As a viable option, I'd like to see absolute coordinates* added to HTML/DOM/CSS so that we can pick a layout engine of our own choosing on the server side. The

As a viable option, I'd like to see absolute coordinates* added to HTML/DOM/CSS so that we can pick a layout engine of our own choosing on the server side. The server-side engine would do the layout calculations and then pass raw vector coordinates to the browser. Trying to be everything to everybody has made CSS an inconsistent bloated buggy mess. If we had the above, we could have domain-specific layout engines that trim features and behaviors not needed by the domain, and reduce the problems of client/browser differences since the real work is done on the server. I'm not saying do away with existing browsers, just allow off-client layout engines when desired. * (Yes, CSS does have a rough notion of absolute coordinates, but it's too screwed up to be practical. If it worked right, we wouldn't need the PDF standard.)