RE: [css3-regions] writing mode and directionality for flows

A very limited set of properties on the region element affect content (other than region styling). Currently only column properties are candidates for that. And size of course.

Considering that in paged media first page is the ICB, first region will be ICB too (right?), then it would be reasonable to expect that root writing mode is that of the first region element.

BTW, what use cases depend on that? The only one I can think of is how many pages to skip for "break-after:even". Anything else?

Alex

-----Original Message-----
From: www-style-request@w3.org [mailto:www-style-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of David Hyatt
Sent: Thursday, August 11, 2011 9:43 AM
To: Vincent Hardy
Cc: www-style@w3.org CSS
Subject: Re: [css3-regions] writing mode and directionality for flows

On Aug 11, 2011, at 11:31 AM, Vincent Hardy wrote:

> Hi Davd,
> 
> On 8/11/11 9:25 AM, "David Hyatt" <hyatt@apple.com> wrote:
> 
>> What are the initial writing mode and directionality of flows? Can 
>> individual regions specify different writing-modes and 
>> directionality, thus causing how you paginate to vary from region to 
>> region in the same flow? I'm really hoping the answer is "No", and 
>> that - as with printing and multi-column elements - there is a single 
>> master writing mode and directionality that determines all of the pagination.
> 
> Yes, that is what it would be. In the new draft that is in the works, 
> the model is sticking to be very close (as much as possible and makes 
> sense) to pagination and multi-column.
> 
>> 
>> My suggestion would be to use the writing-mode and directionality of 
>> the first region to establish the pagination direction and to just 
>> ignore the writing-mode/directionality set on subsequent regions. 
>> Another idea would be to simply use the ICB's writing-mode and direction.
> 
> This is missing from the spec. currently, I'll add an action item to 
> add something about the writing-mode direction.

A third idea would be to support styling a pseudo-element for the named flow.

::flow(myflow) { writing-mode: vertical-rl; }

Probably a bit silly to create a pseudo-element just to style the writing-mode / direction though. I kind of like the "use the first region" heuristic, but I'm curious what others think.

dave
(hyatt@apple.com)

Received on Sunday, 14 August 2011 19:10:13 UTC