CSS10!

(2006-12-19) CSS is ten years old, officially! On December 17th, 1996, CSS1 became a W3C Recommendation, two years or so after its conception. W3C just sent out a press release to commemorate the event. To be precise, the press release is two days late, but — as we know — Tuesdays are good for press releases. CSS has been an intrisic part of my life in the past decade and I was asked to contribute a quote for the press release. I submitted this:

When CSS1 was published ten years ago, there were plenty of sceptics. The CSS community worked tirelessly against browser-specific tags and text in images. Today, all major browsers support CSS, some more than others. A new generation of Web designers will never use the font tag.

Unfortunately, the quote was not acceptable to W3C. The offending phrase is, apparently, some more than others which underlines the fact that the CSS Recommendations have various levels of support in browsers. This is a well-known fact in the web community who has been struggling with the issue for years. It's also a key factor in understanding the history and future of the CSS specifications. It is unfortunate that W3C does not want to acknowledge that its specifications are not always universally supported.

However, this is a day to celebrate, and the celebration will last a year! During the year, Bert and I will accept submissions for the CSS10 gallery. We will showcase interesting CSS designs and essays. The hall of fame has 20 or so entries now, but there is room for more. We're looking for CSS-related content that is clever, instructive, funny, admired, beautiful, accessible, and cute. What are we missing? Send your suggestions to css10@w3.org!

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