Re: flowing around both sides of a float Re: float:center (was: Re: Alignment property proposal)

On Dec 31, 2007, at 10:29 AM, Ambrose Li wrote:

>> I did say I'd write more about reading difficulty.  I mainly just
>> wanted to cite a typography book that recommends against it.  I don't
>> have the book handy to check, but I believe that the book in  
>> question is
>>    author={James Felici},
>>    title={The Complete Manual of Typography},
>>    year=2003,
>>    publisher={Peach Pit Press},
>>    address={Berkeley, CA}
>
> As in my involvement with Wikipedia, I am very much against this.
> Especially in the case of Chinese (but including English), there is
> much typographic knowledge that, apparently, has NEVER been
> published in any book. Having to cite a reference for such things
> is the wrong approach IMHO, it just gives a false sense of authority.
> -- 
> cheers,
> -ambrose

I whole-heartedly agree, and would go further: It should not be the  
purpose of this group to restrict CSS to what one or the other of us  
consider to be "good design". Some of the Western world's most  
cherished artists are the ones that broke free from the traditional  
and came up with visuals that were different from what people were  
used to. Not everyone has to like their art for it to have value.  
This has happened in various design movements as well, and is almost  
certain to happen again.

"float:center"  would not just be for pull quotes, but for images and  
who knows what else? I might want a narrow headline block centered on  
the page that pokes down into the body text. Maybe someone will want  
to put a big button in the middle of a block  with the text flowing  
around it. It is not for us to say that it is ugly and therefore we  
cannot allow it. Maybe someone will come up with a great use for it  
that we have not imagined; it happens all the time.

If we have a well understood float model that allows values of right  
and left, then of course it would be desirable to allow a value of  
center as well. Maybe the implementors didn't have time to include it  
or to sort out the implementation details of it previously, but now  
it just seems like an obvious omission.