Re: Update on Element Queries

On September 7, 2016 at 4:23:43 AM, Tommy Hodgins (tomhodgins@gmail.com) wrote:
> TLDR: In the future Houdini will allow us to write better plugins/polyfills, but that’s  
> different than proposing a spec to be included in CSS. 

Sure, but Mozilla and IIUC other browser vendors are working on Houdini right now, so we (Mozilla) would rather see a community specification for Element Queries that can be implemented in libraries using Houdini and other related technologies. Once there is a widely used Houdini-based implementation of Element Queries, then the community should consider formal standardization. 

This is not to say that the RICG should not do a spec now, but we should do a spec with the aim of having a reference implementation in Houdini and other related technologies already available in the platform (as Wilto also suggested).  

To be clear, even if we did start a formal W3C specification process around Element Queries, there is no guarantee that it would land in browsers before Houdini did. It would much likely be long after.

> A lot of people are hesitant to look  
> at element queries until it’s at least a proposed spec, and would likely also reject Houdini-based  
> support for the same reason. Let’s spec it out!

I don't know who "a lot of people" are, but those people might be confused and should be politely pointed to the extensible web manifesto. From Mozilla's perspective, we want to see Houdini succeed over then next few years - because it can enable Element Queries + opens up the possibility for developers to define their own CSS syntax, etc. 

Respectfully, if there are primitives missing to enable element queries via Houdini, we should add them as part of Houdini - but hopefully not as part of new syntax for CSS defined in some new CSS spec (at least, not yet).

Anyway, the take a way is: yes, let's do the community spec and reference implementations. See what works/doesn't and provide feedback.

Received on Wednesday, 7 September 2016 02:56:57 UTC