Re: The argument for |bugmode|

At 07:19 -0400 UTC, on 2007-04-19, Matthew Raymond wrote:

> Sander Tekelenburg wrote:
>> At 00:15 +0300 UTC, on 2007-04-19, Henri Sivonen wrote:
>>> If you would like the switch to be marked non-conforming, do you
>>> expect Web designers to accept it?
>>
>> Speaking for the Web Repair Initiative, I think that would be awful.

[...]

>    I think you totally misunderstand the concept of |bugmode|. It
> doesn't opt INTO standards mode. It opts OUT of standards mode.

I don't think I misunderstood. I wasn't talking about |bugmode| specifically.

As I understand it, this is the situation:
- Microsoft insists that authors expicitly opt-in to 'IE really standards
mode'.
- Microsoft wants the switch for that to be something that others do not want
(like doctype versioning for instance.)
- If the switch doesn't get specced, Microsoft will 'spec' its own

I took Henri's text to refer to that situation. He pointed out that if the
switch doesn't get specced, documents using it would be non-conforming, and
that that would be a problem for web publishers.

My response voiced my concern over what such non-conformance would result in
-- emphasizing what I believe Henri was saying.

In other words, it seems to me that if Microsoft insists on requiring authors
to explicitly opt-in to 'IE really standards mode', then all of us, and
especially Microsoft, have an obligation to ensure that that switch is
specced. Because if it doesn't get specced, the non-conformance aspect of
that would make it harder for authors to produce interoperable sites, which
would be the opposite of what even our local personification of the Evil
Empire[*] has stated that he wants:

"I'd like to enable web developers spend as near as zero time as possible
fixing browser interoperability problems." --
<http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2007Apr/0736.html>

[*] for the humour-challenged: that's intended as nothing other than humorous
;) In my world people are neither good nor evil.

[...]

>> If we want the Web's interoperability to improve, we should make it easy for
>> authors to produce quality code, not make it harder. A non-conforming IE
>> opt-in switch is unacceptable.
>
>    Since a version number isn't sufficient, and Microsoft won't accept a
> standardized attribute, what other option is there?

I haven't seen Microsoft say that. (But it's quite possible that in the
floods on this list I missed it.) My impression was that they are open to a
specced switch, but are thus far insisting on a form that is unacceptable to
others.


-- 
Sander Tekelenburg
The Web Repair Initiative: <http://webrepair.org/>

Received on Thursday, 19 April 2007 19:20:40 UTC