validation of references to missing IDs and nested tables

Hello,

I took an action item at today's teleconference to determine if the HTML 
validator would catch  attribute values that point to non-existing IDs.  I 
created an example page [1] with the following code:

<code>
<td headers="error">Black</td>
<td headers="error">Espresso</td>
</code>

the ID "error" is not defined. The W3C HTML Validator gave me the following 
message:
<message>
Error: reference to non-existent ID "ERROR"
</message>

Therefore, my concern *would* be picked up by a validator.

Also  note that there is a nested table in this example.  One of the cells 
in the inner table points to a header in the outer table.  This passes the 
validator.

--wendy

[1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/tests/missing-id.html
<>
wendy a chisholm (wac)
world wide web consortium (w3c)
web accessibility initiative (wai)
madison, wisconsin (madcity, wi)
united states of america (usa)
tel: +1 608 663 6346
</>

Received on Monday, 6 December 1999 17:24:54 UTC