- From: Jon Meads <jon@usability-architects.com>
- Date: Mon, 01 Dec 1997 09:21:08 -0800
- To: www-style@w3.org
Hello, I have been recently informed by Steven Pemberton that the W3 committee is discussing the standardization of colour. Steven has proposed using an HSL encoding for specification of colour. While the value of having colour specified in terms of RGB is of definite value for developers of graphic systems and developers who desire to code close to the "hardware", it is significantly less valuable to the developer whose expertise and interest in the domain area. This is particularly true for web page developers whose domain of expertise is closer to graphic design than to machine level coding. I recommend that the standards provide for both RGB and HSL colour specification. There are times when redundancy is a blessing and this is one of them. An argument I made in a paper written for the 1973 National Science Foundation Conference on Engineering Design and Computer Graphics is valid for this issue as well. Providing an API which allows programmers to think more in terms of the application domain and less in terms of the graphic support routines helps them to develop better structured and less complicated application code. Transparency of API or HTML code is an overlooked but valuable asset to the developer. Just as it is important to have transparent UIs so that users can concentrate directly on their work and use their domain expertise rather than requiring them to become tool experts, so it is with developers. Web page developers need to think in terms of what the page will look like and should be experts in web page design, not in translating colors into RGB - a process best left to machines. I sincerely hope that the W3 Committee will consider this issue carefully and, in designing their standard, consider the end user. And, most importantly, realize that our goal should be to design tools which are simple and easy to use. Sincerely, jon -- ======================================================== Jon Meads Usability Architects, Inc. 210 9th Street; Suite E204 Kirkland, WA 98033 Voice: 425-827-9296 Fax: 425-827-6692 Email: jon@Usability-Architects.com Specialists in User-Centered Design & Engineering http://www.usability-architects.com/ues/ ========================================================
Received on Monday, 1 December 1997 12:31:42 UTC