[pmwiki-users] Proposed Default Stylesheet (pmwiki.css)

[H. Fox]

On 2/17/06, Patrick R. Michaud <pmichaud at pobox.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 16, 2006 at 05:06:32PM -0700, H. Fox wrote:
> > I originally had
> > even less space below heading but Pm commented that the above
> > difference...
> >
> > "is likely to be lost on many authors, meaning that same-level headings
> > on a page would likely end up with varying amounts of whitespace between
> > the heading and its subsequent text."
> >
> > so he Pm may prefer to take away the control in case some people can't
> > figure out how to use it.
> >
> > I like giving the author control because I think if it looks bad,
> > they'll figure out how to fix it.
>
> I think my original point is more that authors wouldn't notice that
> it looks bad, so it will tend to go unfixed.  To me the answer is to
> either fix it so that things don't look bad, or make it obvious that
> it ought to be fixed.  :-)

I suppose my approach with the current version (and immediately
forthcoming 0070 version) could be best be described as  "fix it so
that things don't look bad" for H2 headings and "make it obvious" for
smaller headings.

Here's a subset of the test markup I've been using for this:

http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/Test/HeadingsWithText1
http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/Test/HeadingsWithText2
http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/Test/HeadingsWithText3

I think the (forthcoming Real Soon Now) 0070 stylesheet handles these
about right, but I'd be glad to learn what other people think about
it.

> From a "what-appears-in-the-markup" perspective, I prefer there to
> be blank lines after the headings, as it makes the markup text
> more readable (PmWikiPhilosophy #1).   So to me, the "how to fix it"
> step is generally to add a blank line after the heading, not
> to remove it.

Add a blank line to the *markup*?  Maybe.  Some authors may  want
blank lines "mysteriously inserted" in thier markup.  My first
impression is to fafor it, though.

Always add "vspace paragraph"?  Pleas no!  At least make it something
that skin authors can disable.  Skin authors may want to use something
other than whitespace (say, a line) below headings.

Hagan

p.s.:  "Whitespace surrounding headings" may seem like trivial stuff,
but I think it matters (in case that wasn't obvious :-)  ).  It's the
kind of thing that people don't notice when it's doe well, but stands
out as "lack of refinement" when it isn't.