CSS is designed (not deliberately) in such a way that it is very hard
to implement. CSS is an total system - it would be completely
unsatisfactory to simply implement a sub set of it - that just
wouldn't work. Som bits can of course be left out, but most if it
(and, really, the hard parts) can't be left out. The problem is,
that every CSS style feature can apply to every HTML tag, and can
cascade down in all sorts of overlapping paths. This creates great
problems for the would-be implementer in cutting things down to
size.
The hardest aspect of implementing CSS is of course the treatment of
fonts, which is a complete mess on all computer platforms, and
everywhere else. CSS makes (in my opinion) the mistake of supporting
in parallel quite a few different font systems, no doubt in response
to the commercial interests represented in the committee which
designed it. It would have been better and cleaner to support just one
font system, and thus standardise things (which is what things like
HTML and CSS are supposed to do). At least, there is a good "generic"
sub-set of CSS's requirements which is reasonably practical to
implement, and which can up to a point fudge the many other apects
of it.
The first step to implementing CSS for Amiga is to implement Unicode
for Amiga. Unicode is a system of writing all the symbols and letters
of all the world's languages and other symbolic things like
mathematical symbols, printers marks &c. Unicode is a large and
intricate system, which is beautifully designed. CSS2, HTML4,
Javascript, JAVA, and many other representation standards
use Unicode. when you see things like á or in
HTML, thry are really invocations of Unicode characters.
(for more on Unicode, see www.unicode.com).
Thus, before CSS2 or Javascript or JAVA can be properly implemented on
the Amiga, the first step to to implement Unicode, or at least a
subset of it (e.g. omitting the East Asian characters), in such a way
that the Unicode implementation can respond to the requirements, or
at least most of them, of CSS2.
I have been working on an implimentation of Unicode for the Amiga.
I will soon be releasing it for beta testing. It is complex and
intricate to implement Unicode properly - it is not just a case of
designing *many* different glyphs in *many* different styles and
sizes. It is also necessary to implement the very complex rules of
combining characters, bidirectionality, and much else besides. A
Unicode implementation for Amiga must also be extremely fast, and
extremely efficient with memory, since Amiga though a great platform,
has old fashioned and limited hardware.
Anyway, my implementation seems to me to be very stable, and
I am adding all the required features bit by bit. I will make it
freeware. The means of implementing all the font and character
aspects of CSS2 (well, most anyway) will be built into it, and easy to
program. From that base, it will be a not too terribly difficult to
implement CSS2 in such a way that programs like Voyager and
Aweb can plug it in.
If anyone would like to know more about my Unicode project, please
email me (Ken Shillito) at [EMAIL PROTECTED] I would also be
interested to hear if anyone would like to help test it (would
require programming skills). Once my Unicode is up and
running, the next step will be to work on implementing CSS2.
--
Ken Shillito
Home Page: http://fast.to/shillito
Jesus is Lord!
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