<p06240601c23d8733a613@[192.168.0.101]>
Current votes: None.
At 5:38 PM +0200 UTC, on 4/7/07, Alfonso Mart=EDnez de Lizarrondo wrote: > 2007/4/7, Sander Tekelenburg <<mailto:st@isoc.nl>st@isoc.nl>: > >> It seems extremely unlikely to me that every UA will in fact implement= the >> exact same default Style Sheet, even it it were mandated by the spec. >> Therefore, in reality authors will not be able to rely on this and thu= s >> speccing it, giving authors the impression they can rely on it, is lik= ely to >> be result in more problems for users, not less. > > So it comes down to this: > You don't trust that the UA will implement the default Stylesheet, and = so >you say that every UA can do what they want because you propose that eve= ry >web author include that CSS Zapper. That's not at all what I said. I listed 4 specific objections initially. = So far people are responding to details only. All I said in what you're responding to is that [1] it seems unlikely to = me that UAs will actually all use the same default Style Sheet and [2] users will still have User Style Sheets, and that therefore the argument of "ensuring Web pages will look the same across UAs" doesn't fly. That doesn't mean I don't still question whether it is *desirable* at all= to try to make Web poages look the same across UAs. It doesn't mean I don't still question that such a goal would even be achievable, because the sam= e presentation will not work well in different browsing environments (inden= ting lists 40px is a waste of screen real estate on mobiles). And it doesn't m= ean that I don't still think that speccing a default presentation will make i= t harder for UAs to improve their default Style Sheet. I *do* recognise the problem that currently most authors do not consider = the fact that UAs have default Style Sheets. So they end up serving CSS that relies on that built-in Style Sheet, resulting in problems when that buil= t-in Style Sheet is different from what the author anticipated. Authors can handle this reality in two ways [1] when you want padding:0, explicitly state so instead of relying on th= e fact that some UA already uses that as the default [2] have your CSS start out with a 'CSS zapper'. That second approach is easier for most authors, and is implementable for authoring tools, which is why it seems the best approach to advocate. > Some web authors will implement a CSS zapper to achieve the goal of hav= ing >the same rendering in all the browsers That would be a misguided argument. The goal of using a 'CSS zapper' is t= o avoid relying on UAs default Style Sheets. I'm not claiming it would ensu= re sites look the same across browsers. I in fact oppose that goal. >, but too many web authors will focus >just on the browsers that have the most usage Maybe. I think advocating CSS authors include a 'CSS zapper' in their CSS= is a simple enough 'trick' that there is a reasonable chance authors will pi= ck up on it. But assuming authors won't, I still don't see how the spec aiming to "ens= ure Web pages will look the same in every browsing situation" could possibly = have better results, while I *do* see serious potential downsides to that appr= oach. > and new browsers will have to >reverse engineer and copy those de facto standards that aren't documente= d >anywhere or too many websites will look wrong. Yes, that's the one argument that seems to make sense to me thus far. But= it should still be weighed against the objections. --=20 Sander Tekelenburg The Web Repair Initiative: <http://webrepair.org/>