Many people are accustomed to style sheets in word-processing. W3C's style sheets offer extensive control over the presentation of Web pages. The Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) language is widely implemented. It is playing an important role in styling not just HTML, but also many kinds of XML documents: XHTML, SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) and SMIL (the Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language), to name a few. It is also an important means of adapting pages to different devices, such as mobile phones or printers.
W3C is also developing the Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL, see the XML Activity Statement). XSL applies a “style sheet” to transform one XML-based document into another. XSL and CSS can be combined.
W3C has a page on CSS resources, including browsers, authoring tools and tutorials.
The working group published one Recommendation (Media Queries), two Candidate Recommendations (CSS Values and Units Level 3 and CSS Flexible Box Layout) and a large number of first or updated Working Drafts.
Some of the drafts (Transforms, Animations, Filter Effects, Compositing and Blending) are joint work with the SVG WG and are prepared by a joint task force, the FX Task Force.
The group has grown to over 80 members and the public mailing list www-style, where most of the technical discussions take place, has become the busiest list in W3C. It is proof of the popularity of the model and syntax of CSS, but also points to a lack of complementary technologies to appear. (E.g., for GUIs, 3D graphics or advanced book layout).
The WG is working on test suites for some of the specifications that are in CR (CSS Backgrounds and Borders Level 3, CSS Multi-column Layout, CSS Values and Units Level 3 and CSS Flexible Box Layout).
The Current work page gives an overview of the various specifications the group is developing, roughly in order of priority. The page is regularly updated.
The new features in level3 serve fall in two categories: GUIs and document layout. When HTML, instead of a dedicated language, is used for GUIs, a separate language is required to describe the layout, because HTML was only designed for documents. CSS is being extended to be that layout language. Also, while the development of XSL-FO is halted, new features are added to CSS to provide an alternative.
| Group | Chair | Team Contact | Charter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) Working Group (participants) | Daniel Glazman, Peter Linss | Bert Bos, Chris Lilley | Chartered until 15 June 2016 |
The WG was called “CSS & FP WG” from 1997 to 2000.
This Activity Statement was prepared for TPAC 2014 per section 5 of the W3C Process Document. Generated from group data.
Bert Bos, Style Activity LeadModified:
$Date: 2015-03-05 08:41:41 $