Encircled and enrectangled (?) list markers, minor amendment to clip: oval and CSS list-style-type

A frequently used list-style is the number in a circle
(or less frequently in a rectangle).

There are various ways of doing this:

list-style-type: encircled-lower-roman (etc.)
enrectangled-lower-alpha (etc.)

Or 
LI:before {display: marker;
content: counters(counterfunction, decimal) ".";
width: 2em; /* Because of the '.' */
height: 1em;
clip: oval(50%, 50%, 50%, 0%); /* See footnote */
clip-border: thin solid;}

The advantage of the second option is that it offers
enormous flexibility.

Footnotes:

1. This is a minor amendment to my proposed clip
syntax (recall - clip: oval(Xcentre, Ycentre,
Xtopcorner, Ytopcorner, Xleftcorner, Yleftcorner),
namely that if the left 'corner' is omitted, it is of
equal radius and is thus perpendicular to the line
going thru the top corner, centre and bottom corner,
so the example here draws a circle.

2. Note that this syntax for clip: oval (or the one
above) is my preferred option.

3. It seems that SVG is something of a sledgehammer to
crack this particular nut.

4. All known (to me anyway) UAs do:

OL {list-style-type: decimal}

1.
2.
3.

Where as the css spec states that:
1
2
3
is correct.

It strikes me that the former option is better, if
technically buggy but that it is unacceptable when
using counter functions (e.g., content: "("
counter(counterfunction, decimal) ")").

So I would propose that the CSS spec should be amended
to state that 1., 2. is acceptable (and indeed
expected and desirable by authors) with
list-style-type but not when the style is used with content:

=====
----------------------------------------------------------
From Matthew Brealey (http://members.tripod.co.uk/lawnet (for law)or http://members.tripod.co.uk/lawnet/WEBFRAME.HTM (for CSS))
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Bid and sell for free at http://auctions.yahoo.com

Received on Wednesday, 3 November 1999 07:53:05 UTC