Re: [css-regions] Named Flows, Elements and Box Generation

> > On the ladder of abstraction for document design, regions and flows
> > are fairly abstract concepts that depend on lower-level stuff like
> > fitting content on a line. If you truly want the low-level stuff, a
> > better target is TeX's assembly-language-for-documents-like features.
>
> There are multiple levels of abstraction that one can target.  The
> fact that it's possible to go lower doesn't mean that it's not
> reasonable to expose something at a given level.

I've to agree here, with both remarks. Yes, Regions is not the lowest level 
feature we can imagine. Yes, we still can go deeper. And yes there are use 
cases for that, too.

But, yes again, this is orthogonal to the current discussion. Changes happen 
to the platform by iterating, and not by suddenly giving you access to all 
the primitives the browsers kept hidden from you during years. We have to 
consider browsers as they are: products of an agile development process 
where new versions comes every X weeks, and that web developers have to work 
with every day. Planning large and idealistic features is going to bring us 
nowhere, because their implementation does not fit in a reasonable amount of 
time, they seem too far away, people will not feel compelled working on 
them. With low-level primitives, we can set intermediate goals that are 
appealing because they actually help solving real problems in the mean time, 
while still bringing us closer to our goals.

Only when the basement is solid, we can think about building the house.

Received on Monday, 28 October 2013 22:59:18 UTC