How to describe element’s natural sizing behavior

PPK:

When introducing width and height I explain that by default width takes as much horizontal space as it can, while height takes as little vertical space as possible. This leads to a discussion of these two opposed models that I excerpt below.

My question is: which names do I give to these models?

The three options:

  • inside-out and outside-in
  • context-based and content-based
  • extrinsic and intrinsic size

There is more context in the post.

I definitely don’t like inside-out and outside-in — they make my head spin. I think I’m gonna vote for extrinsic and intrinsic size. I hear those terms thrown around a lot more lately and the fact that they match the specs is something I like. At the same time, I do feel like context-based and content-based are maybe a smidge more clear, but since they are already abstracted and made up, might as well go with the abstracted and made up term that already has legs.

Direct Link →