design-reviews#537: Pointer Events Azimuth Angle and Altitude Angle

#537: Pointer Events Azimuth Angle and Altitude Angle

Opened Jul 20, 2020

Saluton TAG!

I'm requesting a TAG review of Pointer Events Azimuth Angle and Altitude Angle.

Currently Pointer Events captures pen inclination by using tiltX (tiltX) and tiltY (tiltY) angles - angles measured from two axes. This proposal is to add altitude and azimuth angles to Pointer Events and to allow user agents to transform from one set of digital pen inclination coordinates to the other automatically thus making both pairs of angles available to developers at the same time.

Explainer¹ (minimally containing user needs and example code): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BkJDlHJvR6jndtJys7IYuqwITgVi6P9iOnfA0z5Cu04/edit#
Specification URL: https://w3c.github.io/pointerevents/#dom-pointerevent-altitudeangle
Tests: there are web platform tests, not available on wpt.fyi yet as the code is in the latest stages of code review/approval
Security and Privacy self-review²: N/A
GitHub repo (if you prefer feedback filed there): https://github.com/w3c/pointerevents
Primary contacts (and their relationship to the specification):
- Liviu Tinta (@liviutinta), Google
- Mustaq Ahmed, (@mustaqahmed), Google
- Navid Zolghadr, (@NavidZ), Google, Pointer Events editor
Organization(s)/project(s) driving the specification: Google
Key pieces of existing multi-stakeholder review or discussion of this specification: PE Issue 321, PE Issue 320, PE Issue 274, PE PR 316, PE PR 322, PE PR 323, PEWG minutes
External status/issue trackers for this specification (publicly visible, e.g. Chrome Status): https://www.chromestatus.com/feature/5731966710185984

Further details:

I have reviewed the TAG's API Design Principles
Relevant time constraints or deadlines: [please provide]
The group where the work on this specification is currently being done: Pointer Events Working Group
The group where standardization of this work is intended to be done (if current group is a community group or other incubation venue): Pointer Events Working Group
Major unresolved issues with or opposition to this specification: N/A
This work is being funded by: Google

We'd prefer the TAG provide feedback as (please delete all but the desired option): ☂️ open a single issue in our GitHub repo for the entire review

Discussions

Discussed Aug 3, 2020 (See Github)

Ran out of time before we got to this.

Discussed Feb 15, 2021 (See Github)

Tess: we talked about closin this and I agreed to write a closing comment. Comment almost done. If we all agree then I'l close.

Tess: to re-cap, this is a develoeper ergonomics win. The old values required developers to do math and the new values skip that step and are directly useful to apps such as painting apps where you need to know the orientation of the stylus to do certain effects.

resolved to close

Comment by @hober Feb 15, 2021 (See Github)

Hi @liviutinta,

Thank you for your patience while we've had this review open. We've discussed this change and overall we're very happy with it. For many applications, the new values you've added are closer to what the developer needs, so she can do less math, write less code, and (hopefully) cause fewer bugs. And providing both types of values ensures back compat.