I've been using CSS for a few years, but there are some quirks that I cannot quite fathom. One of them is the height property when specified with a percentage. To quote the CSS 2.1 Specification (under percentage):If the height of the containing block is not specified explicitly (i.e., it depends on content height), and this element is not absolutely positioned, the value computes to 'auto'.My question is, what is the rationale behind this decision? Is there a bigger picture that makes this decision sensible? As far as I know, this is causing some of the most notorious problems like getting the columns to have equal heights in a float-based multi-column layout.
Rationale behind CSS height with percentage value
language design;css