- From: Gordon P. Hemsley <gphemsley@gmail.com>
- Date: Tue, 6 Oct 2009 15:52:49 -0400
(I'm ignoring all of the unproductive back-and-forth that has occurred thus far. This is meant to start the discussion off fresh.) I was discussing the <cite> element with TabAtkins on IRC and I proposed analyzing the actual word 'cite'. Using it as a verb, the definition of 'cite' applies to quotes/quotations, titles, and people, depending on the context. TabAtkins noted that the first use case is so far off of legacy implementations, that it wouldn't even be worth considering for <cite> (especially because we have other elements that function as such). That leaves usages of 'cite' for both titles of works and authors of works. Putting aside the issue of styling for a moment, these two pieces of data both fall under the semantic meaning of 'cite'. Thus, they should fall under the semantic meaning of <cite>. If an author should have the need to differentiate between the two, I propose that they use <cite class="title"> and <cite class="author">. Thus, I propose the following (which TabAtkins generally agrees with): Leave the default styling of <cite> to be italicized for legacy implementations and allow any reference to any work or author, with the granularity decided by the individual web developer. I also propose allowing parenthetical citations and footnote markers (as is used in the various W3C/WHATWG specifications) to also be marked up with <cite>, though I'm not sure if TabAtkins agrees with me on that point. I hope this message can help bring the discussion back to a neutral zone that will lead to an amicable resolution of this long debate. Regards, Gordon -- Gordon P. Hemsley me at gphemsley.org http://gphemsley.org/ ? http://gphemsley.org/blog/ http://sasha.sourceforge.net/ ? http://www.yoursasha.com/
Received on Tuesday, 6 October 2009 12:52:49 UTC