Hi Anne, Alfonso, Thanks for your reply and the reference to Microsoft's range.expand. Please see my reply inline.
On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 6:35 AM, Anne van Kesteren <ann...@opera.com> wrote: > Initially I did not quite understand what this API was proposing, but after > reading it a few times it seems to mimic the behavior of what typically > happens when you double-click a "word". > Yes. you are right. It is to identify a word when user mouse over or click on a page. A specific use case is dictionary, which shows the word definition when user mouse over or click in a webpage. For example: following JS code would locate a word under mouse. var range = document.caretRangeFromPoint(event.clientX, event.clientY); var word = document.expandRange(range, 'word'); > I'm still not quite sure whether I understand the API though. Is "word" a > keyword on how the range is to be extended or is it an example? Also, > wouldn't it be better to put the method on Range rather than Document? "word" is a keyword. Like Microsoft's spec<http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms536421%28VS.85%29.aspx>, a range could be extended to a 'character', a 'word', a 'sentence', or a 'line' etc. As to whether it should be a method in Document or in Range, it is open to discussion. > > > And finally, use cases would help as well as a definition of "word > boundary" and how this works/won't work in an international context. A word is the smallest semantic form in one language. In languages use space to break word, such as English, a word is a collection of characters terminated by a space or punctuation. In languages do not use space to break word, such as Chinese, word breaker is needed to break a word. The API should work for English, at least. Whether it works in an international context depends on whether the layout engine/browser supports correct word breaker in that language. Thanks, Xiaomei > > > Cheers, > > > -- > Anne van Kesteren > http://annevankesteren.nl/ >
