In computing, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a stylesheet language used to describe the presentation of a document written in a markup language. Its most common application is to style web pages written in HTML and XHTML, but the language can be applied to any kind of XML document, including SVG and XUL. The CSS specifications are maintained by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). In order to maintain standards compliance, it is recommended that CSS code be validated before release.

Overview

---

CSS is used by both the authors and readers of web pages to define colors, fonts, layout, and other aspects of document presentation. It is designed primarily to enable the separation of document content (written in HTML or a similar markup language) from document presentation (written in CSS). This separation can improve content accessibility, provide more flexibility and control in the specification of presentational characteristics, and reduce complexity and repetition in the structural content. CSS can also allow the same markup page to be presented in different styles for different rendering methods, such as on-screen, in print, by voice (when read out by a speech-based browser or screen reader) and on braille-based, tactile devices. Similarly, identical HTML or XML markup can be displayed in a variety of styles, 'brands', liveries or colour schemes by using different CSS.

CSS information can be provided by various sources:

• Author styles (style information provided by the web page author), in the form of
  • external stylesheets, i.e. a separate CSS-file referenced from the document
  • embedded style, blocks of CSS information inside the HTML document itself
  • inline styles, inside the HTML document, style information on a single element, specified using the "style" attribute.
• User style
  • a local CSS-file specified by the user using options in the web browser, and acting as an override, to be applied to all documents.
• User agent style
  • the default style sheet applied by the user agent, e.g. the browser's default presentation of elements.

More on [ Cascading Style Sheets ]

NPR Topics: Technology

Particle Accelerator Helps Test Wine
Sat, 06 Sep 2008 10:53:00 -0400
Stephen Williams of the Antique Wine Company describes the new high-tech way to determine a wine's vintage.
Voting Technology Evolves In Electronic World
Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:00:00 -0400
Officials in many states are concerned about the reliability of electronic voting and are now moving toward systems that can provide a voter-verified paper trail. Larry Norden, author of The Machinery of Democracy, discusses the latest advances in voting technology.
Google Launches 'Chrome' Web Browser
Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:00:00 -0400
Internet search giant Google unveiled Chrome, a new piece of Web browser software on Tuesday. Danny Sullivan, editor-in-chief of SearchEngineLand.com, explains what Google's open-source browser can do, and why a search engine leader wants to get into the Web software market.

L.A. Times - Technology News

Katie Couric tests the waters with live webcasts
Fri, 05 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700
'CBS Evening News' anchor checks out the medium's possibilities by going live with more-casual, even cheeky, coverage of the Democratic and Republican national conventions. NEW YORK -- Katie Couric was listening to Declan McCullagh, CNET's chief political correspondent, explain Barack Obama's and John McCain's stances on Net neutrality.
Electronic Arts spawns Spore -- which may be a benevolent god
Sat, 06 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700
The unconventional video game could usher in a new golden age for the once undisputed industry giant, which has slipped in recent years. Spore lets people play god, tinker with a digital primordial soup and birth civilizations that conquer galaxies.
Tropical storm may delay nation's first test of digital TV conversion
Sat, 06 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700
Wilmington, N.C., which is scheduled to make the switch Monday, is in Hanna's path. Rumbling toward the Carolina coast, Tropical Storm Hanna may force the delay of the nation's first test of the digital television conversion.

Subscribe to Data_Formats RSS feed