Re: Why no compositional positioning?

On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 9:48 AM, Thomas Davie <tom.davie@gmail.com> wrote:
> That sounds like a very strange contradiction indeed actually.  The elements
> are positioned within their parent but are not in their parent.  Is there a
> reason for this strange behavior?

Yes.  Absolutely positioned elements can be placed *anywhere*.  Their
position is specified exactly, without any reference at all to the
rest of the document.  Thus, the rest of the document can't depend on
them.

They are still within the parent for all purposes.  They are not
within the parent's *flow*.

> Incidentally, this returns me to my original question – there is no
> positioning mode which simply lays the elements out within their parent.
>  Why not?

Well, no, not quite, because your original question is excessively
vague.  There are a number of ways to handle CSS display.  You can use
normal static positioning.  You can use relative or absolute
positioning.  You can use floats.  You can use the table-* display
types.  In the future, you will be able to use Template Layout or Grid
Positioning, or perhaps another similar method.

Please, read up on all of these.  If none of them fit your needs, then
return and lay out precisely how they fail you and what you need from
them.  At present it's not clear that you understand all the options
at your disposal.

~TJ

Received on Monday, 16 March 2009 14:55:05 UTC