Re: wading into the Prefix morass...

On 20/2/12 21:39, David Singer wrote:
> I do this with all appropriate humility, and aware that I may be inviting flame-throwers pointed my way…
>
>
> I do wonder whether it would help us, and the web community, if we differentiated more clearly between
>
> A) experimental features that vendors introduce, that are truly vendor-specific
> and
> B) 'early' (before spec. stability)  implementations of specifications that are in process at the W3C.
>
> It doesn't seem to help the web community much to ask them to write N similar 'vendor-specific' constructs for case (b), when, in fact, they are all (trying to) implement the same specification.
>
> This is what led to me wondering (a few emails ago) if we could usefully use draft-specific prefixes for features, and only change the prefix if the parsing had to change.  I agree, it makes life harder for the spec. author (you have to think: do I need to change the 'draft prefix' as a result of this edit?) but it makes life way easier for the web developer.  And it removes the ugly temptation to implement another vendor's prefix; you don't, you implement the 'draft' prefix.
>
> so, instead of -webkit-frotz, we might see -css-a-frotz, -css-b-frotz, and so on (as the definition of frotz evolves), with some final definition being -frotz and equivalent to -css-r-frotz (well, I hope we don't have 'r' revisions of anything).
>
> I use -css- to suggest "the definition currently 'belongs' to the CSS WG", and the lack of it to say "it's now owned by the whole wonderful world and its web"…
>
>
> David Singer
> Multimedia and Software Standards, Apple Inc.
Relevant: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/2012Feb/0507.html

-- 
Lea Verou (http://lea.verou.me | @LeaVerou)

Received on Monday, 20 February 2012 23:48:36 UTC