[css3-mediaqueries] Width/Height Clarifications

In the definitions of 'width' and 'height', the spec says:

   # For continuous media, this is the width of the viewport
   # (as described by CSS2, section 9.1.1 [CSS21]). For paged
   # media, this is the width of the page box (as described
   # by CSS2, section 13.2 [CSS21]).

Opera's 'projection' mode is in some sense both paged and
continuous. In this case you would want to use the viewport
size, not the page box size (which depends on the content).
In print media also the page box size can change: all even
pages can be one size, all odd pages another, for instance.
So Media Queries should not be referring to the page box.
I'd suggest the terms "paper size" or "page size". (The
interaction of media queries and the 'size' property is a
horrible mess, but I'm hoping we can deal with that in the
Paged Media spec.)

The definitions say that 'height' "describes the height of
the rendering surface of the output device". This would be
a more appropriate description for 'device-height', which
is currently described as  "the height of the output device".
The viewport of a browser window can be smaller or larger
than the height of the screen (which is "the rendering
surface of the output device"). And the 'device-height'
query isn't intended to refer to the height of the physical
monitor box, but rather to the height of the screen.

~fantasai

Received on Thursday, 24 April 2008 21:00:03 UTC