Re: flowing around both sides of a float

Oh, and by the way, I've only tested this in FireFox and Safari.  
Don't expect it to look right in IE6. IE7 should work OK, but I make  
no guarantees.


On Jan 6, 2008, at 1:22 PM, Brad Kemper wrote:

>
> On Jan 1, 2008, at 2:50 PM, David Woolley wrote:
>
>> Actually, I've just done a quick scan of some of the magazines and  
>> newspapers I have around (mainly English, but also a paper and  
>> magazine in Simplified Chinese).  I can't find any centred  
>> displays (with text around both sides).  On the other hand, I can  
>> find several displays (pulled quotes, images, supplementary text,  
>> that are symmetrically floated right in one column and left in the  
>> next column, so it would seem that that has better use cases than  
>> centring in a single column. (There are also ones spanning several  
>> two or more columns completely, some which are unbalanced, and, at  
>> least one that was quite narrow, but with edges cropped to the  
>> image it contained, and placed between columns, so as to take  
>> irregular chunks out of two columns.)
>
> People may have a hard time coming up with printed, published  
> examples of two sided floats that are not in columns, but that is  
> largely due to the fact that most newspapers and magazines are  
> arranged in columns of some sort. But a Web page is not the same as  
> a static piece of paper, as I suspect even David would agree. Paper  
> cannot have a fluid design, and columns (other than those that  
> define page divisions, like sidebars and navigation bars) can cause  
> problems on screen when the text gets so long that it requires re- 
> scrolling from the bottom to the top of each column.
>
> Since the conversation has largely ignored the fact that floats in  
> Web pages are, probably more often than not, used for things other  
> than pull quotes, I have put together a fictional Web page to show  
> how a positioned float (or positioned element with "wrap", or a  
> "free" floated element) could lead to creative possibilities that  
> are not currently possible with CSS.
>
> This is a liquid layout, so feel free to try it in different window  
> sizes (it can be made very narrow). Right now, the positioned  
> elements just overlap and cover up the text, but with some sort of  
> positioned float, the idea is that the floats would split each line  
> in two, rather than just overlapping:
>
> http://bradclicks.com/cssplay/centerfloat.html
>
> You need not like the design in order to appreciate how a  
> positioned float would open up new creative possibilities.
>
> To those who think Web pages should only use the browser's default  
> style sheets, and abhor the idea of pages with creative designs, or  
> who think the Web would be better if all pages resembled the way  
> they looked in 1993: you need not comment, as I already know you  
> won't like it.
>
>> I have a suspicion that the only time I've seen displays centred  
>> within a column, they have have not had rectangular outlines.
>