- From: Matthew Thomas <mpt@myrealbox.com>
- Date: Fri, 7 Jan 2005 04:46:27 +1300
On 7 Jan, 2005, at 3:57 AM, James Graham wrote:
>
> Matthew Thomas wrote:
>>
>> Again, I know that <sup> and <sub> are (almost always) used to mean
>> something, just like <b> and <i> are. But again, just as with <b> and
>> <i>, *a computer can't tell what you mean*.
> ...
> Of course the same is true with, say <li>. A computer can't tell
> whether you mean a list of shopping, or a list or a list of links, or
> a list of people who have offeneded you in the past month, or ...
A computer can tell that it's an item in a list, which is useful by
itself <http://labs.google.com/sets>. In contrast, a computer can't
tell anything at all about <sup> and <sub>.
> ...
> HTML by it's nature has weak semantics. That means that elements
> should conatin some information ("this is a list not a set of
> paragraphs", "these characters are superscripted and so not part of a
> word") that the UA can use, as far as it is able, to provide an
> appropriate interface to the document. It does not mean that every
> element has to have a precidely defined meaning in the sense that you
> criticise <sup> and <sub> for lacking.
> ...
Where did you get the idea that I was criticizing <sup> and <sub>?
They're useful presentational elements, just like <b> and <i>.
--
Matthew Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/
Received on Thursday, 6 January 2005 07:46:27 UTC