The W3C's latest draft of CSS3 Module: W3C Selectors has inspired some active discussion on the www-style mailing list.

The W3C Selectors draft defines "patterns that match to elements," used by CSS to "bind style properties to elements in the document."

The draft is part of an effort to modularize Cascading Style Sheets, breaking it into a set of smaller modules. The CSS selectors draft is the only module currently released.

Discussion on the www-style mailing list centered on additional possiblities for useful selectors and pseudo-elements. Jonas Sicking suggested the addition of:

":default pseudo-class.... pseudo-class inversion....nth-last-child(n)... nth-child(3 to 10)... every other child (this one is new : )"

as well as styling support for unresolved XML entities. Response on the list was largely positive, and the suggestions led Ian Hickson to propose "Structural Pseudo-Classes" and "Negative Attribute Selectors," though the issue of XML entities is not as clear.

Related stories:

• CSS3 Modularization
• CSS3 selectors draft merges specs
• XSL and CSS working relationships