Re: [css-align] 2 issues / comments on the specification

On Wed, Jan 29, 2014 at 5:41 PM, Julien Chaffraix <jchaffraix@google.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> * 'flex-end' resolves to 'start' on non-flex items
>
> This is very confusing and I think it would make more sense to have it
> resolve to 'end' to be consistent with the author's cue.

The reasoning for this is that if you're typing 'flex-end' and you're
not in a flexbox, we have no idea what you actually intend.  Our usual
approach is to error-correct into something close to your intent if we
can reasonably infer that, and just reset to the initial value
otherwise.

That said, I don't actually have a strong opinion here.  If you say
'flex-end' accidentally, it might be *reasonable* to assume that you
meant to say 'end'.  I'm okay with making this change.


Somewhat unrelated, I note that 'flex-start/end' are defined to be
"equivalent to" start in a non-flex context.  We should probably just
compute them to start instead; doing so relies on information that is
generally okay to deal with in computed values (just the 'display' of
the element's parent).

> * Currently the specification is silent on what happens when
> 'self-start' and 'self-end' are set on an orthogonal writing mode.
>
> I have thought of 2 ways to think about this (there is probably others):
> A) As the axes from the containing block / child are orthogonal, it is
> invalid and we would default to 'start' / 'end' (based on the original
> property).
> B) We use the child's coordinate system to resolve start / end into a
> physical direction and use it for the resolution.
>
> >From my perspective, A) makes more sense as B) would involve looking
> at the opposite axis (e.g. 'justify-self' would end up working on the
> child's block-axis).

It's not silent; the behavior is well-defined, it's just stupid.  A
grid item using "align-content: self-start;" and an orthogonal writing
mode would just align its inline-start edge with the corresponding
block-* edge of the grid-area.

I'm okay with changing to your suggested behavior A, and just
computing it to start/end instead.

~TJ

Received on Monday, 3 February 2014 23:34:50 UTC