even
capitalization for names (using the user's address book) and for text (using a
dictionary). They'd use different algorithms, but still the type (name, text)
is a different aspect from whether I want the computer helping my type or not.

That all doesn't seem well-thought out, and Mozilla thinks so, too:
http://lists.whatwg.org/htdig.cgi/whatwg-whatwg.org//2013-February/038914.html

This whole definition of inputmode seems off, because in my usecase, it is
actually "prose" text that the user enters. But the prose contains special
abbreviations and terms that I need to recognize, and Firefox OS' autocorrect
wrongly "corrects" these, too, rendering this form and app feature useless. So,
I actually *do* want to say that it's "prose" text (inputmode="prose"), I just
want to tell Firefox OS to get out of the way. An autocorrect="off" seems like
a much better way to turn off one specific malfunctioning feature than saying
inputmode="verbatim", which would disable all typing aids. I have nothing  the
autocomplete suggestions that Firefox OS shows in the row above the virtual
keyboard, but inputmode="verbatim" disables these as well.

This is why I think that autocorrect on/off/default should be a boolean
(3-state) flag, which is independent from any other dimensions like language or
data type.

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Received on Monday, 2 December 2013 23:51:05 UTC