Re: SVGt 1.2: processing invalid external URI references

Jonathan Chetwynd wrote:
> 

> would it not be necessary or at least helpful, if as expressed and 
> provided for in html, that a marker should be displayed, indicating that 
> an image, or some graphical content is missing?

I don't believe that HTML mandates the behaviour for broken images and 
there are at least two de facto behaviours:  to display a broken image 
icon; and to fall back to the alternative text as though the browser 
couldn't handle images at all for that image.  HTML also provides 
object, which if implemented properly, would give finer control, but, in 
practice doesn't do images well.

SVG is a presentational language, so a failure to display an image is 
much more catastrophic.  A viewer may well want to limp along in that 
case, but the missing image is likely to have seriously compromised the 
author's intent, whatever the the viewer does as a workaround. (I'm 
sssuming HTML used as intended, rather than the create a specific visual 
design, even though the latter is rather common.)

I'm assuming HTML 4.01.

-- 
David Woolley
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RFC1855 says there should be an address here, but, in a world of spam,
that is no longer good advice, as archive address hiding may not work.

Received on Wednesday, 2 April 2008 10:29:27 UTC