If understand the original suggestion, it was not intended that the
bitmaps be internal to all the browsers, simply that there by a well
known set of names for common ones so that non-text browsers could cope.
If all browsers co-operate in this way, and intelligently cache the
icons, then in fact it should reduce the overall number of personal
preferences, and eliminate internally hardcoded icons from browsers altogether.
Of course, maybe you're right, and I'm reading to much into it....
> If these are going to be universal bitmaps, then you
> need to provide a specification so that people can
> make equivalents for them on other browsers/platforms;
> perhaps you need a universal bitmap format so we can
> have the same appearance on diff platforms, and maybe you
> need to define the intended semantics of the icons.
But please God, nobody invent another "universal" bitmap format. There
are enough already. As far as I'm aware, that's the idea - a name which
implies the meaning, i.e. "home-icon" would draw a standard picture of
a little house, or "HOME" on a dumb terminal.
Peter Lister p.lister@cranfield.ac.uk
Computer Centre,
Cranfield Institute of Technology, Voice: +44 234 754200 ext 2828
Cranfield, Bedfordshire MK43 0AL UK Fax: +44 234 750875