RE: conformance (was layout solutions blah blah blah)

Hello,

> -----Original Message-----
> Hello Christian,
>
> On Tuesday, January 29, 2002 you wrote:
>
> > Am Montag, 28. Januar 2002 16:23 schrieb Hoyt, Phil:
> >> In defence of the Browser makers: Jesse, reporting bugs admirable and
> >> useful, but I think you would do well to keep your broad
> judgements on the
> >> quality of software and software companies off this list. It is
> >> counterproductive in that it doesn't point out any fact that was not
> >> already known and only serves to offend and anger people
> without whom you
> >> might not have a browser at all. Microsoft deserves credit for
> providing a
> >> browser that (still) provides among the best css support out there.
>
> > I would agree with you, if Microsoft would not offend us,
> > a) the users, that try to visit MS pages with non-MS browsers,
> ("your browser
> > is not standards compliant" - but MS, so is yours?)
> > b) the vendors of other browsers, (by the same thing stated above)
>
> > But since MS behave contrary, Jesse's got me full on his/her side.
>
>   I'm on Phil's site: this discussion is counterproductive. Tantek
>   was explicitly talking about CSS1 conformance. That's also his area
>   of expertise and (partly, I assume) responsability. Generic comments
>   from MS and MSN marketing about standards support, however ill
>   advised, should not be related to his claims about CSS1, and are off
>   topic for this list.

If this discussion is counterproductive, why do you participate?


Tantek was responding on a thread about multicolumn layout. He responded to
a mail about HTML4 conformance.
Message-ID: <000001c1a31f$a5fcb400$2e95e23e@andromedacwh>
Subject: RE: CSS multicolumn layout solutions (was: RE: CSS not enough )

I wrote:
> So why should I already use CSS3 features that only work in IE, if even
> HTML4 and CSS2, Recommendations from *1998*, do not work in IE6?

Etan replied:
> HTML 4 published as Recommendation prior to 1998 (1997-12-18).
> But, hey, what's a difference of a few months at this point?
> [... about CSS3 inline-block ]
> Nevertheless, it is irritating that certain resource-rich
> companies can't muster the development power to implement
> four-year-old specifications.  (Or five-year-old specifications;
> has *anybody* produced a CSS1-conformant user agent?)

Tantek replied:
> It is interesting that you refer to four or five year old specifications
but
> apparently have a memory gap of the past two or three years.  IE5/Mac was
> released almost two years ago with fully conformant HTML4 and CSS1[1], and
> IE6/Windows was released in the past year as well with fully conformant
CSS1
> and DOM1.

So HTML4 conformance still was a topic. No one, including Tantek, was only
talking about CSS1 conformance in the first place.


I agree with Jesse:
> As long as this list is used to advertise browsers (especially falsely), I
> feel free to air my grievances.
I have respect for Tantek's knowledge. But that must not be a reason for me
to shut up and do not talk about conformance issues of Microsoft Internet
Explorer, Netscape Navigator or any other product with "warts in
conformance".

Tantek's knowledge and competence are no reason for ignoring "warts in
conformance".


And if you would have read the thread, you would also have noticed, that:
Tantek wrote:
> IE5/Mac was
> released almost two years ago with fully conformant HTML4 and CSS1[1], and
> IE6/Windows was released in the past year as well with fully conformant
CSS1
> and DOM1.
> [...]
>So, I'd say that leaves the burden of proof in the naysayers' court.

Jesse replied:
> I guess your definition of full CSS 1 conformance somehow allows
> for a broken @import implementation?

Tantek replied:
> Such remarks carry no substance without _at_a_minimum_ a URL to a valid
> example that _clearly_ demonstrates the statement.
>
> The same problem exists with simply hurling a statement like "such and
> such is not compliant".
>
> This is not comp.sys.browser.putdown. This is www-style.
>
> Please raise your standards.
I already would have liked to comment on this, but I restrained.

Of course Jesse couldn't restrain, Jesse replied:
> If that's how you feel about it, perhaps you should refer to my message of
> December 19 which I sent to this list and to you personally -- which,
> interestingly enough, you made no response to -- that contains a URL to a
> valid example that, thanks to the log entry included in the message,
> _clearly_ demonstrates the statement:
>
> http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/2001Dec/0025.html
>
> This also is not comp.sys.browser.my_companys.advertise, but since you
have
> no reservations about using it as such, the least you could do is tell the
> truth.  Don't preach to me about raising my standards.

And that's what Tantek replied:
> Now how sad is that?
>
> No, it does not appear to have been fixed in IE5.1/Mac.
> [...]
> Thanks

The rest you can easily find in your inbox yourself.

Is there a talk mode for "Read The Fucking Thread"? Is it RTFT?


>   I'm sure there are warts in any browsers CSS1 conformance (on the
>   new CSS-Discuss lists problems with many floats in MacIE were
>   discussed, and I know of some bugs in Opera).

So why are people of a some firms (no need to specify further) always
telling the untruth about certain qualities of their products? They always
tell they are "stable", "secure", "conformant".

Some firms is not restricted on MS. No one can currently make sure his/her
browser is 100% CSS Level 1 conformant. Same probably applies to HTML and
XHTML. So why do some firms tell us things about conformance they cannot
prove?

Their maxim seems to be "conformant until proven not to be", and if you tell
them about the "not to be" they are deaf on that ear. Not only applies to
MS.

My maxim is "not conformant until proven to be". This requires an extensive
and huge test suite, and if such a test suite does not exist, the vendor has
to create this test suite on his/her own. If the vendor doesn't... that's
what Jessy already said.



Funny enough the following test suites taken from Tantek's message
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-style/2001Dec/0024.html
fail with IE6/Windows (which doesn't neccessarily mean that IE6 is wrong, a
test might also contain bugs):

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~dbaron/css/test/sec040102
doesn't display serif fonts for me.

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~dbaron/css/test/xmltypesel
second isn't blue.

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~dbaron/css/test/parsing3
4th from bottom isn't maroon

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~dbaron/css/test/childsel
Nearly all tests fail, only green and black worked.

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~dbaron/css/test/sibsel
Nearly all tests fail

Don't have the time to continue this.



Greetings

Christian

Received on Wednesday, 30 January 2002 11:01:28 UTC