Meeting minutes
Deprecate properties - w3c/epub-specs#2841
Wendy Reid: This is to deprecate rendition orientation and the spine overrides, flow, and spread
… in the case of spread there is some concern for the spine level overrides
Ivan Herman: let us be precise - we would declare these as obsolete but not conformant, not deprecated.
… this will reduce the message level from epubcheck
… we have heard from toshiakikoike that this is used widely in Japan and deprecating would be bad
… so we should just say that these won't be used
Shinya Takami: yes, if these are marked as errors it will be a big problem in Japan
… so if we deprecate we have to consider epubcheck behavior
Romain Deltour: If we want epubcheck to be more aggressive, then we deprecate some values but make the others obsolete
Matt Garrish: The whole point of obsolete is to mark things as not used or supported, but we don't want to generate errors
… The rendition viewport one should be deprecated, [deprecated???]
Susan Neuhaus: I have been doing fxl for a long time, some are other 10 years old
… this will be a nightmare for them
… I would vote for obsolete over deprecated
Ivan Herman: I think we should make it clear that we meant obsolete
… we just should not discuss deprecation
… are we ok putting all these in that category?
Matt Garrish: It is actually obsolete but conforming, not "not conforming"
ivan + Matt Garrish: some discussion around language for obsolete
Wendy Reid: I do agree with Susan Neuhaus, we cannot deprecate since we will suddenly get a lot of errors
… so we should obsolete these
… we did discuss obsolete with a path to deprecate
… we are in consensus with orientation and flow
… spread still has some nuance
… package level makes sense to remove, but there is some question around spine level
Hadrien Gardeur: spread settings are harmful, auto is only default, none is problematic
… landscape, like portrait makes no sense
… that leaves 'both' which is highly misused
… If you build a RS that follows this behavior you get very bad experience
… All we need is "this should be side by side" or "this shouldn't be side by side"
… we are sending the wrong message by combining all this information one big property
… So something like 'center' is better
… We obviously don't want to break everything, but addressing these separately is confusing
Wendy Reid: even I was incorrectly conflating placement, so we should clarify that section
Susan Neuhaus: I am glad placement will still be there
… I hope we test epubcheck with different types of fxl
Shinya Takami: Regarding spread: none, we do use it in some cases, but it is the same as 'center'
… in some cases we say spine spread-none, so it would be bad for these to be errors
Wendy Reid: If we make it obsolete, epubcheck will only use INFO, so it won't be an error
… at the very least this will be obsolete for now
… so there will be a lot more INFO messages, but it shouldn't break toolchains
<Wendy Reid> PROPOSED: rendition:spread, rendition:flow, and rendition:orientation will be made obsolete in EPUB 3.4 at the package and spine level, in EPUBCheck they will use INFO messages.
<Susan Neuhaus> +1
<Hadrien Gardeur> +1
<Ivan Herman> +1
<Wendy Reid> +1
<Shinya Takami> +1
<Toshiaki Koike> +1
<Matt Garrish> +1
<Romain Deltour> +1
<Brady Duga> +1
<Gregorio Pellegrino> +1
<Masakazu Kitahara> +1
<Charles LaPierre> +1
<Dale Rogers> +1
RESOLUTION: rendition:spread, rendition:flow, and rendition:orientation will be made obsolete in EPUB 3.4 at the package and spine level, in EPUBCheck they will use INFO messages.
Reorganized Layout Section - w3c/epub-specs#2844
Wendy Reid: In working on the reorg PR, some questions have come up about moving some things to the fxl section
… like synthetic spreads
… mgarrish are there others?
Matt Garrish: The biggest one is the one we just resolved
… our previous big problem was it being spread over two specs, 3.3 glommed them together
… I cleaned that up a lot
… and Hadrien's roll is in it, a few other things
… some issues like where are spine overrides allowed
… not sure if we want to get into that now
Ivan Herman: The big question does spreads ever apply to flowing?
… strictly speaking today it is allowed, but the should we continue with that? Or reorg the doc to make that better
Matt Garrish: I introduced images in spine simply to acknowledge that they are fxl
… just to make it clear
… if those are ok, and if we are ok with spreads and reflow not going together?
Susan Neuhaus: I haven't seen a used case where it makes sense for spreads in reflow
… but there is a need for mixed documents that have reflow and hybrid
… I just want to make sure if we disallow spreads we aren't taking options away from some creators?
