Hyphen Bullet

[Matt]

I would like to set the "list-style-type" to be a hyphen (-). How can I
accomplish this in a style sheet. I tried list-style-type: hyphen; and
list-style-type: dash; but neither worked. I also tried adding this to
the style sheet (with the list-style-type set to none in the UL
element).

LI:Before
{
content: "- ";
}

If someone has a solution to this please supply the proper syntax. That
may be what my issue is right now. Thanks.

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Stan Brown <th************ @fastmail.fm> wrote:

That's odd, because style guides usually recommend the use of a dash,
I don't think so.

OK, let's say that good old style guides recommend the use of a dash for an
itemized list, to the extent that itemized lists are used at all. Lists are
not common in good old style, and as they became popular due to word
processors, presentation graphics software, etc., they became bulleted.
HTML browsers followed suit. The sad thing is that CSS doesn't let you
simply change the marker _character_, only select between a few
presentation-graphics-like bullet styles or use an image.
If a majority of style guides recommended a dash instead of a bullet,
it would be called a dashed list and not a bulleted list.

It's an itemized list. The HTML tag name ul, for "unnumbered list", is a
poor compromise between an appropriate structural description and a
presentational name.

--
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

[Alan J. Flavell]

On Fri, 7 Oct 2005, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

The HTML tag name ul, for "unnumbered list", is a poor compromise
between an appropriate structural description and a presentational
name.

Except that "ul" is specified to mean "unordered list", not
"unnumbered list".

Though, now that the issue has been raised, I must admit that far too
many of my own <ul> lists would make less sense if the items were to
be put into a different order. One day I suppose I should go through
and correct those where the sequence of items is significant.

[Jukka K. Korpela]

"Alan J. Flavell" <fl*****@ph.gla .ac.uk> wrote:

On Fri, 7 Oct 2005, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

The HTML tag name ul, for "unnumbered list", is a poor compromise
between an appropriate structural description and a presentational
name.
Except that "ul" is specified to mean "unordered list", not
"unnumbered list".

Yes, but people (including me) generally read it as "unordered in the sense
that the order is not emphasized with numbers". I would say that it would
be incorrect, at least on practical grounds, for a browser to render the
<li> elements of a <ul> element in an order that deviates from their order
in the HTML source. Much like a browser should not reorder the rows of a
table, although there is no explicit rule against that.

The <ol> and <ul> elements are really two kinds of list much the same way
as you can style a list in a word processor to use numbers or bullets. In
CSS, you can make an <ol> bulleted or a <ul> numbered (though I wouldn't
normally do so).
Though, now that the issue has been raised, I must admit that far too
many of my own <ul> lists would make less sense if the items were to
be put into a different order. One day I suppose I should go through
and correct those where the sequence of items is significant.

If the order is significant, e.g. in instructions that need to be followed
step by step, it's best to use <ol> - for much the same reasons as we make
a list numbered in text processing.

--
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

[Dr John Stockton]

JRS: In article <Xn************ *************** **@193.229.0.31 >, dated
Wed, 12 Oct 2005 19:34:34, seen in news:comp.infos ystems.www.authoring.s
tylesheets, Jukka K. Korpela <jk******@cs.tu t.fi> posted :

If the order is significant, e.g. in instructions that need to be followed
step by step, it's best to use <ol> - for much the same reasons as we make
a list numbered in text processing.

Perhaps not, since AIUI there's no way to access the numbers elsewhere
in the text.

So it's too easy to write, for example, "Be sure to do Step 3 outdoors"
and then forget to update it on adding a new list entry before Step 3.
If the numbers are actually written in the HTML, the error is somewhat
less likely to occur.

Some form of internal cross-referencing, apart from links, would be
useful; IIRC, I used it in a word processor decades ago.

One can probably do it with the help of javascript.

--
© John Stockton, Surrey, UK. ?@merlyn.demon. co.uk Turnpike v4.00 IE 4 ©
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