CSS Transitions Module Level 3

Abstract

CSS Transitions allows property changes in CSS values to occur smoothly over a specified duration.

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This is the first public Working Draft of the “css3-transitions” series.

Table of contents

• 1 Introduction
• 2 Transitions
  • 2.1 The ‘transition-property’ Property
  • 2.2 The ‘transition-duration’ Property
  • 2.3 The ‘transition-timing-function’ Property
  • 2.4 The ‘transition-delay’ Property
  • 2.5 The ‘transition’ Shorthand Property
• 3 Transition Events
• 4 Animation of property types
• 5 Animatable properties
  • 5.1 Properties from CSS
  • 5.2 Properties from SVG
• 6 References
  • Normative references
  • Other references
• Property index
• Index

1 Introduction

This section is not normative.

This document introduces new CSS features to enable implicit transitions, which describe how CSS properties can be made to change smoothly from one value to another over a given duration.

2 Transitions

Normally when the value of a CSS property changes, the rendered result is instantly updated, with the affected elements immediately changing from the old property value to the new property value. This section describes a way to specify transitions using new CSS properties. These properties are used to animate smoothly from the old state to the new state over time.

For example, suppose that transitions of one second have been defined on the ‘left’ and ‘background-color’ properties. The following diagram illustrates the effect of updating those properties on an element, in this case moving it to the right and changing the background from red to blue. This assumes other transition parameters still have their default values.

Transitions of ‘left’ and ‘background-color’

Transitions are a presentational effect. The computed value of a property transitions over time from the old value to the new value. Therefore if a script queries the computed style of a property as it is transitioning, it will see an intermediate value that represents the current animated value of the property.

Only animatable CSS properties can be transitioned. See the table at the end of this document for a list of properties that are animatable.

The transition for a property is defined using a number of new properties. For example:

  div {
    transition-property: opacity;
    transition-duration: 2s;
  }
  

Each of the transition properties accepts a comma-separated list, allowing multiple transitions to be defined, each acting on a different property. In this case, the individual transitions take their parameters from the same index in all the lists. For example:

  div {
    transition-property: opacity, left;
    transition-duration: 2s, 4s;
  }

  

2.1 The ‘transition-property’ Property

The ‘transition-property’ property specifies the name of the CSS property to which the transition is applied.

A value of ‘none’ means that no property will transition. A value of ‘all’ means that every property that is able to undergo a transition will do so. Otherwise, a list of properties to be transitioned is given.

2.2 The ‘transition-duration’ Property

The ‘transition-duration’ property defines the length of time that a transition takes.

This property specifies how long the transition from the old value to the new value should take. By default the value is ‘0’, meaning that the transition is immediate (i.e. there will be no animation). A negative value for transition-duration is treated as ‘0’.

2.3 The ‘transition-timing-function’ Property

The ‘transition-timing-function’ property describes how the intermediate values used during a transition will be calculated. It allows for a transition to change speed over its duration. These effects are commonly called easing functions. In either case, a mathematical function that provides a smooth curve is used.

The timing function is specified using a cubic bezier curve, which is defined by four control points, P₀ through P₃ (see Figure 1). P₀ and P₃ are always set to (0,0) and (1,1). The ‘transition-timing-function’ property is used to specify the values for points P₁ and P₂. These can be set to preset values using the keywords listed below, or can be set to specific values using the ‘cubic-bezier’ function. In the ‘cubic-bezier’ function, P₁ and P₂ are each specified by both an X and Y value.

Timing Function Control Points

The timing function takes as its input the current elapsed percentage of the transition duration and outputs a percentage that determines how close the transition is to its goal state.

The timing functions have the following definitions.

ease

The ease function is equivalent to cubic-bezier(0.25, 0.1, 0.25, 1.0).

linear

The linear function is equivalent to cubic-bezier(0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 1.0).

ease-in

The ease-in function is equivalent to cubic-bezier(0.42, 0, 1.0, 1.0).

ease-out

The ease-out function is equivalent to cubic-bezier(0, 0, 0.58, 1.0).

ease-in-out

The ease-in-out function is equivalent to cubic-bezier(0.42, 0, 0.58, 1.0)

cubic-bezier

Specifies a cubic-bezier curve. The four values specify points P₁ and P₂ of the curve as (x1, y1, x2, y2). All values must be in the range [0, 1] or the definition is invalid.

