Re: [CSS3 Text Layout] working draft (compact version)

The choice of top-to-bottom as default for right-to-left scripts is not 
based on what is common in existing documents.  It is so the reader 
doesn't need to switch reading direction when they encounter the 
embedded right-to-left script.  My feeling is that it isn't unreasonable 
to expect someone who wants to orient embedded horizontal scripts in a 
certain direction (for example to align the text orientation with the 
block progression direction) to mark their horizontal scripts up with 
the direction they want.  Note that both left-to-right and right-to-left 
scripts would have the same mark up (eg. text-orientation-vertical: 
right) for this purpose.  This is something I would definitely like to 
hear other opinions on though.

Paul Nelson (ATC) wrote:
> Elika's document should not be the only document you consider for understanding vertical text layout. For example, Arabic text in the common form of documents in vertial text mode rotates 90 degrees clockwise, *not* 90 degrees counterclockwise as you indicate.
>  
>   
The text-orientation-vertical: natural layout is completely consistent 
with the natural orthography.  Cases like text-orientation-vertical: 
left for Latin scripts laid out horizontally are, I think, also possible 
with glyph-orientation-horizontal: 270.  Removing the need to specify an 
inline direction is simply to remove the need to specify things which 
don't need to be specified to obtain correct results.
> Your approach seems to try to devorce the glyphs from the natural orthography for a script and therefore the fact that glyphs run on a baseline according to orthographic conventions is sufficient for normal text in document. I do not see that your special properties are necessary.
>  
> Regards,
>  
> Paul
>
>

Received on Tuesday, 9 January 2007 09:53:42 UTC