Re: BGSOUND, no need for it

| From: Paul Prescod <papresco@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca>
| To: Jason O'Brien <jaobrien@fttnet.com>; www-style@w3.org;
www-html@w3.org
| Subject: RE: BGSOUND, no need for it
| Date: Saturday, August 24, 1996 5:24 AM
| 

If we are going to blow things out of the water, lets do it fairly uh?

| >Why NOT have a BGSOUND tag?   
| 
| BGSOUND, like BGCOLOR, should be a style-sheet thing. I cannot
imagine a
| circumstance where a sound that starts playing when a page is
downloaded
| could be considered anything other than fluff. If a sound is
important to
| the meaning of a web page, it should be embedded or linked to so that
the
| user is in control of when it plays. If the meaning of the sound
isn't
| important enough for you to allow the user that control, then it is
just
| presentation and should be in the style sheet.

And since when should HTML be only content... theres no way... already,
just embeding CSS1 into HTML files causes HTML to hold style... a CSS1
document is not content!

| > Microsoft has shown how easily it can be   
| >added to rendering and how efficiently it can be used -- I think a  

| >rendering tag for background sound or music when a page opens is a
very   
| >good and useful feature to add without even having to mess with java
--   
| >when you say that BGSOUND shouldn't even be a part of HTML, then
what   
| >about EMBED or IMG -- why have images inserted with HTML, according
to   
| >your argument?   
| 
| Embedded images or objects COULD be crucial information in a Web
page.
| Although web developers should work their butt off to be
cross-platform,
| some content requires multimedia features. An art gallery without
pictures
| is not very meaningful. That is why <EMBED SRC="mysound.wav"> is also
very
| important. The ALT content of the EMBED and IMG tags allow users to
know
| what they are missing so that they can decide whether to download it
or not.
| BGSOUND is a completely different thing, because it is presentation,
not
| content.


Images COULD be crucial information (ie CONTENT) BUT usually isn't! 
BGSOUND is not different from EMBED...  EMBED was a bad bad bad idea on
netscape's part...  Its too broad with no backwards compatibility... as
such it can not even be considered better.

In the real world anyway, once OBJECT passes, everything will be
embeded with OBJECT... these discussions will die off... and HTML will
continue to go were WE the end users WANT it to go... There is no
standards body anywhere that can stop (mark my words!) HTML from
becoming what ever it will...  The world right now would rather have
style, then thats what it will be.  (Describing content in and of
itself produces its style anyway, so why can't HTML be considered
style?  Face to face, HTML is just one very flexible form of style
description...)

| So you don't mind that they will lose the sound without getting any
ALT
| text? Clearly, then, you either intend to use the BGSOUND element for
| presentation, not for serious content, or you intend for your pages
to
| degrade poorly on non-multimedia computers. Either one goes against
the
| goals of HTML.

Like I said above, like EMBED would allow this?  Come on!

| "Tags" are always supposed to define structure. BGSOUND is a
presentational
| attribute. It might make sense to make it an attribute of BODY, or a
CSS
| property of BODY. As a CSS property, it could be used more generally,
for
| instance as a way of "attaching" sound to hypertext links, or even to
page
| actions: I could imagine properties like:

and since when doesn't structure describe style!  People ought to wake
up, look the world square in the face and relise they can't because IT
IS ROUND!  Style and content go hand in hand, without one the other
doesn't exist, not in the consumer world anyway.

| Finally, the style-sheet mechanism allows background sounds to be
added to
| any SGML DTD, not just HTML. All in all, style sheets are the best
place to
| put background sounds.

Just as a note, there is no backwards compatibility mechanisms in style
sheets yet.  Nothing in CSS1 comes close to what the OBJECT tag will...
 Does DSSS?  If not, maybe that is where people should be looking... 
It was mentioned not that long ago that OBJECT's flexibility just
doesn't exist in CSS1 or tags like BODY BACKGROUND and BGSOUND... 
before any more elements such as the ones above are proposed that issue
should be covered.

I also challenge anyone to prove that any tag is style only or isn't at
all style...  The arguements on content and style need to thought out
much more carefully...  at least as it refers to HTML...

Received on Saturday, 24 August 1996 17:46:34 UTC