[Bug 9685] New: empty elements in polyglot documents

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=9685

           Summary: empty elements in polyglot documents
           Product: HTML WG
           Version: unspecified
          Platform: PC
               URL: http://dev.w3.org/html5/html-xhtml-author-guide/html-x
                    html-authoring-guide.html#empty-elements
        OS/Version: Windows NT
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: HTML/XHTML Compatibility Authoring Guide (ed: Eliot
                    Graff)
        AssignedTo: eliotgra@microsoft.com
        ReportedBy: eliotgra@microsoft.com
         QAContact: public-html-bugzilla@w3.org
                CC: mike@w3.org, public-html@w3.org,
                    eliotgra@microsoft.com


Currently, the spec says this about empty elements:

You may use only the elements in the following table as empty elements. 

•area
•base
•br
•col
•command
•embed
•hr
•img
•input
•keygen
•link
•meta
•param
•source
You must use the minimized tag syntax for empty elements, e.g. <br/>. The
alternative syntax <br></br> allowed by XML gives uncertain results in many
existing user agents. 

Given an empty instance of an element whose content model is not EMPTY (for
example, an empty title or paragraph) do not use the minimized form (e.g. use
<p> </p> and not <p />). 

Note that MathML and SVG elements may be either self-closing or contain
content. 

Other issues have arisen in feedback and need to be resolved:
--  Many elements, such as <i> and <b>, are ones where <i/> and <b/> would most
likely cause behavior that is decidely unexpected.
--  What to say about completely new elements, where
<newEmptyElement></newEmptyElement> 
has better text/html compatibility than <newEmptyElement />
--  Should "Given an empty instance of an element whose content model is not
EMPTY (for example, an empty title or paragraph) do not use the minimized form
(e.g. use <p> </p> and not <p />)" use the RFC2119 MUST NOT?
--  What to say about legacy elements, like the 'br' element?
--  What to say about other legacy elements, like 'meta', 'img', 'embed' and
'param'?
--  What do we say about white space and newline characters in empty elements?
--  What special considerations must be made for <i/> or <b/> and other inline
elements?


Related emails:
1. http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2010Apr/1095.html
2. http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2010Apr/1102.html
3. http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2010Apr/1166.html
4. http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2010Apr/1191.html
5. http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2010Apr/1192.html

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Received on Friday, 7 May 2010 19:38:07 UTC