CSS User Preferences

CSS User Preferences Support

this is to follow up on a point i raised at today's DHTML style guide 
call -- the original post is archived at:
* http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007Dec/0026.html

and is reproduced following this intro text; responses are archived at:

* http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007Dec/0028.html
* http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007Dec/0030.html 
* http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007Dec/0031.html
* http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007Dec/0032.html
* http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007Dec/0033.html

--- ORIGINALLY POSTED TO XTech DECEMBER 2007 ---
is anyone aware of ANY user agents that support "User preferences for 
colors", as defined in CSS2?  it seems like one of the most sane 
approaches to honoring the user's default operating system environment's
settings:

QUOTE
[source: http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS2/ui.html#system-colors]
[compare to: http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/ui.html]

18.2 User preferences for colors

In addition to being able to assign predefined color values to text, 
backgrounds, etc., CSS2 allows authors to specify colors in a manner that 
integrates them into the user's graphic environment. Style rules that
take into account user preferences thus offer the following advantages:

  1. They produce pages that fit the user's defined look and feel. 
  2. They produce pages that may be more accessible as the current 
     user settings may be related to a disability. 

The set of values defined for system colors is intended to be exhaustive. 
For systems that do not have a corresponding value, the specified value 
should be mapped to the nearest system attribute, or to a default color.

The following lists additional values for color-related CSS attributes 
and their general meaning. Any color property (e.g., 'color' or 
'background-color') can take one of the following names. Although these 
are case-insensitive, it is recommended that the mixed capitalization 
shown below be used, to make the names more legible.


ActiveBorder 
   Active window border. 

ActiveCaption 
   Active window caption. 

AppWorkspace 
   Background color of multiple document interface. 

Background 
   Desktop background. 

ButtonFace 
   Face color for three-dimensional display elements. 

ButtonHighlight 
   Dark shadow for three-dimensional display elements (for edges facing 
   away from the light source). 

ButtonShadow 
   Shadow color for three-dimensional display elements. 

ButtonText 
   Text on push buttons. 

CaptionText 
   Text in caption, size box, and scrollbar arrow box. 

GrayText 
   Grayed (disabled) text. This color is set to #000 if the current 
   display driver does not support a solid gray color. 

Highlight 
   Item(s) selected in a control. 

HighlightText 
   Text of item(s) selected in a control. 

InactiveBorder 
   Inactive window border. 

InactiveCaption 
   Inactive window caption. 

InactiveCaptionText 
   Color of text in an inactive caption. 

InfoBackground 
   Background color for tooltip controls. 

InfoText 
   Text color for tooltip controls. 

Menu 
   Menu background. 

MenuText 
   Text in menus. 

Scrollbar 
   Scroll bar gray area. 

ThreeDDarkShadow 
   Dark shadow for three-dimensional display elements. 

ThreeDFace 
   Face color for three-dimensional display elements. 

ThreeDHighlight 
   Highlight color for three-dimensional display elements. 

ThreeDLightShadow 
   Light color for three-dimensional display elements (for edges facing 
   the light source). 

ThreeDShadow 
   Dark shadow for three-dimensional display elements. 

Window 
   Window background. 

WindowFrame 
   Window frame. 

WindowText 
   Text in windows. 

For example, to set the foreground and background colors of a paragraph 
to the same foreground and background colors of the user's window, write 
the following:

P { color: WindowText; background-color: Window }

--- END EXTENDED QUOTE

the CSS2.1 draft notes that the UI section on using system colors 
and respecting user settings will be deprecated with the CSS3-color
module (http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-color)

these CSS properties are the sanest way to respect a user's operating
system preferences, and should be promoted -- and perhaps highlit as 
an important accessibility feature in any final comments submitted to
the CSS 2.1 editors...

gregory.
--------------------------------------------------------------
You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of
focus.                                           -- Mark Twain
--------------------------------------------------------------
Gregory J. Rosmaita: oedipus@hicom.net
   Camera Obscura: http://www.hicom.net/~oedipus/
          Oedipus' Online Complex: http://my.opera.com/oedipus
--------------------------------------------------------------

Received on Tuesday, 12 February 2008 16:18:44 UTC