The rule that tightens the gap when a subheading directly follows a heading contradicts its own comment, and has since before the element-token audit.
The contradiction
In elements.text.css, h1 through h3 get a 16px margin-bottom (--sm1), but the pre-audit comment on the adjacent-subheading rule said:
h1—h3 that has h2—h4 right after gets a smaller margin bottom
while the rule's value was --sm2, which is 20px. So a heading followed by its subheading gets more space below it than a heading followed by body text, the opposite of what the comment promises (and of the usual typographic move, which pulls a subheading closer to its parent heading).
Either the comment was wrong or the value was. The element-interface-tokens branch preserved the behavior exactly, moved the value behind the new --heading-spacing-condensed token (defaulting to --sm2), and neutralized the comment so it no longer claims "smaller".
Options
- The value was wrong: change the
--heading-spacing-condensed default to something actually smaller than the 16px h1-h3 default, e.g. --xs2 (8px) or --xs3 (12px). Visual change on every page with stacked headings.
- The comment was wrong: keep 20px as the deliberate design and the current neutral comment stands. No change needed beyond closing this issue.
Either way it's a one-line change now: the default lives in settings.ui.css, and any site that disagrees can override the token from a theme.
The rule that tightens the gap when a subheading directly follows a heading contradicts its own comment, and has since before the element-token audit.
The contradiction
In
elements.text.css, h1 through h3 get a 16px margin-bottom (--sm1), but the pre-audit comment on the adjacent-subheading rule said:while the rule's value was
--sm2, which is 20px. So a heading followed by its subheading gets more space below it than a heading followed by body text, the opposite of what the comment promises (and of the usual typographic move, which pulls a subheading closer to its parent heading).Either the comment was wrong or the value was. The
element-interface-tokensbranch preserved the behavior exactly, moved the value behind the new--heading-spacing-condensedtoken (defaulting to--sm2), and neutralized the comment so it no longer claims "smaller".Options
--heading-spacing-condenseddefault to something actually smaller than the 16px h1-h3 default, e.g.--xs2(8px) or--xs3(12px). Visual change on every page with stacked headings.Either way it's a one-line change now: the default lives in
settings.ui.css, and any site that disagrees can override the token from a theme.