2.4 The ‘transition-delay’ Property

The ‘transition-delay’ property defines when the transition will start. It allows a transition to begin execution some some period of time from when it is applied. A ‘transition-delay’ value of ‘0’ means the transition will execute as soon as the property is changed. Otherwise, the value specifies an offset from the moment the property is changed, and the transition will delay execution by that offset.

If the value for ‘transition-delay’ is a negative time offset then the transition will execute the moment the property is changed, but will appear to have begun execution at the specified offset. That is, the transition will appear to begin part-way through its play cycle. In the case where a transition has implied starting values and a negative ‘transition-delay’, the starting values are taken from the moment the property is changed.

2.5 The ‘transition’ Shorthand Property

The ‘transition’ shorthand property combines the four properties described above into a single property.

3 Transition Events

The completion of a CSS Transition generates a corresponding DOM Event. An event is fired for each property that undergoes a transition. This allows a content developer to perform actions that synchronize with the completion of a transition.

Each event provides the name of the property the transition is associated with as well as the duration of the transition.

Interface TransitionEvent

The TransitionEvent interface provides specific contextual information associated with transitions.

IDL Definition

  interface TransitionEvent : Event {
    readonly attribute DOMString          propertyName;
    readonly attribute float              elapsedTime;
    void               initTransitionEvent(in DOMString typeArg, 
                                          in boolean canBubbleArg, 
                                          in boolean cancelableArg, 
                                          in DOMString propertyNameArg,
                                          in float elapsedTimeArg);
  };
  

Attributes

propertyName of type DOMString, readonly

The name of the CSS property associated with the transition.

elapsedTime of type float, readonly

The amount of time the transition has been running, in seconds, when this event fired. Note that this value is not affected by the value of transition-delay.

Methods

initTransitionEvent

The initTransitionEvent method is used to initialize the value of a TransitionEvent created through the DocumentEvent interface. This method may only be called before the TransitionEvent has been dispatched via the dispatchEvent method, though it may be called multiple times during that phase if necessary. If called multiple times, the final invocation takes precedence.

Parameters

typeArg of type DOMString

Specifies the event type.

canBubbleArg of type boolean

Specifies whether or not the event can bubble.

cancelableArg of type boolean

Specifies whether or not the event's default action can be prevented.

propertyNameArg of type DOMString

Specifies the name of the property associated with the Event

elapsedTimeArg of type float

Specifies the amount of time, in seconds, the transition has been running at the time of initialization.

No Return Value

No Exceptions

There is one type of transition event available.

transitionend

The ‘transitionend’ event occurs at the completion of the transition

• Bubbles: Yes
• Cancelable: Yes
• Context Info: propertyName

4 Animation of property types

The following describes how each property type undergoes transition or animation.

• color: interpolated via red, green, blue and alpha components (treating each as a number, see below).
• length: interpolated as real numbers.
• percentage: interpolated as real numbers.
• integer: interpolated via discrete steps (whole numbers). The interpolation happens in real number space and is converted to an integer using floor().
• number: interpolated as real (floating point) numbers.
• transform list: see CSS Transforms specification [CSS3-2D-TRANSFORMS].
• rectangle: interpolated via the x, y, width and height components (treating each as a number).
• visibility: interpolated via a discrete step. The interpolation happens in real number space between 0 and 1, where 1 is "visible" and all other values are "hidden".
• shadow: interpolated via the color, x, y and blur components (treating them as color and numbers where appropriate).
• gradient: interpolated via the positions and colors of each stop. They must have the same type (radial or linear) and same number of stops in order to be animated.
• paint server (SVG): interpolation is only supported between: gradient to gradient and color to color. They then work as above.
• space-separated list of above: each item in the list is interpolated using the rules above.

5 Animatable properties

5.1 Properties from CSS

5.2 Properties from SVG

6 References

Normative references

[CSS3-2D-TRANSFORMS]

Dean Jackson; David Hyatt; Chris Marrin. CSS 2D Transforms Module Level 3. 20 March 2009. W3C Working Draft. (Work in progress.) URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/2009/WD-css3-2d-transforms-20090320

Other references

Property index

Index

• transition, 2.5
• transition-delay, 2.4
• transition-duration, 2.2
• transition-property, 2.1
• transition-timing-function, 2.3