Re: RGB is not ANSI-friendly

On Dec 1,  9:59pm, John Murray wrote:

> >From the point of view of the user [ie the person specifying
> colors in a particular interface], a facility must be available to
> imitate ANSI color specification standards.
>
> An RGB-only standard does NOT address this issue at all.

Really ... ?

> ANSI specifications are addressed in terms of the Munsell System,
> with CIE 1931 equivalents.  See for example the ANSI
> Safety Color Code - Standard Z535.1.  There's a picture of
> the CIE Chromacity digram at the following URL:
> <http://cybertheater.com/Tech_Reports/Envir_Light/cie.html>

Yes, so the corrected Munsell system could be readilly converted to
CIE XYZ and thence to sRGB. What in particular is NOT being addressed?

> The HSL format provides a better means of approximating
> this standard approach to color specification.

Splutter. HSL has nothing to do with it.

>  It allows better
> construction of interface design tools that match the color
> specs used in content experts' environments,

Erm, if the users are using tools then the tools can present any
interface that is convenient and the tool can convert to a single
canonical representation.

The point of the HSL suggestion is that users with plain text editors
find it easier. I have shown earlier todaythat this is not necessarily
the case and that HSL has some well-known HCI flaws which render it less
than suitable; these have been known about for the last 20 years or so.


-- 
Chris Lilley, W3C                          [ http://www.w3.org/ ]
Graphics and Fonts Guy            The World Wide Web Consortium
http://www.w3.org/people/chris/              INRIA,  Projet W3C
chris@w3.org                       2004 Rt des Lucioles / BP 93
+33 (0)4 93 65 79 87       06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex, France

Received on Tuesday, 2 December 1997 01:35:30 UTC