Re: [dom3core] getAttribute

On Nov 18, 2005, at 4:37 PM, Joseph Kesselman wrote:

>
> Personal reaction: If all the other browsers really are wrong...  
> They're
> still wrong, and we should be beating them up and trying to get  
> them to fix
> it rather than endorsing this error.
>
> But I have a bit of trouble believing this assertion.
>
> If folks want to distinguish between empty attribute and absent  
> attribute,
> they should be using getAttributeNode(), which *does* return null  
> for an
> empty node.
>
> Are you sure you aren't confusing these two calls, or working in a  
> language
> binding that masks the difference between null and empty string?

My recollection (which I'll confirm tomorrow) is that Anne's  
observation is correct.  The recommendation explicitly says "empty  
string" (http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-DOM-Level-3-Core-20040407/ 
core.html#ID-666EE0F9).  Java implementations typically conform to  
the spec and return "", ECMAScript implementations typically return  
null to be compatible with Internet Explorer.

Received on Saturday, 19 November 2005 04:23:54 UTC