Re: CSS enhancement proposal

   Date: Sat, 14 Jun 1997 19:03:47 -0700
   From: Todd Fahrner <fahrner@pobox.com>

   Typefaces and type sizes are now specified independently in CSS. More
   precisely, there is a mechanism to suggest alternate typefaces, but
   not to bind alternate type sizes and line-heights to the alternate
   typefaces. This is not especially useful, as typefaces have highly
   irregular metrics and suitability for screen display at a given size.
   It would be far better to specify typefaces, type sizes, and
   line-heights (and possibly also letterspacing) together, and let
   these cascade/degrade as groups.


   Consider this case:

	   font: 9pt/15pt Verdana, "Gill Sans," sans-serif;

   This will result in a very legible Verdana (unless it's a Mac), a
   wretched, overleaded Gill Sans, or an imponderably rendered default
   sans. This would be much better:

	   font: 9pt/15pt Verdana, 12pt/14pt "Gill Sans," 1em/1.2em sans-serif;

I think you just destroyed the impact of your example with the comment
``unless it's a Mac''.

I don't know the precise details of these fonts; but I would expect
that even with your proposal, you're going to have problems if
two systems have very different fonts with the same name.

And I'm sure you're discussing style sheets on websites, rather than
reader style sheets, because obviously in reader style sheets for
your personal use, you're going to specify a font that you actually
have.

Received on Saturday, 14 June 1997 23:28:57 UTC