Re: HTML: Dazed and Confused

In article <33F85F48.2B8E@fox.nstn.ca>,
Francis Cottier <cottier@fox.nstn.ca> wrote:
> 1) Why do there seem to be two interpretations/implementations of 3.2
> (Wilbur & CSS1) ?

There is only one - HTML 3.2, formerly known as "Wilbur". CSS1 is
a different language altogether. It can be used to define presentation
for HTML elements. 

Of course, browsers may use different ways to render HTML by default,
if that is what you mean.

> 2) Why do different HTML validators produce different results when
> evaluating the same page against the same standard ?

Perhaps they are using different definitions of the standard, or
you used "Strict" on one and "Non-strict" on another? Can you give
an example URL that gives different results on different validators,
and tell us which ones they were?

As far as I know, the well-known validators use the same package
to validate documents, although the error messages may be phrased
in a different way.

> 3) Are the W3C standards written in such an ambiguous manner as to be
> virtually useless ?  

If you have any specific examples, please post them. I have seen
little ambiguity in the specs, although some drafts (like the
HTML 4.0 one) could use some rewriting.

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Received on Monday, 18 August 1997 15:59:50 UTC