Re: CSS 2.1 WD and non-CSS presentational hints

Coises wrote:
> 
> In slightly different words: "If something in the document implies certain
> values for one or more CSS properties, but the connection between the
> document specification and the resultant CSS properties is not expressed in
> CSS, that's a non-CSS presentational hint."  This seems reasonable to me.

It doesn't to me because <b> should be considered a non-CSS presentational
hint, and under your definition, it's not.

> Unfortunately, this definition does beg a new question: what SHOULD go in
> the (real or virtual) user agent default style sheet, and what SHOULD be
> treated as a "non-CSS presentational hint"?
> 
> I believe it will not be possible to define this in a CSS specification ---

Wasn't this the question you were trying to answer?

> At minimum, "non-CSS presentational hint" MUST include whatever affects CSS
> properties but cannot be expressed in a style sheet.  For example, there is
> no way to write a CSS 2 declaration that implements the BACKGROUND
> attribute of the BODY tag in HTML; so that must be a non-CSS presentational
> hint. 

There's no way to write a CSS2 declaration, but what about CSS3? If you're
giving a definition of non-CSS presenational hint, it should be a definition
that doesn't need to change with every version of CSS.

> For example, a browser maker could choose to include:

Which is exactly the problem David Baron is talking about. With your
definition, what is and is not a presentational hint is determined
by the browser's implementation, and thus is not predictable.

~fantasai

Received on Tuesday, 20 August 2002 06:09:54 UTC