Re: ACTION-78: Suggestion text for 1.5.4

On Jan 19, 2009, at 5:36 AM, Lachlan Hunt wrote:

>
> Ian Hickson wrote:
>> The HTML5 effort started with two main foci: defining the existing  
>> language in far more detail than before, for various reasons, and  
>> extending the language to better support Web applications, since  
>> that is one of the directions the Web is going in and is one of the  
>> areas least well served by HTML so far.
>> This puts HTML in direct competition with other technologies  
>> intended for applications deployed over the Web, in particular  
>> Flash and Silverlight. People often ask about what technology they  
>> should use to develop their applications. I think we do ourselves a  
>> disservice if we ignore this and don't include this section.
>
> The problem with the current text is that it doesn't really describe  
> the relationship with the technologies, but rather touts the  
> benefits of open standards-based solutions over proprietary  
> alternatives.

That is an excellent point. Even if it is worthwhile to expound the  
benefits of open standards (something I am at this point unsure of),  
it seems inaccurate to label such text as describing the relationship  
of HTML5 to vendor-specific technologies.

> Comparing it with the sections describing the relationship to HTML4,  
> XHTML 1.x and 2, and XForms, those sections actually describe the  
> relationship of this spec to those.  i.e. The XHTML2 and XForms  
> section compares and contrasts the use cases covered by XHTML2/ 
> XForms with those of HTML5.  Similarly, the XHTML 1.x compares the  
> vocabulary and describes how the XHTML Modularisation approach  
> differs from the HTML5 approach.
>
> The section describing the relationship to proprietary languages  
> would be much more useful if it instead described an actual  
> relationship.  For instance, it could mention that HTML includes  
> mechanisms for embedding such content within a page, and that it  
> also contains many features that can compete with the features  
> provided by those technologies, such as improved forms, multimedia  
> and scripting abilities.

That is an e great suggestion and better describes the true  
relationship in technological terms. HTML5 both interoperates with and  
competes with various vendor-controlled Web technologies. And many  
ideas in HTML5 took inspiration from some of those technologies,  
folding capabilities that were formerly available only by extension  
into the standards-based Web platform itself.

Regards,
Maciej

Received on Monday, 19 January 2009 22:49:11 UTC