WingColors

What's the language you program external CSS documents in? CSS, right?

@Oli
You don't really program CSS or HTML, they're just mark-up languages. That is: they merely explain to a browser how the text should appear.

External CSS sheets usually do end with the .css extension, but you can put a stylesheet within an HTML file rather than calling the remote sheet within the CSS file.

So, JeffJ, I guess it really depends on whether they're really putting CSS into the HTML file (something I think it silly but certainly can be done) or if they're just separately adding style elements to HTML, in which case they wouldn't really be adding CSS. I agree that external files are both easier to use and more convenient to change, but that doesn't stop people from putting CSS in HTML files. I hope I answered your question somewhere in there.

I guess if you want to be all technical, you could say "I'm adding Stlyes to my HTML since CSS would normally mean you're linking to a style sheet.

I think it's more that I just get frustrated when the term is constantly misused because it shows how people really don't know what it means or understand its application.

This whole argument is based on a bigger pet peeve, which is general misuse of acronyms. I'm not sure why it bugs me so much, but I guess it has something to do with people becoming comfortable with using them when they probably don't understand the concept.

A pretty good example would be when someone says "PIN number". Well, it's Personal Identification Number, so you're being kind of redundant there buddy.

I think it's more of a case of you being all OCD about it... most people know what PIN means and still say PIN number to make sure people know they're expecting a number string.

AFAIK it's AOK to use CSS in that context :)

I'll stop.

I believe you can properly say you're using CSS in the HTML doc. The 'cascading' part means that what you use within your XHTML markup will generally overrule the CSS markup in the style sheet, etc..

You don't really program CSS or HTML, they're just mark-up languages. That is: they merely explain to a browser how the text should appear.

Semantics. Telling the user-agent how to display the page is programming.

These sorts of redundancies ("PIN number") or incorrectnesses ("inline CSS") involving an acronym happen when the acronym is understood as its subject without having to be translated out into its composite words.

If a cashier told people here to enter their personal identification numbers in, I'm sure most would give them a quizzical look and ask if they meant the PIN. In some (even many) cases people actually forget what the acronyms they use daily stand for.

This happens even more in the technology world: DVD, HDMI, HTML, IP, POP3, URL, UPnP, VGA - all terms people put about with gay abandon with only a few confidently knowing what they stand for.

CSS moreso because "CSS" has the additional meaning of being the name of the "programming language" (or grammar or syntax or whatever you call it to get to sleep at night) used in cascading stylesheets, inline styles and wherever else you can use them in the context of HTML and web browsers.

The short and curlies of this is: get used to it. Meanings of words change with popular opinion and use, and as an acronym gains popularity, it's likely to be used as its own word.

CSS and HTML aren't acronyms, they're just plain old initialisms.

Acronyms are abbreviations pronounced as words, like NATO and PIN.

I was tempted to agree then I checked define:acronym in google and the first result was:

A word formed from the initial letters of a series of words. (eg, IEEE is an acronym for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers).

Some examples agree with you too though.

I'm still tempted to agree with you.

Edit: Grammar Girl is with you. I'm with you.