parenthesized and circled list types

Hi,

Recently, I sent the message below to the editors of CSS3-List draft, 
but haven't heard back from them, yet. So, I'm now sending this to the 
style-list to seek your opinion.

Thank you in advance for your opinion,

Jungshik

----------

Hi,

KANG Jeong-Hee wrote to me that circled version of 'hangul' and
'hangul-consonant' list types need to be included in CSS3.
(he also suggested it in his email relayed by Bert Bos to
style list : 
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/2003Mar/0037.html)

My first response was that they're NOT necessary because CSS2 provided
'on-the-fly synthesis' of parenthesized and circled list types
based on pre-defined list types and I believed CSS3 would
offer a similar feature. I also citied as my rationale
that there's no such list type as 'lower-latin-circled'
and 'decimal-circled', which turned out to be wrong.

Indeed, CSS3 WD appears to offer ::marker pseudo-elment that  can
be used to circled list types as follows:

<STYLE type="text/css">
    LI::marker {
      content: counter(counter, listtype) "&#x20DD;";
      }
    LI {
      display: list-item;
      counter-increment: counter;
    }
</STYLE>

where U+20DD is 'combing enclosing circle'.

An example is also given in CSS3-list WD for parenthesizing
counters.

However, I also found that CSS3 WD specifiies several
'composite' list types that can be, in theory, obtained with
::marker psuedo-element. All these 'composite' types
are for non-repeating and finite-length lists
and apepar to have been added for precomposed
parenthesized/circled/dotted/double-circled
characters in Unicode.

Now my questions are:

  - Is my example given above
a valid way to obtain circled version of
existing list types for which predefined composite
types are not defined?

  - How would you respond to a proposal for
    a few new 'composite' list types
    such as

     - cjk-ideographic-parenthesized : U+3220 - U+3229 (10)
     - cjk-ideographic-circled : U+3280 - U+3289 (10)
     - hangul-syllables-circled : U+326E - U+327B (14)
     - hangul-consonants-circled : U+3260 - U+326D (14)
     - hangul-syllables-parenthesized : U+320E - U+321B (14)
     - hangul-consonants-parenthesized : U+3200 - U+320D (14)
     - katakana-circled : U+32D0 - U+32FE (48?)


 From a client implementor's point of view, it's easier to
have them pre-defined in CSS3 than to support ::marker
pseudo-elment with a bit complex
substitution with precomposed characters in Unicode (although that may
not be mandatory. Document authors may also find it easier
that way. Besides, for the sake of consistency,
it could be argued that other
'composite list types' should also be removed from CSS3 to
reject those listed above as 'redundant' because
they can be generated with '::marker'.

On the other hand, pre-defined composite list types
are all finite and rather short so that as long
as CSS3 provides a mechanism for on-the-fly composition
of parenthesized/circled list type, it can be
argued that there's no need to 'further enlarge' the
already-long list of list types.

I'm not sure which side to take. In the long run,
definitely I would be against separate 'composite'
list-types for the parenthesized/circled. However,
CSS3 might  need to add them to address
a short-term need.


Anyway, it'd be nice if you could share your thoughts
on these issues with me.

Best,

Jungshik Shin

Received on Saturday, 22 March 2003 02:51:58 UTC