On 18/09/2007, Chris G cl@isbd.net wrote:
On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 09:34:07AM +0100, Greg Thomas wrote:
On 16/09/2007, Chris G cl@isbd.net wrote:
What is the 'inherited' font size? I think this is the essential bit that I haven't grasped yet.
In any particular part of the page, the font will have a size. The 'inherited' size is the size of that font. For example, if you have a
<TH> class defined with a "large" font, the font size (for you) will be 14x1.2, i.e. 16.8pt.
If I understand you correctly this 'inherited' size is fixed relative to my default, so any font size relative to this inherited size will also have a fixed relation to my default font. How does this differ from using an absolute size?
In display, it won't differ. However, the advantage comes when you make subsequent changes. If you had an "small" instead of "smaller" smallprint in a <TH> and you subsequently change the size of the <TH> class to xx-large <TH>, the "small" smallprint may need changing to "medium" to stop it looking ridiculous compared with other text in the <TH> - whereas if you used the relative "smaller", the size of the smallprint would be relative to the size of the rest of the text, and you would only need to change the <TH>. It would also stop you having to define thsmallprint and tdsmallprint, if you <TH> and <TD> have different size fonts. Considering my "smallprint" and <TH> examples earlier which used a relative size, "smallprint" text in a "larger" <TH> would be larger than "smallprint" text in a <TD>. This is typically what you want, as you generally want to de-emphasis the small print with respect to the rest of the text around it.
Greg