The CSS selector mechanism was designed to match elements
in HTML or XML documents. It can also be used to match a hierarchy
of Java™
objects accessible from
a model interface. In this context, the CSS level 2 recommendation
is transposed for the Java language and used to set bean properties
according to the Java object hierarchy and state.
In applying CSS to Java objects, the term
model objects is used as the equivalent of the term
elements in the W3C recommendation.
The CSS declarations for each model object are sorted
and used according to the application that controls the CSS engine.
The declarations represent
property settings on a target object. The target object
concerned depends on the way the CSS engine is used.
Rogue Wave® JViews Diagrammer
uses CSS declarations to create and customize one graphic object for
each object in the data model, and to create and customize renderers
according to user settings.