Justification for the cite attribute on ins&del

http://www.w3.org/html/wg/html5/#cite3
> The cite attribute may be used to specify a URI that explains the  
> change. When that document is long, for instance the minutes of a  
> meeting, authors are encouraged to include a fragment identifier  
> pointing to the specific part of that document that discusses the  
> change.
>
> If the cite attribute is present, it must be a URI (or IRI) that  
> explains the change. User agents should allow users to follow such  
> citation links.

Currently, mainstream UAs don't interoperably fulfill the requirement  
of the last sentence quoted above. Therefore, as far as  
implementation goes, this counts as a new feature although the  
language feature is roughly a decade old[1].

Given that the language feature hasn't gained UA support in a decade,  
I think it is time to reassess the demand for the feature and how  
well the feature addresses the demand if there even is demand. See  
also[2].

[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40-971218/struct/text.html#adef-cite- 
INS
[2] http://canvex.lazyilluminati.com/misc/cgi/issues.cgi/message/% 
3C44F4892E.9030404%40cam.ac.uk%3E
-- 
Henri Sivonen
hsivonen@iki.fi
http://hsivonen.iki.fi/

Received on Thursday, 11 October 2007 07:40:32 UTC