This effort at producing a cross-browser, cross-platform drop cap is the result of discussion on the stylesheets newsgroup, and experimentation by Susan Lesch, Howard Marvel, Sue Jordan, and Eric Meyer. The problematic platform, in this development was Mac. Rendering on Win'95 were fairly consistent. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat.
Additional problems were encountered cross-browser, and it was found that the addition of a value for the width attribute was necessary to provide consistency. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat. Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation ullamcorper suscipit lobortis nisl ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.
The selection of background and text color is up to the author (except in instances when the user has the option to override author colors).Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat. Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation ullamcorper suscipit lobortis nisl ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.
Ö à ü characters are used here, to explain why the alignment of the drop cap with the text-top of the line appears to be askew (see example without background, below). Jan Roland Eriksson pointed out that the font height includes required space for diacritical marks, which explains why the apparent extra space is allowed at the top of the drop cap. Further explanation is available at the document: Typographical measurement systems.
An apparent discrepecy in the height of the drop cap is explained above. This paragraph is included for comparison purposes. Text added for filler: Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat. Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation ullamcorper suscipit lobortis nisl ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.
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