browser context menus need to catch up with css ?

[Jeff]

I suppose webmasters worried about image hotlinking and such might actually appreciate this as a feature, but one thing I've noticed (and been a bit annoyed with) is that in Firefox there are frequently no context menu items for images called via CSS. For images called via html you can easily right click and choose properties to see file size, you can right click and view (just) the image with view image or view background image, etc. Is the lack of this support for css-defined images a trend to move away form visitors being able to scrutinize the individual building blocks of a web page? Is this a good or a bad thing?

[Matt]

I am most familiar with CSS images being background images and I can make an image "non-downloadable" in standard HTML as well: just set it as the background for a table or cell. Note that this does not in any way affect hotlinking (just view the CSS source and reference the image directly). If there isn't a Firefox plug-in out there to accomplish what you want, I bet there will be soon. -Matt