My CSS Wishlist

Everytime I hear a podcast and lots of times when I read a webdev article, people are asked what CSS features they would like to see implemented the most.

Now it's my turn.

CSS 3

Most of the time, people would love to see more CSS 3 features implemented. Rounded corners, multi-column layouts, downloadable fonts.

I agree on the fact that it would be great to be able to use these exciting new features, but to be honest, they would not appear on my list.

The reason they wouldn’t is because we can already do all those things. We can use rounded corners, we can use multi-column layouts (look at 90% of all websites for the proof). Sure, it would be wonderful if we didn’t have to use 4 different corner-images and soil our markup to achieve this effect, but in the end, rounded corners can be used. The same goes for multi-column layouts.

CSS 2.1

The thing I would like to see widely implemented the most is the complete set of CSS 2.1 selectors; attribute-selectors, sibling selectors, child-selectors. And some pseudo-classes, like :last-child and :first-child. Or the :nth-child selector.

I have been in numerous situations where these selectors would be useful and would’ve resulted in cleaner markup. Less classes, less ids, less elements. And above all, higher flexibility.

So please, browser vendors, concentrate on selectors first. Fancy-schmancy rounded corners I will implement myself.