Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
blog.echoenduring.com
Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
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Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#2No.
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#3No.
Did you read the article? He makes a good argument why CSS icons are a Bad Idea. In short, paraphrased:
CSS is about facilitating graphical display, it's not about creating the graphics themselves.
I think that's a good point. I'm quite shocked to see someone's pushing CSS Icons as an actual solution to a problem - what next, CSS video? It's possible (an absolutely positioned div for each frame, and then just cycle the z indices to animate (perhaps even sans-js using :hover!)), and would be a lovely thing to hack around with, but as a serious "let's deploy this"? Whoa there.
That's taking CSS too far.
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#4If you want to minimize HTTP requests, or store everything in one document, couldn't you embed a GIF or PNG in the HTML using MIME? I just checked, and a PNG of the "profile" icon is about half the size of the CSS. (261 bytes vs. 560).
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#5It bothers the hell out of me that many web devs have decides that all HTML and CSS should be hand-editable and comprehensible at a glance.
Obviously, it's vital that both those features be possible.
But it's not obvious to me that those features be required in all markup; on the contrary, it seems far more useful for there to be a standard, predictable strata of functionality that developers can target with compilers.
From that perspective, the ability to do pure-CSS buttons and icons is a win. It's hard for a web developer hand crafting markup to apply CSS buttons, but it's trivial for a developer using something like Sass to get a button as a oneliner.
I'd sacrifice 10,000 extra lines of line noise markup in every design if it meant I never had to open Photoshop.
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#6No.
Did you read the article? He makes a good argument why CSS icons are a Bad Idea. In short, paraphrased: CSS is about facilitating graphical display, it's not about creating the graphics themselves. I think that's a good point. I'm quite shocked to see someone's pushing CSS Icons as an actual solution to a problem - what next, CSS video? It's possible (an absolutely positioned div for each frame, and then just cycle t…
CSS buttons mean that web apps can create UI elements without (a) relying on ugly, unreliable browser builtin sprites, and (b) having to handcraft graphics for every label the application needs. It's not a small win; it reduces many feature requests from 30 minutes down to 2.
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#7If you want to minimize HTTP requests, or store everything in one document, couldn't you embed a GIF or PNG in the HTML using MIME? I just checked, and a PNG of the "profile" icon is about half the size of the CSS. (261 bytes vs. 560).
short answer: base64.
See: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1124149/embedding-backgro...
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did you read the article? He makes a good argument why CSS icons are a Bad Idea. In short, paraphrased: CSS is about facilitating graphical display, it's not about creating the graphics themselves. I think that's a good point. I'm quite shocked to see someone's pushing CSS Icons as an actual solution to a problem - what next, CSS video? It's possible (an absolutely positioned div for each frame, and then just cycle t…
CSS buttons mean that web apps can create UI elements without (a) relying on ugly, unreliable browser builtin sprites, and (b) having to handcraft graphics for every label the application needs. It's not a small win; it reduces many feature requests from 30 minutes down to 2.
CSS Buttons are all well and good for simple styles and rapid prototyping. But what happens when your boss asks you to add an icon inside the button? Or stretch it vertically? Or add it to an email bulletin?
And the time you claim to have gained by not having to fire up photoshop and knock out a few simple buttons, you'll lose again by having to test in different browsers. Also consider readability, maintainability, future-proofing your code, semantic html.
edit: and if the ability to autogenerate arbitrary buttons is important, knock up a server side script to create the graphics for you. Really. That's much nicer than doing it in CSS for all but the simplest of cases.
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#9Somedays I just wish we had used Postscript with hyperlinks instead of HTML/CSS/Javascript.
Re: Are We Taking CSS Too Far?
#10I agree with the author wholeheartedly.
I always assumed these were experimental of the "just 'cause I can" type. Trying to show off how far CSS can go, but not really in a realistic usage.
I read here though that people believe this is a useful type of use. Without getting into a flame-war if it is or isn't, I think the answer there is SVG: that should be just perfect for these sort of usage.