RE: [css3-ruby] [css3-text] Position values and before/after definitions in LR vertical writing mode

My first instinct is to question whether there is an issue here. Is it a
problem that ruby text labelled 'before' will appear to the left of vertical
mongolian text?  Before and after refer to the position relative to the
block progression, in my mind. It's not about top of line coincidence.

I think that above and below are confusing, since they suggest physical
locations that are not appropriate for vertical text.

(Note that the CSS Ruby module says " vertical-ideographic layout mode, the
ruby appears on the right side of the base" - mongolian isn't ideographic.
That could certainly be made clearer with a note.)

RI

============
Richard Ishida
Internationalization Lead
W3C (World Wide Web Consortium)

http://www.w3.org/International/
http://rishida.net/




> -----Original Message-----
> From: www-international-request@w3.org [mailto:www-international-
> request@w3.org] On Behalf Of fantasai
> Sent: 26 September 2010 15:15
> To: www-style@w3.org; 'WWW International'
> Subject: [css3-ruby] [css3-text] Position values and before/after
definitions in
> LR vertical writing mode
> 
> In top-to-bottom horizontal writing mode (English, most other scripts) and
in
> right-to-left vertical writing mode (CJK), the "before" side and the
effective
> top of the line (wrt vertical alignment, glyph rotation, etc) coincide.
> 
> See
>
http://fantasai.inkedblade.net/style/discuss/vertical-text/diagrams/text-flo
w-
> vectors-tb.png
>
http://fantasai.inkedblade.net/style/discuss/vertical-text/diagrams/text-flo
w-
> vectors-rl.png
> 
> But in left-to-right vertical writing mode (Mongolian), the "before" side
and
> the effective top of the line do not coincide. See the illustration here:
>    http://fantasai.inkedblade.net/style/discuss/vertical-
> text/diagrams/mongolian-vectors.jpg
> 
> The "before" side of a line is to the left. The "top" (ascender) side of a
line
> is to the right.
> 
> If ruby-position and text-underline-position use "before" to mean "on the
> right
> side of the line" in vertical text, then we have a problem where "before"
> means
> different sides of an item depending on what property is involved.
> 
> Either the definitions should be updated to depend on whether the block
> flow
> is right-to-left or left-to-right, or the keywords should be changed to
> something
> else to avoid a conflict in meaning. I suggest the latter, since I suspect
that
> the current definitions are the ones that are typographically relevant.
> 
> However, I haven't encountered any really good pairs of keywords. (Koji
and I
> are using "above" and "below" for now.)
> 
> Richard, do you have any thoughts on this?
> 
> ~fantasai
> 
> 
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Received on Monday, 27 September 2010 13:11:48 UTC