Re: Differences between WHATWG and W3C specs

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Regards

SteveF
HTML 5.1 <http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/>


On 20 September 2013 03:17, Jens O. Meiert <jens@meiert.com> wrote:

> There are many differences between the WHATWG and W3C HTML specs.
>

The bulk of the W3C HTML specification is the same as the WHATWG spec,
Differences are based on discussion and decisions made in the HTML WG.


>
> I’d like to pick a simple example, the <cite> element [1,2], to wonder
> how useful maintaining two specs really is—and whether we on the W3C
> side take the appropriate steps to keep such differences to a minimum?
>

We maintain one HTML 5.1 spec.
I believe we do take steps to keep differences to a minimum. But we do make
changes to HTML based on discussion and decisions of the HTML WG.


>
> To use the <cite> example, it doesn’t seem clear what the benefit is
> to remove important parts like “A person's name is not the title of a
> work” (I’ve just observed confusion on a WebAIM list [3]—the WHATWG
> spec was clear about this), and I’d claim it’s not a good use of time
> to change things like names (for example, Ian became Hillary).
>
> In whose interest is this?
>

Thanks for the heads up on the webaim thread will respond!

It seems like you may have missed the voluminous discussions on list, and
elsewhere, of late on cite and blockquote.
I agree its not a good use of time to chnage a name in an examle in
isolation, this does not occur, but if as part of a substantive
modification of the existing spec text I find an opportunity to tweak, to
improve genders reference balance, an example then i do.

>
> If there really is need for two specs, though I don’t want to open
> this can here, what does the group think about limiting changes and
> differences to what reflects insurmountable dispute between groups? Is
> that something to embed in the group charter?
>



>
>
> [1]
> http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/multipage/text-level-semantics.html#the-cite-element
> [2]
> http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/text-level-semantics.html#the-cite-element
> [3] http://webaim.org/discussion/mail_message?id=24285
>
>
> --
> Jens O. Meiert
> http://meiert.com/en/
>
>