html - usage of spaces in CSS files

Question

This one has to be the most basic question but it's not clear in my mind, so I'd like to ask it:

Say you have some basic HTML like this:

<div class="a">
    <p class="b">something</p>
    <img class="b">
    <p class="c">something</p>
</div>

How can you select the first <p> element using CSS?

The reason why I'm puzzled that up till now I believed that CSS can work by both specifying type and class, but it seems I cannot do it. So I can have something like: div p or div .b or .a p or .a .bbut not div .a p .b as I was believing and as how every browser tool names the elements (like div.a p.b)

Is all this issue because of the space between the class and the type?

Answer 1

Is all this issue because of the space between the class and the type?

Yes, a space is a descendent selector.

a.b means "An element of type a and class b".

a .b means a *.b means "An element of any type and class b that is a descendent of an element of type a.