Re: [selectors-api] Handling :link and :visited Pseudo Classes

Lachlan Hunt <lachlan.hunt@lachy.id.au> wrote:

> 
> Hi,
>    The current Selectors API draft states:
> 
>    "... user agents may treat all links as unvisited links, or implement
>     other measures to preserve the user’s privacy."
>
[snipped]
> 
> I'm considering adjusting the spec to allow just two options, and making 
> IE8's behaviour non-conforming.
> 
> Either:
> 1. Match unvisited and visted links normally with :link and :visited, 
> respecitively.
> 2. Match all links with :link, and no links with :visted (i.e. treat all 
> links as unvisited)
> 
> Feedback from implementers on this issue, particularly from Microsoft, 
> would be appreciated.

Option 2 is what I do - primarily because there is usually no global history
available with which to evaluate the "visitedness" of links anyway (the
history is a configurable option that I don't believe any of our users ever
enable).


> Another option would be to effectively treat :link and :visited as
> synonymous and match all links with both, but I'm not so comfortable with
> that.

I don't think that you can do that safely, as it changes the specification -
specifically, it removes the guarantee that something can never match both
the :visited and :link psuedos at the same, which could break existing
content in subtle ways.


-- 
Stewart Brodie
Software Engineer
ANT Software Limited

Received on Wednesday, 16 April 2008 12:57:46 UTC