[thelist] quick css text layout float?

[rudy]

> this looks like the solution, however is there something for the first two
> letters etc
>
> p {font-size: 12pt}
> p:first-letter {font-size: 200%; float: left}
> <p>The first words of an article.</p>


one nice thing about   :first-letter  is that it requires absolutely no
markup in the actual document

(at the risk of setting off another flame-fest about font size, i should
like to point out -- no pun intended -- that points should only be used for
print style sheets, not display, and that 200% will not necessarily give you
14 -- points or pixels -- as you indicated in your first email)

but the first two letters? i'm afraid you will have to introduce some kind
of markup

to wit --

     <something>ab</something>cdefg

now, many people will suggest that you use <span> for this purpose, give it
a class (or locate it as a descendent selector or whatever it's called), and
then apply the necessary style in the stylesheet

at the risk of setting off another flame-fest about markup and
deprecation -- a much more fruitful one, in my opinion -- i will suggest
that a good choice for markup in this situation is

    <big>ab</big>cdefg

because it require no style (unless you want to override the browser's
default) and is furthermore supported even by browsers that don't do style
sheets

rudy