Re: Support Existing Content

On May 1, 2007, at 11:06 AM, Dave Raggett wrote:

> On Tue, 1 May 2007, Håkon Wium Lie wrote:
>
>> Also sprach T.V Raman:
>>
>> > Why aren't we defining Javascript the same way as what you
>> > describe --i.e. make every failing program "somehow work".
>> > Why aren't we even defining CSS that way i.e. "somehow make every
>> > CSS rule parse and mean something."
>> > Why is HTML special?
>>
>> CSS was designed with error recovery built into the syntax. If an
>> unknown property or unit is used, the CSS specification describes how
>> to handle it.
>
> I think that we may differ on how effective CSS's error handling  
> really is. It's great that there is a well defined way to resume  
> parsing after finding something that isn't understood or which  
> violates the grammar in someway, but CSS hasn't helped developers  
> who are struggling to deal with browsers that vary considerably in  
> their support for CSS. You have to learn all kinds of subtle rules  
> of thumb which is a great shame for something that should be really  
> simple.

CSS implementations do have interoperability problems, but rarely in  
the area of error handling, as far as I know. In HTML, incompatible  
error handling is a significant problem.

> In fact, one could say that the problems with CSS and scripting  
> dwarf any interoperability problems with HTML itself.

I think you're right on that, and we need to keep working on the CSS  
spec and CSS implementations to raise the bar there too.

> However, the idea of converging on the parsing algorithm for HTML  
> is certainly attractive.

Agreed.

Regards,
Maciej