[rfc-i] Should figures float?

[mellon at fugue.com (Ted Lemon)]

On Jul 11, 2014, at 1:16 AM, Joe Hildebrand (jhildebr) <jhildebr at cisco.com> wrote:
> (Sigh.  I know you're trolling, but I can't help responding.  Any chance
> we could all refrain from being intentionally inflammatory?  This problem
> is hard enough to discuss already.)

Sorry, I didn't intend that as a troll, but I see why you saw it that way.

> float=right is sometimes useful in non-paginated output.

Oh, interesting.   I thought you meant floating as in not in a fixed location relative to the text, not floating as in CSS floats.   Being able to fit a diagram to a page rather than having to fit the pages to the diagram is a really useful thing when doing paginated layouts; this is what I thought you had in mind.

I don't know if HTML floats are good.   In principle of course they are a good tool, but we aren't doing magazine layout here, so I am a bit concerned that they will turn into a time sink.   But maybe the right way to approach the problem is to just consider use cases.   Presumably you have one or more in mind, since you thought to ask about it.   Can you describe what you have in mind?