Dale Rogers: I want to agree with SueNeu. In the epubs I create, I have mixed fxl/reflow
… I am learning that sometimes documents are treated as reflow or fxl as an entire epub
… it would be nice to have that capability
Hadrien Gardeur: I don't think there is any impact
… the other thing is, no one knows how to implement this
… or how we would even test this
… and it is unused
… and it is hinted that it is for fxl
… this just makes sense for clarity
… as a top level section I think it causes confusion
Wendy Reid: If we move spread placement to fxl, it will be clearer since in practice it only works for fxl
… You could use it on a reflow, but it doesn't really make sense
<Shinya Takami> +1 to Wendy Reid
Wendy Reid: so we should say spread placement is only for fxl documents, whether they are complete epubs or hybrid
Susan Neuhaus: Thanks, that is helpful.
… I agree now, it is better to focus on fxl
Dale Rogers: For me it is more semantics. Does document mean an xhtml page or the epub?
Wendy Reid: We mean content document
Romain Deltour: Just checking that the PR stays open for a few days, I have some comments
… one is about identifying fxl documents
… we have some statements that are hard to test
… so we say when the creator has this intent, but we can't test intent
… if instead, we say a document is fxl BECAUSE it has a viewport (e.g.) then we can test
Matt Garrish: It will definitely be open for a while
… I need to do a proper clean up
… so please comment on the PR
Ivan Herman: we should do a proper resolution before we move on
<Wendy Reid> PROPOSED: Move the spread placement section into the pre-paginated section of the specification.
<Matt Garrish> +1
<Wendy Reid> +1
<Shinya Takami> +1
<Toshiaki Koike> +1
<Ivan Herman> +1
<Romain Deltour> +1
<Brady Duga> +1
<Susan Neuhaus> +1
<Dale Rogers> +1
<Masakazu Kitahara> +1
<Hadrien Gardeur> +1
<George Kerscher> +1
<Charles LaPierre> +1
RESOLUTION: Move the spread placement section into the pre-paginated section of the specification.
Naming
Wendy Reid: Hadrien started this as a side comment, but it is worth discussing
… we have always called it pre-paginated, but everyone calls it fixed layout
… Fortunately I have never seen that in the property itself
… should we clarify in the spec that we are discussing fixed layout when we mention pre-paginated
Ivan Herman: Is 'roll' fixed layout or not?
Matt Garrish: This came up in the PR
… fixed-layout is the document, pre-paginated is the layout
… that is why I split out fixed layout, so fixed layout can apply to pre-paginated and roll
… just from a spec perspective the presentation should be split from the property
Shinya Takami: 'roll' is for scrolled comics, which will be images, which will be fixed layout
Susan Neuhaus: fixed layout is clearer than pre-paginated
… all it meant to me was that pre-paginated meant all the page breaks were pre calculated, perhaps with hard page breaks
Wendy Reid: the way I look at it, we have reflow and fixed, and within fixed we have pre-paginated and roll
… they are both fxl, with the same restrictions (e.g. no font changes)
… I don't think we should remove pre-paginated, and it actually makes more sense now
… I wonder if we frame it that way
<Susan Neuhaus> wendyreid +1
Wendy Reid: so people know at it's core it is fxl with a different presentation
<Ivan Herman> +1 to wendy's view of terms
Dale Rogers: There is a difference in the way that book makers and technical people discuss things
… in html there is the pre tag, which means this is already formatted don't touch it
… is there a way to make technical specs more human centered so we don't have to translate things?
Matt Garrish: So we could make a new fixed layout section with pre-paginated and roll together underneath
<Susan Neuhaus> mgarrish +1
Wendy Reid: Yes, that is exactly what I am thinking, and it makes things clearer
Hadrien Gardeur: To go back to the previous resolution, we need to make sure syntehtic spreads are for pre-paginated only
… not for roll docs
Ivan Herman: We have to careful about [something] being applied to both types of fxl documents
<Shinya Takami> Reflow or Fixed: font size changeable or not, Pre-paginated or Roll: spread usable or not
Matt Garrish: Yes, so images in spine will go in the higher level fixed layout section
Hadrien Gardeur: Images in spine for fxl will be very common
… for roll it may be the only thing that is used
Wendy Reid: Homework - think about a better name for obsolete, and think about using the transcript for scribing
Matt Garrish: We can just use outdated for obsolete
… which seems just as good
<Romain Deltour> HTML uses 'obsolete' for both, specifying whether it is conforming or non-conforming