Re: [css3-page] examples in 3.3.2 (page size) are 'US-centric'(?)

> [Original Message]
> From: Bjoern Hoehrmann <derhoermi@gmx.net>
> To: <ernestcline@mindspring.com>
> Cc: <www-style@w3.org>
> Date: 1/19/2004 5:27:11 PM
> Subject: Re: [css3-page] examples in 3.3.2 (page size) are 'US-centric'(?)
>
> * Ernest Cline wrote:
> >I don't get your point.  W3C specs such as XHTML aren't revised whenever
> >another language is added to ISO 639 or another MIME type is registered
with
> >the IETF.  Rather they just reference the standard and mention where one
> >can get the latest list of registered values. Why then should CSS3 Page
need
> >to be revised when the IEEE PWG accepts a new standard paper size?
>
> A CSS user agent would be expected to support new keywords out of the
> box while a Voice Browser would not be expected to support speech
> synthesis for a new language or a browser a new image format just
> because of new registered language tags or MIME types. If the page
> dimensions can be inferred from the keyword that would not be a problem,
> but then I don't get the point of using
>
>   size: na_letter_8.5x11in;
>
> (a keyword I would probably have to look up first) instead of
>
>   size: 8.5in 11in;
>
> As an author, what's my benefit if this is added to css3-page?

Well first off, you should be able to use just

size: na_letter ;

or if you can't remember the short name, then altho not strictly
kosher, a UA should be able to understand either:

size: custom_xyzzy_8.5x11in;

or:

size: us_letter_8.5x11in;

as referring to 8.5" x 11" paper.

The main one advantage this gives an author is that it uses  a standard
way of referring to page sizes so that if you are also dealing with other
types of documents than CSS stylesheets, then if they also
follow that standard, you would only have to refer to one standard.

I will admit that given the sheer number of keywords (165 different 
standard paper sizes in that standard if I counted correctly) it would
be unwieldy to require that all 165 short names (without the dimensions)
be supported by all UA's.  However, since there are only a few common
paper sizes, it should be practical to require a basic set of keywords
(or even restrict the list of  allowed short keywords to just those
keywords.)

What follows is what I feel to be a likely maximum minimum:

na_invoice (5.5" x 8.5")
na_letter (8.5" x 11")
na_legal (8.5" x 14")
na_ledger (11" x 17")

iso_a5 (148mm x 210mm)
iso_b5 (176mm x 250mm)
iso_a4 (210mm x 297mm)
iso_b4 (250mm x 353mm)
iso_a3 (297mm x 420 mm)

For general printing, we probably don't need to have CSS
support keywords for envelope sizes, and I don't know
how commonly  the non-ISO paper sizes used by China,
Taiwan, or Japan that are referenced by the IEEE standard
are used with computers. As it is, with these nine
I probably have overkill for general use, as "na_letter"
and "iso_a4" are certainly the two most used sizes of
computer paper.  "na_invoice" and "iso_a5" are most
likely to be used when a user has chosen to print
a document in a 2-up format.

In any event, as I have said, if the decision is made to only
support a few keywords instead of the full IEEE PWG
standard for  paper sizes, I strongly want the keywords
chosen to conform with the <class-name> "_" <size-name>
format so that if it should be decided in a future version
of the Paged Media Module to support this standard
there would not be any legacy keywords that don't follow
that form that would have to be supported as well.

Received on Tuesday, 20 January 2004 00:42:57 UTC