Re: <font color="blue"> (was ISSUE-32)

On 6/9/09 10:52 PM, Sam Ruby wrote:
> Rob Sayre wrote:
>> On 6/9/09 6:02 PM, Shelley Powers wrote:
>>> Why reference the Mozilla API? I'm assuming because it drives the
>>> Mozilla editor, as well as the browser, which puts the API into the
>>> conforming author territory, while still being part of a user agent.
>>
>> That's a good point. Just more fallout from the ridiculous author 
>> conformance requirements. Pseudo-intellectual ideas about "semantic 
>> markup" just don't buy you that much as requirements.
>>
>> Like anything else, some HTML files are better crafted than others, 
>> but conformance requirements should address showstoppers.
>
> Are there MUSTs in the current spec that the Mozilla foundation is 
> unlikely to ever implement?  Can they be identified specifically?

Yes, most of the authoring requirements are meaningless or at least 
pointless. I hope you can forgive me for failing to produce an 
exhaustive list, but the subject of this message is a good example.

<font color="blue">

could be reformulated as

<span style="color: blue">

in order to meet the document's authoring requirements. In this case, 
the style attribute is just a talisman of validity. It helps to think of 
three kinds of editing tasks:

   1.) whole site authoring, where the software can create and arrange 
CSS files, etc.
   2.) whole page authoring, where the software can at least create 
reusable styles
   3.) fragment authoring, where the software doesn't have control over 
the final context of the markup

Case three is where these requirements really fall down. For example, 
software that creates HTML email will create font elements all over the 
place, because font elements have the best survival characteristics. Why 
would they change that?

Even in other cases, meeting the author requirments will often provide 
no appreciable benefit. For example, http://www.google.com uses a font 
element to render the list of advanced options to the right of the 
search box. I am not sure how changing that page to be valid HTML5 would 
make it better.

- Rob

> Note: I am not suggesting that Mozilla or anybody has a special role 
> or any sort of veto authority, but if it is the case that there is 
> something specific that Mozilla is unlikely to ever implement, it 
> seems plausible to me that other browser manufacturers might feel 
> likewise, and that ultimately such statements will make consensus on 
> the spec difficult to obtain.
>
>> - Rob
>
> - Sam Ruby

Received on Friday, 12 June 2009 16:44:16 UTC