Re: Selector Syntax Survey - subject indicator vs :has()

On 12/02/2014 13:17, Bruno de Oliveira Abinader wrote:
> On Feb 12, 2014, at 5:49 AM, Pete Boere <pete@the-echoplex.net>
> wrote:
>
>> In the comments to the earlier survey, I noticed someone choosing
>> :has() because '!' means negation in programming languages.
>>
>> But this does not to apply to CSS for the following reasons:
>>
>> 1. With `!important` the exclamation mark already has a meaning in
>> CSS, which is *the opposite* of negation. Like in the regular
>> written word, it indicates emphasis.
>>
>> 2. CSS is not a programming language, like SASS (of which voters
>> may be more familiar with).
>>
>> So by that reasoning the exclaimation mark is a strong choice,
>> since it indicates emphasis and already has precedence in CSS
>> syntax.
>
> I'd like to share my thoughts on this subject - CSS Selectors tend to
> behave similarly to regular expressions in some way, and for that I'd
> say that if we go on using "^E > F"  it could be also seen as "select
> all E elements except the ones in which F is a child". This is how
> POSIX regular expressions defines its usage under brackets [1]:
> "Within brackets, ‘^’ can be used to invert the membership of the
> character class being specified."
>
> Links: [1]
> http://www.gnu.org/software/findutils/manual/html_node/find_html/posix_002dextended-regular-expression-syntax.html

Naming is hard, but giving arbitrary meaning to single ASCII characters 
is harder.

-- 
Simon Sapin

Received on Wednesday, 12 February 2014 13:22:40 UTC