[CSS21] Lack of version control for content

Hello ,

This comment is sent from both the CDF WG and the SVG WG.

  Thus, while it is not the case that a CSS2 stylesheet is necessarily
  forwards-compatible with CSS 2.1, it is the case that a stylesheet
  restricting itself to CSS 2.1 features is more likely to find a
  compliant user agent today and to preserve forwards compatibility in
  the future. While breaking forward compatibility is not desirable, we
  believe the advantages to the revisions in CSS 2.1 are worthwhile.
  http://www.w3.org/TR/2005/WD-CSS21-20050613/about.html#q1

Experience with the CSS validator shows that the lack of version
identification is a significant problem for managing CSS content; there
is no way to indicate to which of the multiple, changing, overlapping
versions of CSS the stye sheet is attempting to comply. As the quoted
section illustrates, there are incompatibilities between versions.

The SVG WG requests that CSS 2.1 align itself with the Architecture of
the World Wide Web

   A data format specification SHOULD provide for version information.
   http://www.w3.org/TR/webarch/#ext-version

As an example, @version 2.1; would be one method. Unknown at-rules are
ignored by compliant parsers.

-- 
 Chris Lilley                    mailto:chris@w3.org
 Chair, W3C SVG Working Group
 W3C Graphics Activity Lead

Received on Thursday, 25 August 2005 13:44:18 UTC