Re: [css4-background] 9-part slicing images in background-image

On 24/07/2013, at 11:07 AM, Liam R E Quin <liam@w3.org> wrote:

> On Wed, 2013-07-24 at 04:40 +1000, Dean Jackson wrote:
> [...]
>> It's more than backgrounds. As Tab mentions, the idea is a single
>> image resource that can be used anywhere that accepts an image.
> 
> Is there a reason why they are restricted to 9 and not also 16 (giving
> centre pieces on the edges)?

Two reasons come to mind:

- Designers typically work with 9-part images.
- The syntax for 9 part border images is already borderline confusing (get it? borderline!). Adding any more slices will likely explode brains.

Although if we expose this as a function that returns <image>, we can extend the syntax at any time.

The good news is that we'll still be able to explode brains and keep our jobs even with a 9-part image:

border-image: nine(nine(nine(url(a.png) 1 1 1 1) 2 2 2 2) 3 3 3 3) 4 4 4 4;

Dean