Re: [CSS21] Addition of 2 values to the visibility property

(Sorry, this didn't get to the list on the first try.)

On Thu, Jun 26, 2008 at 6:43 PM, Damian Vila <damianvila@gmail.com> wrote:
> Well, I'm not really up-to-date with the work being done in CSS3, that's why
> I put the [CSS21] on the subject.

Well, as far as I know CSS 2.1 is closed to all novel changes and is
updated only to clarify things and bring them in line with client
behavior.  So this would have to go in CSS3, and the proposal seems
redundant with others there (which are much more broadly useful).

> It's true that the same (apparent) thing to 'visibility:foreground' can be
> made with 'background:none', but they are conceptually different. For
> example, it's not the same to load a page and have one element with
> 'backgound:none' than to load a page and have that same element with a
> background but the visibility set to 'foreground' (invisible background). In
> the first case you don't have a background at all, while on the second you
> just can't see the background (but effectively, it is there.)

What would be the practical difference, though?  It seems like a bad
idea to add new property values that are conceptually different but in
practice completely identical.  CSS is complicated enough already
while only trying to serve real needs of authors.  Although what you
suggest is superficially similar to visibility: hidden and display:
none, those are only dedicated property values because what they hide
is parts of the document tree, not things created by CSS.  Things
created by CSS can be changed using the same CSS properties used to
create them.

> This could be
> used also to 'preload' backgrounds, for example.

There are already ways to indirectly preload any images you like, for
instance by putting them in a 1x1px <img> tag, or somewhere
absolute-positioned off the viewable document, or similar.  For this
purpose it's still redundant.  It might conceivably be (although I
can't see it) that some functionality to *explicitly* preload images
would be a good idea, but your proposal is not explicit, but
roundabout and no simpler or otherwise more attractive for the purpose
than existing means.

Received on Friday, 27 June 2008 04:22:06 UTC