[WikiEN-l] Transclusion of formatting templates (again?)

Wed Jun 14 08:27:10 UTC 2006

On 6/13/06, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> Myself, I never understood the point in it at all. Why do you ever want
> to clear floating elements? It creates ugly stretches of empty space. If
> you feel that you need it in some particular situation, then surely that
> is an indication that the floating elements are positioned badly, and
> using "clear:both" only adds to it by also positioning the section
> headers badly.

I use it frequently. The "ugly stretches of empty space" are often
better than images crossing headings, images piling up on each other
etc. And hell, that empty space might just inspire someone to fill it
in :)

> If there are too many images on the page, surely the page would look
> better if they were turned into a gallery or removed entirely, instead
> of stacking floating elements left and right.

As far as layout goes, to me an image gallery is a total abdication:
"There's some text up there. There are some images down here". Images
carefully chosen and well spaced out and laid out throughout the text
is vastly preferable. Some principles I tend to follow, which
obviously conflict:

- No images on the same level as a heading
- Don't start paragraphs with images on the left
- Alternate images on the left and right sides
- Don't centre images except for large panoramas
- Make high-quality, important images, bigger. Make diagrams smaller.
- Make all image widths multiples of 50px.
- Attempt to align images vertically.
- Place images close to the most relevant text.
- Start the article with a large (300px) image on the right hand side.

I would love some formal guidelines for the layout of images. Hell,
some more formal guidelines for layout in general wouldn't go astray.

Steve