Re: Colour gradient backgrounds.

 
> [Original Message]
> From: Lachlan Hunt <lachlan.hunt@iinet.net.au>
>
> Ernest Cline wrote:
>
> > Just to make it clear, the reason I have for wanting CSS gradients
> > is not as a stopgap until SVG is widely implemented, but as
> > something that would be useful even in environments where SVG
> > will never be implemented.
>
> Yes, but would the extra complication of adding such properties to 
> CSS be worth it for UAs that can support SVG, considering that it 
> *shouldn't* be a big loss if a solid colour, or even a fallback image 
> was presented, rather than a gradient in UAs that don't support SVG?
>
> I'm all for adding new types of colour properties and values to CSS, 
> but not at the expense of crossing *too far* into the realm of images. 
> For example, I have been thinking about for a while, but not yet 
> proposed, adding properties to do bitwise (NOT, OR, XOR and AND) 
> operations between colours and backgrounds which wouldn't use up
> much processing power at all, but haven't had time to write up a full 
> proposal. Maybe later this week I'll get around to it.
 
Well, I think that probably would go too far, largely because those who
would use such effects likely will be graphic professionals who would
likely be doing stuff better suited for SVG, Flash, or PDF, than using
the box model and CSS. This is not because it would be complicated
to program, but because it would be complicated for people to figure
out what they wanted from it.
 
Gradients don't have that problem. They are easy for both humans
and computers to grasp.
 
> > There is also a minor problem, in that 'color' would have multiple
> > shortcut properties ('font' and 'foreground') that would reference it,
> > a difficulty that so far has only affected border properties.
>
> The 'font' shorthand property doesn't reference 'color' in any 
> version of CSS, and AFAIK, there is no shorthand property that
> currently  references 'color'.
 
You're right, I don't normally use the shorthand properties myself
and since the primary effect of 'color' is to affect the font color,
I just assumed that it was something you could specify there.
 
In any case even were I correct, it would only be a botherance,
not a major problem.
 
> PS. This isn't really related to this thread, but I noticed that, in 
> CSS3, 'font' no longer has 'inherit' in the list of values, whereas it 
> did in CSS2 and 2.1. Was that intentional, or was it just missed?
 
Probably just missed. It says in Section 3.1 of CSS3 Values.
 
   All CSS3 properties accept the keyword value "inherit".

Of course that is just a working draft, so that might be changed. :)

Received on Sunday, 16 May 2004 10:28:37 UTC