The margin property and "html" & "body" elements

[tayiper]

You see, I've already opened many threads (or particupated in), in which I questioned about the margins and padding and the difference in displaying them between Firefox and Internet Explorer; for instance see the: Margins and padding; IE's display compare to Firefox's (http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/showthread.php?t=106562) and Further discoveries: display in Firefox vs. Internet Explorer (http://www.webdeveloper.com/forum/showthread.php?t=108102) threads that I opened here on WebDeveloper forums ...


And in one similar thread on Digital Point forum I also asked about the recommendation my friend gave me (see the examples below) to use the margin property for "html" and "body" selectors and IIRC (since I can't find that particular thread anymore) one of the memebers here on DP said that at least in "html" selector's case, this actually doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't make sence (I kind of understand why though)


The code of "html" selector is the following:

html {
margin: 8px;
}

The code of "body" selector is the following:

body {
margin: 8px;
}


So my question is the folowing: could anyone please explain this thing to me once more, i.e. this "issue" of html element not being able to have margins (or/and padding) ??!


tayiper

[felgall]

With standards compliant browsers nothing outside of the body can have styles applied since it is only the body content that displays in the browser window. Internet Explorer incorrectly allows styles to be applied to the HTML tag as well.

[tayiper]

Thank you very much "felgall" for a quick and educative reply ...


tayiper