Re: Public feedback on HTML5 video

On Tue, 29 Dec 2009 00:44:50 +0100, Edward O'Connor <hober0@gmail.com>  
wrote:

>> Is the absence of the autobuffer attribute an explicit request not to
>> pre-buffer?
>
> I'd rather it not be.
>
> I think it's important for the author to be able to say "hi browser,
> please do whatever is most appropriate given your platform / network
> connection / memory / etc., insofar as buffering is concerned." In fact,
> I suspect this to be the most common authoring case. Most authors would
> prefer it if, say, cell phone browsers defaulted to no-autobuffering,
> whereas they might prefer desktop browsers to behave differently. Given
> that, I'd prefer the default/lazy authoring behavior (not specifying the
> attribute at all) to have this meaning.
>
> Essentially, we have three things we'd like authors to be able to convey
> to the browser:
>
>   1. Do whatever the browser thinks best.
>
>   2. Please autobuffer.
>
>   3. Please *don't* autobuffer.
>
> And there are a few things we'd like to be able to say about whatever
> design we settle on:
>
>   A. (1) above should be the default condition, so its syntax should be
>      what most authors will do anyway (not provide attributes at all).
>
>   B. Any new boolean attributes should behave like the other boolean
>      attributes already present in HTML (presence means t and absense
>      means nil).
>
>   C. If at all possible, we should be able to use different values for
>      the same attribute for (2) and (3). (Minting separate attributes
>      for (2) and (3) means allowing authors to write nonsensical markup,
>      and having to spec what HTML5 processors should do when they're
>      both present. What does <video buffer nobuffer> mean?)
>
> There's a lot of tension between (B) and (C), so much so that I think
> autobuffer="" should probably become an enumerated attribute[1] instead
> of a boolean attribute. Something like the following:
>
>   1. Do whatever the browser thinks best. [no autobuffer attribute]
>
>   2. Please autobuffer. [autobuffer="on"]
>
>   3. Please *don't* autobuffer. [autobuffer="off"]
>
>
> Ted
>
> 1.  
> http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/multipage/common-microsyntaxes.html#keywords-and-enumerated-attributes
>

I do not support making this distinction, because as an implementor I  
cannot act any differently in case 1 and 3. Any browser that has gone to  
the effort of being conservative with network resources will want that  
behavior even if autobuffer="off" is given. Unless there is some browser  
vendor who can see themselves acting differently in case 1 and 3, this  
just adds a bit of complexity and the illusion of control on part of the  
author where there is in fact none.

-- 
Philip Jägenstedt
Core Developer
Opera Software

Received on Tuesday, 29 December 2009 07:52:49 UTC